Microsoft promises to boil down its lengthy and confusing privacy controls… in 1,500-word announcement

Technically, no. But there's a gigantic chasm of possibilities between a theoretically 100% free market and a command economy.

When most economists advocate for a free market, they're usually advocating for the "freest" market–what's realistically achievable in a given society.

For data collection, you'll see a wide range of opinions. I suspect many will advocate for the complete and total banning of data collection on moral grounds. But you'll also see economists play contrarian and ask about those who *don't" mind the collection of personal data–espeically if they saw it as a fair trade-off for free services. For companies like Google, the argument can be made that they've effectively "bought" users' data by providing them with thousands of dollars (maybe even millions in some cases) of useful services. In those cases, you'll probably see economists advocating for a (pay to opt out) version of all software and services

Main point, a free market isn't necessarily 100% free in practice. It's all about maximizing well-being. And most of the time, it usually means a few acceptable inefficiencies in the system.

/r/sysadmin Thread Parent