NewsGator, Free Products and Attention Data

One of the most exciting news RSS-wise this month , among other things, is NewsGator products can now be obtained for free. Tris at MapleLeaf 2.0 adequately and passionately covered the news on NewsGator consumer products in his post: NewsGator consumer products now all free–now you have no excuse not to use them. Web Worker Daily came up with an interesting article about the latest developments with Newsgator. The post: Newsgator: It’s the Attention, Stupid. And points out to obvious and not so obvious reasons behind the move:

1) It is a marketing ploy to get clients to test the free product before purchasing their enterprise products, which they previously stated is the new focus of their business.

2) Another reason is to collect reading habits of its users, which is also known as Attention Data.

Web Worker Daily discusses the specifics of how NewsGator is doing it and at a certain point compares it with the Attention Data practices of others like Google and Attensa. It really is an in interesting read.

Web Worker Daily near the end of the post had this to say about the move:

Newsgator is being more explicit about this trade than many web sites: they’ll give you useful functionality for free, and in return, they collect data on your habits which they combine with similar data and then market.
[Source]

But what is Attention Data? According to the Attention Trust Org Attention Data is:

When you pay attention to something (and when you ignore something), data is created. This “attention data” is a valuable resource that reflects your interests, your activities and your values, and it serves as a proxy for your attention.[Source]

Attention Trust and its members believe that we have the following rights regarding Attention Data:

1. Property

You own your attention and can store it wherever you wish. You have CONTROL.

2. Mobility

You can securely move your attention wherever you want whenever you want to. You have the ability to TRANSFER your attention.

3. Economy

You can pay attention to whomever you wish and receive value in return. Your attention has WORTH.

4. Transparency

You can see exactly how your attention is being used. You can DECIDE who you trust.

[Source]

One can see the economic importance of Attention Data and more importantly the need to safeguard it.

As Attention Trust blurb states:

OUR ATTENTION DATA HAS REAL VALUE AND NEEDS TO BE PROTECTED