DrKK
FreeNAS Generalissimo
- Joined
- Oct 15, 2013
- Messages
- 3,630
I don't understand all the details, and I don't care that much. But this is clearly a thing. I am just going to put it out there for you all, and invite you to adjudicate the situation for yourselves.
On or around 18 August 2017, the Plex people sent out a mass email, indicating that there would be some changes to their privacy policy. All of us, as a result of the trends and realities of the past decade, of course, are now trained to go into King Cobra Hooded Defense mode when you get a nonchalant email about "changes" to "privacy policies". It was the usual kind of thing...which I will now paraphrase:
"Oh yeah, hi guys. Yeah so this is totally no big deal, and this is really totally nothing at all, and well hey, we will be making some very minor changes to the privacy policy that we are like so embarrassed to even have to waste your time in email about these changes but like we have to do it because of ridiculous lawyers lolololol anyway yeah they go into effect on 20 September, and here's a link for additional clarity, if you really feel you must know more information, but this is really totally nothing. Plex on! Woop woop Plex yo!!! Yours Truly, {Silly Comedic Self-Reference to Make Everything Seem Casual}".
Which, of course, put me on code-red-uber-jihad alert, instantly.
So anyway, that day, you would click their link, and there's a few totally irrelevant things that you know damn well they'd never put out an email about. And then they spring something that caught my attention: "Yeah also lolololol so you will no longer be able to opt-out of sending Plex your information about your use of the media server. But that's totally cool because we won't sell any information. And there's going to be a lot of third parties with new cool stuff, and they need this information, that's all, lol."
People weren't buying it.
And *THEN* there was a bit of jihad on their forums. And ***THEN*** they actually CHANGED the content of the aforementioned link to *REMOVE* the information that you could no longer opt-out. Which really concerned me. It's still the case that you can no longer opt-out, that was truthful, BUT, now it's buried deeper instead of front and center. So here's the deal, at least as far as I can understand, as of this moment (20 August 2017, noon on the USA East Coast):
It looks to me like there are more and more and more and more "third party" elements to Plex, and if you use any of those, then all bets could be off, depending on whatever deal and licensing has been worked out between these guys.
Bottom line: I don't know what to make of it. I will continue to use Plex, I'm not too concerned about it, but I know a lot of you guys out there have a very, very low tolerance for data-sharing, privacy etc etc etc, and this is surely way over your smell test line. So I thought I'd let you know, if you use Plex.
I tried to search our FreeNAS forum for this information and didn't find anything, which surprised me, since I thought a lot of people would notice/care about this. I apologize if I'm duplicating a thread.
I want to stress that I will continue to use Plex, that I myself assume that any information of this type is already spread out there far and wide and this doesn't even move the needle. But that's my view. I know most of you are way, way, way more hard core about this than I am, and will want to consider your options.
By all means, if someone has better/more information, please put it in the thread.
On or around 18 August 2017, the Plex people sent out a mass email, indicating that there would be some changes to their privacy policy. All of us, as a result of the trends and realities of the past decade, of course, are now trained to go into King Cobra Hooded Defense mode when you get a nonchalant email about "changes" to "privacy policies". It was the usual kind of thing...which I will now paraphrase:
"Oh yeah, hi guys. Yeah so this is totally no big deal, and this is really totally nothing at all, and well hey, we will be making some very minor changes to the privacy policy that we are like so embarrassed to even have to waste your time in email about these changes but like we have to do it because of ridiculous lawyers lolololol anyway yeah they go into effect on 20 September, and here's a link for additional clarity, if you really feel you must know more information, but this is really totally nothing. Plex on! Woop woop Plex yo!!! Yours Truly, {Silly Comedic Self-Reference to Make Everything Seem Casual}".
Which, of course, put me on code-red-uber-jihad alert, instantly.
So anyway, that day, you would click their link, and there's a few totally irrelevant things that you know damn well they'd never put out an email about. And then they spring something that caught my attention: "Yeah also lolololol so you will no longer be able to opt-out of sending Plex your information about your use of the media server. But that's totally cool because we won't sell any information. And there's going to be a lot of third parties with new cool stuff, and they need this information, that's all, lol."
People weren't buying it.
And *THEN* there was a bit of jihad on their forums. And ***THEN*** they actually CHANGED the content of the aforementioned link to *REMOVE* the information that you could no longer opt-out. Which really concerned me. It's still the case that you can no longer opt-out, that was truthful, BUT, now it's buried deeper instead of front and center. So here's the deal, at least as far as I can understand, as of this moment (20 August 2017, noon on the USA East Coast):
- This is now their first stab landing page. It wouldn't surprise me if this page is going to change about 2 or 3 more times. So whatever you see when you click may be different than what I'm talking about. This is the page that had the "money shot" about not being able to opt-out, and what that meant, removed from view in the past 24 hours. If that doesn't satisfy you, they pull the curtain back a little more in:
- This page, which they hope sates you. This now restores the original information, albeit in an implicit way, that "opt-out" is not longer going to be possible. If you are still not sated,
- You are directed to this, the formal policy. This itself leads to various formal legalisms, such as this.
It looks to me like there are more and more and more and more "third party" elements to Plex, and if you use any of those, then all bets could be off, depending on whatever deal and licensing has been worked out between these guys.
Bottom line: I don't know what to make of it. I will continue to use Plex, I'm not too concerned about it, but I know a lot of you guys out there have a very, very low tolerance for data-sharing, privacy etc etc etc, and this is surely way over your smell test line. So I thought I'd let you know, if you use Plex.
I tried to search our FreeNAS forum for this information and didn't find anything, which surprised me, since I thought a lot of people would notice/care about this. I apologize if I'm duplicating a thread.
I want to stress that I will continue to use Plex, that I myself assume that any information of this type is already spread out there far and wide and this doesn't even move the needle. But that's my view. I know most of you are way, way, way more hard core about this than I am, and will want to consider your options.
By all means, if someone has better/more information, please put it in the thread.