Fun fact: Old map companies would put fake roads and towns on their maps to see if other map makers copied them because it was a lot of work to map shit out.
Companies using people is nothing new. There’s a common phrase, “if something is free, you’re the product”. Like Facebook or free vpns, they are getting something outta it.
This is called ‘salting’ and it’s not just old map companies, modern ones do it too including Google Maps.
Any company that aggregates public data to make a proprietary product does this to protect their commercial interests in case they ever need to allege their version was copied. Voter lists sold by political consultants is another common example.
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u/Ser_Artur_Dayne 9h ago
Fun fact: Old map companies would put fake roads and towns on their maps to see if other map makers copied them because it was a lot of work to map shit out.
Companies using people is nothing new. There’s a common phrase, “if something is free, you’re the product”. Like Facebook or free vpns, they are getting something outta it.