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Comment by __MatrixMan__ | Hacker News Reader

We should really just abandon the notion of ownership when it comes to data. When I own data, sometimes it refers to data I created. Other times it refers to data about me. Other times it's something I've been sold. Other times it's my responsibility to ensure that data's accuracy. There are probably a few I'm missing.

I happen to like the notion of ownership that you're describing, but I think we'd all have more fruitful discussions about data if we dispensed with: "_____ is not ownership because of _____" and instead just came up with entirely different words for each kind of relationship one can have to data. Then stasis could move away from arguing what words mean and closer to doing something about the problems that arise around data "ownership".

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Agreed. I'd go further. This obsession with ownership has always struck me as a peculiarly American thing, perhaps related to the absolutely central role of private property in the USA's history. In other cultures the concept of private property is often diluted somewhat by social obligations and counter-obligations. But that aside, the term is already very imperfect for the reasons you describe.

Perhaps the better word is just "control".

Isn't it the same thing?

Stuff you fully control is stuff you own fully.

Stuff you don't fully control is stuff you don't own fully.

Stuff you fully own is stuff you fully control.

Stuff you don't fully own is stuff you don't fully control.

As I mentioned, "ownership" is not always such an absolute concept outside the USA, which began as a freewheeling frontier society. For example, the French translation of "company" is "société", and the thing is understood to be a bundle of obligations rather than a discrete object to be bought and sold. Even in England, houses are commonly sold on leases rather than the "freehold" which is intrinsic to ownership in the US.

IMO the verb "own" is only fully unambiguous in the case of non-fungible physical goods. Which clearly data is not.

So by your logic, if I steal something, I own it?

I've been asked to own several microservices, yet I'm not allowed to share their code with people, am I therefore barred from actually owning them?

If I have my DNA sequenced, there's a possibility that the company that did the work made a copy. Do I not own that data because of the mere possibility that they could share it with somebody in the future without my consent? Is the only way to retain ownership of that data to do the sequencing myself?

If I record a song, somebody copies it, and then something destroys the original, does the copier now own it instead of me?

It all seems very inconsistent to me. Better to just drop the word all together when it comes to data and handle each case independently.

> We should really just abandon the notion of ownership when it comes to data. When I own data, sometimes it refers to data I created. Other times it refers to data about me. Other times it's something I've been sold. Other times it's my responsibility to ensure that data's accuracy.

We should really just abandon the notion of ownership when it comes to food. When I own food, sometimes it refers to food that I harvested for myself. Other times it refers to food from me. Other times it's food I have bought from someone. Other times it's about my responsibility to ensure the edibility of food I sold.

In the case of data it should be more aptly described as "possession" rather than "ownership"

These are different things, and this is precisely the point here. You do have the possession of the data when you stream a movie, but you do not have the ownership. When someone makes a picture of you, they do posses it, but they do not necessarily own it, that would be you.

I also don't agree with your parent, because ownership is precisely the correct term here.

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