Data Portability Policy Metaphors

Rough ideas for the DataPortability Project EULA/ToS Task Force

By Phil Wolff

Portability is a Rose

What are the Portability parts of a service’s End User License or Terms of Service?

What data portability promises do we* expect from Internet sites and services?

We* the people, tribes, families, organizations, and societies

How best to organize and explain those expectations?

Metaphors build on existing cultural structures and human experiences

4 frames

Social

Psychological

Legal

Political

What’s a meta for?

Portability is Our relationshipLife cycles

The new privacy policya universal disclosure standard

Identity’s Creative Commons licensesimpler policies unleash social

activity

Net Neutralityconsumer and citizen protection

principles rebalance power

“ I'm looking for metaphor elements that make portability easier to understand, to argue for, and to stir people up and connect emotionally.”

Fall in Love - Make it Work - Break Up Well

1. Portability is a Relationship

start

A relationship in three stages

1. Open Arms

2. Ever Fresh

3. Graceful Exit

time

sustain end

Open Arms EmotionBeginnings, welcome, curiosity,

fun, discovery

ActionsMove in with all of your thingsLearn everything about each

other

PayoffsBetter understood relationshipServices do more with more

info

Open Arms We are full of hope when we start, digging deep to learn about each other, exploring ways to work together, developing trust, making promises. We want some quick joy, validating further investment and engagement.

Open Arms “When you come to our site, bring all of yourself. We'll help you put it to use in our context. We'll make it easy to come. We'll keep it safe. We'll respect ownership as you see it.

“What you add while you are here will join your collection and be portable in turn.”

Ever Fresh Emotion Comfort, Trust, Familiarity, Getting

Things Done

Actions Keep the relationship going Keep up with my onlife when I’m

not at your site Keep the rest of my onlife

informed of what we do together Resolve problems together

PayoffsUpdate once, Enjoy everywhere

Ever Fresh “We will consume and share your onlife with other services and you. So everywhere you go, you have all of yourself, as appropriate. As we change, we'll let you know.”

Graceful Exit

Emotion Fear, anxiety, concern, anger

ActionsNotice, Redress, RecoveryMigrate and download my onlife Completeness: all my digital

debris: stuff, friends, conversations

Payoffs Confidence earlier in the

relationship Continue your onlife without

disruption

Graceful Exit

All relationships finish. With a little forethought it can be less painful, leaving us with good memories and the ability to move on with our lives.

Graceful Exit is your online prenuptial agreement.

Graceful Exit

Six elements to minimize the damage of forced eviction. 1. Intervene quickly. 2. Prevent by building exit

strategies into products from the start.

3. Commit by building Graceful Exit into EULAs and TOSs.

4. Insure to spread risk and fund prevention and remediation.

5. Advocate for consumers and netizens.

6. Enforce through legal means.

Relationship metaphor Pros & Cons

ProsTime stages

Human contexts, not technical or legal ones

Emotional overlay

Prior art from other kinds of relationships

ConsCorny

A little Cosmo Quiz

2.Portability is the new Privacy

Portability is the new Privacy

Both P’s were triggered by explosive growth of people using the web

Framed problems, solutions and opportunities

Universal de facto adoption took five years

The Privacy Policy is well known

Well understood structure

what data we keep

what we do with it

how we protect it

and what you can do

The Privacy Policy in action

Peer pressure to have a privacy policy

Privacy is a trustmark

Disclosure more important than specific pledges

Pledges varies by industry, jurisdiction, risk

Link from every home page

The Portability Policy

Needs a clear, understandable structure

Disclosure first

Privacy Metaphor Pros & Cons

Pros

Established, Proven

Workflow for creating policies is understood

Cons

Looks like work

Comes from risk avoidance more than opportunity seizure

3.Portability is

Identity’s Creative Commons

Identity’s CC license

Creative Commons simplified intellectual property licensing

Focus

Most common uses

Most common concerns

Three yes/no questions, eight combinations

Iconography for visual quick read

Identity’s CC license

Can the DPP do for social data portability what CC did for intellectual property?

What are the most common uses? Most common concerns?

Can we reduce them to a handful of binary questions?

Portability as CC License Metaphor Pros & Cons

ProsHighly effective within some

communitiesObjective symbolism

ConsApplied to a fairly static domain

(intellectual property) instead of a rapidly changing one (social media)

Strong, famous evangelists behind launch and first five years

consumer and citizen protection principles rebalance power

4.Portability is Net Neutrality

Portability as Net Neutrality

Net Neutrality was framed as Consumer protection

Civil liberty / Democracy 2.0

Consumer protection ISPs exercising monopoly

power to control what you see and say, to make more money

Freedom ISPs shouldn’t be allowed to

interfere with speech or action

Portability as Consumer Power

Standing up for the average person

Get back control over your online communication and information and relationships

Portability as a Civil Liberty

Freedom to come and go without your onlife held hostage by a site

Meaningful freedom to

Assemble

Speak

Due process

Seek meaningful redress

Portability as Net Neutrality Metaphor Pros & Cons

Pros

Defines right and wrong

Emotional ties to powers, liberties, freedoms

David v. Goliath

Cons

Confrontational

Finding the Rose

Picking the Best of Metaphors for a Portability Policy

What can Portability Policies take from each of these metaphors?

Our relationship Life cycles Emotional connection

The new privacy policy Disclosure standards Ease of Generation

Identity’s Creative Commons license Find the right dimensions Committed evangelists

Net Neutrality Acknowledge power is out of balance Rights and Freedoms are easily understood Consumer protection makes proponents

look virtuous, opponents look evil

See also: http://blog.DataPortability.org

http://wiki.DataPortability.org

http://twitter.com/dataportability

http://wiki.dataportability.org/x/mIRE

Google groups

LinkedIn

About me Phil Wolffsits on the DataPortabilityProject Steering Action Group

Contact info: evanwolf on twitter and Skype. editor@SkyepJournal.com +1-510-444-8234

Disclaimer: my thoughts, not necessarily those of the DPP (http://dataportability.org)