# Free Coffee?



## Foxbat (Jun 29, 2020)

I was looking through information regarding personal data and how it’s used when I found this article on Shiru cafes.  This business started in Japan and now has outlets in the USA. It’s also looking to expand into the UK.

They serve coffee to students and no cash or card transaction takes place. Instead, students are asked to hand over personal data...date of birth, phone number, email address etc. They must agree to being contacted by a number of companies that support Shiru’s business venture through corporate sponsorship. Also, as students enjoy their coffee, specially trained staff inform them of the companies and sponsors behind this venture. It doesn’t seem to bother many of the students, one even saying that everybody seems to have your data anyway so why not?  But there’s more than just data at stake, a student’s future employment prospects could be too. Shiru have said that 40% of the JP Morgan hires from Brown University were Shiru cafe patrons.

This is an interesting section from the linked article below:
_In response to a request for more information, Alex Inoue, Shiru Cafe's general manager, wrote in an email that the cafe does not give out data on specific students. But it does provide general, aggregate data such as student majors and expected graduation years._

It’s interesting because it appears to directly contradict that students must consent to being contacted by various companies and organisations. Maybe I’ve misunderstood but it seems to me that if a company has been given your contact details in return for coffee, it probably knows who you are.


I declined all cookies in the link to this article so it's text only.




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						No Cash Needed At This Cafe. Students Pay The Tab With Their Personal Data
					





					text.npr.org


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## Elckerlyc (Jun 29, 2020)

Well, it seems to me that they actively give consent by entering the cafe and accepting that cup of coffee. Your personal data is the currency of future societies. I wonder, how often can you you use the same data at the same outlet for another cup of coffee?
If must you can live without coffee. Or go visit Starbucks. Or wait till you get home.
Students are not exactly the most well-to-do group of people. It reeks of abuse of their situation to invite them to use their personal data as cash. What will be next?


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## CupofJoe (Jun 29, 2020)

I don't have a problem if this is all they are doing, it looks the same a ticking the send me spam email box to get a freebie, just a bit more in your face.
That 40% stat is a bit misleading it more to do with JPM using the cafes as recruiting sites.
Now, if they are using data for some deep dive data mining to do more interesting things and selling that data on... I guess you really should read those T&Cs for once.
And I'm guessing you can't claim 25 coffees a day.
I'm annoyed that Shiru don't want faculty as well... I'd have to pay for my coffee [not that I go to chains anyway but still...]


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## -K2- (Jun 29, 2020)

*sigh* Unfortunately (whether it is happening there or not), simply by walking into a place carrying smart-phones, credit cards and the like, they're already compromised. People have been warned time and again at the potential cost of relinquishing their privacy. I hope the day I sacrifice mine, it's for something more substantial than a ten-cent cup of coffee.

K2


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## Elckerlyc (Jun 29, 2020)

Your birthright for a bowl of red pottage?


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## Foxbat (Jun 29, 2020)

Elckerlyc said:


> I wonder, how often can you you use the same data at the same outlet for another cup of coffee?


That thought crossed my mind too. It’s not clear whether you can get multiple cups or not.


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## .matthew. (Jun 29, 2020)

-K2- said:


> *sigh* Unfortunately (whether it is happening there or not), simply by walking into a place carrying smart-phones, credit cards and the like, they're already compromised. People have been warned time and again at the potential cost of relinquishing their privacy. I hope the day I sacrifice mine, it's for something more substantial than a ten-cent cup of coffee.
> 
> K2




I try to protect mine for the most part, but at this point so much has slipped out it's barely worth bothering. I still block as much as I can from cookies and marketing rubbish, don't use social media, etc, but even just using google (which I dislike but gives infinitely better results than duckduckgo) and shopping on Amazon I'm already compromised. 

Fortunately I also immediately blacklist anything I feel is directly advertised to me, so it balances out... maybe


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## -K2- (Jun 29, 2020)

.matthew. said:


> I try to protect mine for the most part, but at this point so much has slipped out it's barely worth bothering.



If you fade away (your digital/paper footprint), you might be surprised how quickly you slip toward the bottom of the 'to-do' (pay attention to) stack of names. Advertisers to more nefarious entities are looking for those folks who are carelessly active they can touch on without resistance. The more of a ghost you are, the less attractive of a target.

K2


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