Have you heard this?
“If you’re not paying for the product, then you ARE the product being sold.”
This quote is an attempt to make social networks look evil.
Take Facebook for example: The more time you spend on Facebook, the more ads they can show you, the more money they make.
All true.
However… you can also look at it like this: Facebook shows you some ads, and in exchange you get to use their ultra-expensive and unbelievably huge world-wide computer infrastructure to promote your stuff and be entertained.
Not a bad deal. And by the way, TV and radio have worked the same way for a long time.
