this post was submitted on 16 Dec 2023
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Yep, I take issue with that phrase as well for two reasons.
like you say, most of the time you pay and your data is still harvested, because if you're not collecting all that valuable data your shareholders will demand to know why you're ignoring such a massive revenue stream.
plenty of stuff IS genuinely free without you being the product. FOSS as a general rule will not track you and you aren't the product.
Now I appreciate that people who frequent Lemmy probably know about that exception to the rule, but plenty of people don't, and I've seen people refuse to use open source software because they believe it being truly free is too good to be true, so they stick with an inferior paid-for alternative thinking some black box proprietary code is more private and secure so long as you paid for it.