Clare Malone:

It's funny to see how normal they all look, standing around in their Patagonia gear, these people who brought us now ubiquitous street maps and excellent e-mail design, and, however inadvertently, helped usher in a jarring new reality about privacy. They seem so nice, so trustworthy, as they work the ropes for their climbing friends perched on high precipices. And we have trusted them almost wholeheartedly up until recently, because they seem to have the best of intentions. But who's to say they always will?

Decius:

Money for me, databases for you.

Jodi Quoidbach:

Young people, middle-aged people, and older people all believed they had changed a lot in the past but would change relatively little in the future. People, it seems, regard the present as a watershed moment at which they have finally become the person they will be for the rest of their lives. This "end of history illusion" had practical consequences, leading people to overpay for future opportunities to indulge their current preferences.

Om Malik:

Did you know at the time of signing up for Strava, that lovable cycling and running activity tracker is sharing real time user data and selling that to municipalities for 80 cents a year. We, the citizens don't really know what these data-hoarding companies -- big and small -- are really going to do with all the data they have about us in their databases.

It is important for us to talk about the societal impact of what Google is doing or what Facebook can do with all the data. If it can influence emotions (for increased engagements), can it compromise the political process?

Sam Thielman:

Here's the short version: Everyone in advertising is buying exhaustive records of your purchases -- all your purchases -- and comparing them to your viewing habits so that they know which ads you saw and whether or not they changed your behavior.

If you feel like this is kind of invasive, that probably means you understand me so far.