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Comment by Nextgrid | Hacker News Reader

Because some other people might be working with code that is not in the public domain, or code whose mere existence should be kept hidden (so even relatively innocent things like project, file or branch names should be kept secret)?

I personally prefer tools that don't spy on me. In 99% of cases I probably won't care, but I don't want to take the chance of the 1% where a telemetry request would send out something I'd rather keep private which is why I want tools that are private by design.

My screwdriver doesn't spy on me and report what kinds of screws I use it with, the hammer doesn't either, I want my text editor to behave in the same safe and predictable manner.

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As an application developer it's quite frustrating to be left completely in the dark about how people actually use my applications. All I can do is guess. Those guesses are most probably incorrect and the app won't be as good as it could.

Just a simple button click heat map would be very useful info to have. But then sending click heat map is the same thing as stealing credit card info in the minds of many ...

> to be left completely in the dark about how people actually use my applications

You don't have to be left in the dark. You can ask people for feedback (yes that used to be a thing) or run user testing sessions (yes that used to be a thing too but seemingly not anymore when we look at the quality of modern software).

> the app won't be as good as it could

I have yet to see any evidence that telemetry improves software quality enough to warrant the privacy trade-off. If there is a correlation it seems to be opposed; telemetry started becoming popular in the last decade, and the last decade is also the time around which software started declining in quality or usability (see Windows 8+, certain changes to macOS and iOS, bloated or user-hostile websites, etc).

> Just a simple button click heat map would be very useful info to have.

That heatmap thing will also at least leak my IP address, software version and a persistent UID that will allow the backend server (whether self-hosted, or powered by a nasty ad-tech company like Google analytics) to keep a log of my IP changes and usage patterns.

> You can ask people for feedback (yes that is still a thing)

That's not very reliable. It's quite common behavior that people give feedback only when they are not happy so you can get feedback like "this is horrible" although it still works nicely for the silent 99%.

> or run user testing sessions (yes that used to be a thing too but seemingly not anymore when we look at the quality of modern software).

Difficult to do for projects with $0 budget. I'm also interested in the long term (experienced) users behavior which is not possible with such testing sessions.

> That heatmap thing will also at least leak my IP address, software version and a persistent UID that will allow the backend server (whether self-hosted, or powered by a nasty ad-tech company like Google analytics) to keep a log of my IP changes and usage patterns.

* IP address - I don't care about your IP, that does not give me any useful info

* software version - sure, I'd like to know which version you run. Is that really privacy violation though?

* persistent UID - that's a matter of discussion, for me what's important is behavior within one session, connecting several sessions is not so important and I could do without it, so no persistent UID

Each of these items could be a matter of discussion - it would be nice to move the discussion from "all telemetry is literally evil" to "what's acceptable to collect?".

I disagree with feedback not being reliable. I think that detailed feedback from someone being not happy give you more details than a heatmap for example. I also think that feedback from a user who takes the time to actually leave feedback (and so is more invested in the product, and likely to give you repeat business) might be more valuable than one-off users.

> I'm also interested in the long term (experienced) users behavior which is not possible with such testing sessions.

Is it not possible to reach out to those users and invite them to such a session in exchange of $$$?

> I don't care about your IP, that does not give me any useful info

True but some malicious third-parties might care, whether it's the analytics service itself (Google Analytics comes to mind) or even a law enforcement request to capture/access such data. You are basically creating a potential liability for the user; some people might not want the software to phone home for certain reasons and I think the default should always be safe so telemetry is "off" by default.

There's also the issue that telemetry is typically opaque and the user has no visibility or control over what is sent, so out of an abundance of caution they opt out. I think a good improvement would be to queue all the telemetry data locally, and then periodically ask the user to review, edit/redact & send it if they want to. Apple has done it relatively well there where if an app crashes they allow you to review the report before sending it, and I actually send these the majority of the time (unless it's a process dealing with sensitive data) despite having OS-level telemetry disabled.

> I think that detailed feedback from someone being not happy give you more details than a heatmap for example.

Detailed feedback is definitely nice, but it's quite rare & not sufficient. It's again one person's view, people also often can't articulate what's wrong. Usage patterns across many users may reveal what's wrong ...

> that feedback from a user who takes the time to actually leave feedback might be more valuable than one-off users.

Both are valuable - one-off users might be people who got confused enough to be discouraged from using the product. That's extremely useful info.

> Is it not possible to reach out to those users and invite them to such a session in exchange of $$$?

Impossible for projects with $0 budget.

It's also very unreliable since people working on artificial test data have very different behavior than when they are working on their production data.

> ... people also often can't articulate what's wrong.

Then you’re not asking the right questions to get useful answers. People often can’t articulate anything well unless they’ve had the practice of doing so. I regularly interact in professional and private settings with people who regularly cannot articulate their thoughts, feelings, or ideas on things. I get them to do so by asking the right questions, digging deeper into what responses they give, and putting it all together.

The questions you ask determine the understanding and clarity you receive.

This gets brought up all the time and what I can't figure out is why user interfaces have gotten worse over the last 10 years, even as developers have gathered unprecedented amounts of information from telemetry. Is the most common feedback developers get from telemetry "good, but needs more whitespace"?

> what I can't figure out is why user interfaces have gotten worse over the last 10 years

I don't know, but I'm pretty sure telemetry is not making UI worse.

My point is it's not making it better. So what am I, a humble user, getting in return for sending potentially sensitive data to third parties?

Neat comment id, by the way (2345678)

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