Facebook and Google have an incentive to track their users because they sell targeted advertising. The user isn’t the customer, they are the product. This is an atypical business model.
One thing about the real estate business is because so much money is changing hands, there’s a big incentive to cut out the middleman. (Winning Through Intimidation is a fascinating book about this.) I would highly recommend you avoid actions which run the slightest risk of pissing your customers off, lest they cut a deal with the property owner directly. Airbnb will ban anyone who exchanges money outside their platform, but that’s less of a threat here because people don’t change homes frequently. With the amount of money you’re making per customer, you should be able to afford an army of customer service people in order to provide a high-touch customer experience.
There are a few reasons I think for-profit is generally preferable to non-profit when possible:
It’s easier to achieve scale as a for-profit.
For-profit businesses are accountable to their customers. They usually only stay in business if customers are satisfied with the service they provide. Non-profits are accountable to their donors. The impressions of donors correlate imperfectly with the extent to which real needs are being served.
First worlders usually aren’t poor and don’t need charity.
You can donate the money you make to effective charities.
Facebook and Google have an incentive to track their users because they sell targeted advertising.
Even without ads they would have a very strong reason for tracking: trying to make the product better. Things you do when using Facebook are all fed into a model trying to predict what you like to interact with, so they can prioritize among the enormous number of things they could be showing you.
For-profit businesses are accountable to their customers. They usually only stay in business if customers are satisfied with the service they provide. Non-profits are accountable to their donors. The impressions of donors correlate imperfectly with the extent to which real needs are being served.
This is per definition false. For-profit businesses are accountable to their shareholders which can but does not have to mean that they want to act accountable towards their customers for strategic reasons. Strategic reasons can also lead to irresponsible behavior towards customers. You make a good example with facebook and google.
In a similar vein, non-profits are not accountable to their donors but to their charter and members. However, non-profits may want to act accountable towards donors for strategic reasons. For example, if a non-profit is not tax-exempt it can act just as regular company.
Moreover, there are organization types between simple for-profit and standard non-profits, e.g., public benefit corporations [1] or cooperatives [2].
Having said that, I have nothing against well-calibrated for-profit companies but I think my point still stands that anyone who may follow your proposal and has a vested interest in making the world a better place for everyone (from a tentatively impartial and welfarist perspective) should really think about the incentive structure they get themselves into. At least investigate a little bit beyond the standard playbook of neoliberal start up 101.
Facebook and Google have an incentive to track their users because they sell targeted advertising. The user isn’t the customer, they are the product. This is an atypical business model.
One thing about the real estate business is because so much money is changing hands, there’s a big incentive to cut out the middleman. (Winning Through Intimidation is a fascinating book about this.) I would highly recommend you avoid actions which run the slightest risk of pissing your customers off, lest they cut a deal with the property owner directly. Airbnb will ban anyone who exchanges money outside their platform, but that’s less of a threat here because people don’t change homes frequently. With the amount of money you’re making per customer, you should be able to afford an army of customer service people in order to provide a high-touch customer experience.
There are a few reasons I think for-profit is generally preferable to non-profit when possible:
It’s easier to achieve scale as a for-profit.
For-profit businesses are accountable to their customers. They usually only stay in business if customers are satisfied with the service they provide. Non-profits are accountable to their donors. The impressions of donors correlate imperfectly with the extent to which real needs are being served.
First worlders usually aren’t poor and don’t need charity.
You can donate the money you make to effective charities.
Even without ads they would have a very strong reason for tracking: trying to make the product better. Things you do when using Facebook are all fed into a model trying to predict what you like to interact with, so they can prioritize among the enormous number of things they could be showing you.
Thanks for your reply.
I disagree with your statement that
This is per definition false. For-profit businesses are accountable to their shareholders which can but does not have to mean that they want to act accountable towards their customers for strategic reasons. Strategic reasons can also lead to irresponsible behavior towards customers. You make a good example with facebook and google.
In a similar vein, non-profits are not accountable to their donors but to their charter and members. However, non-profits may want to act accountable towards donors for strategic reasons. For example, if a non-profit is not tax-exempt it can act just as regular company.
Moreover, there are organization types between simple for-profit and standard non-profits, e.g., public benefit corporations [1] or cooperatives [2].
Having said that, I have nothing against well-calibrated for-profit companies but I think my point still stands that anyone who may follow your proposal and has a vested interest in making the world a better place for everyone (from a tentatively impartial and welfarist perspective) should really think about the incentive structure they get themselves into. At least investigate a little bit beyond the standard playbook of neoliberal start up 101.
1:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public-benefit_corporation 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative