I’m pretty skeptical about how much fundamental change is possible on this issue. So long as we give consumers a choice, the overwhelming evidence is that most people dgaf about their data, and are willing to sell it off.

This is a totally free exchange. Even when you plant the choice in front of users as an obnoxious and intrusive accept-cookies prompt, they’ll happily click Accept All even for sketchy websites (let alone something like Gmail). So you end up wasting everyone’s time for little benefit.

The only way around this situation is to enact heavy-handed centralized government controls, like how China regulates its internet giants. But this would be a decisive move away from the entire idea of a decentralized internet.