In this post ‘No Cash Needed At This Cafe. Students Pay The Tab With Their Personal Data‘, an example is developed where a privately-run university coffee is providing free coffee in exchange for personal data and the acceptance of receiving communications and promotional material.
I find this example interesting as it gives a practical value to personal data: in effect, the coffee’s business model is based on targeted advertising to its patrons.
It is unclear if the model will be a success as it seems to be only at experimental stage and not fully operational yet.
Also, the value of personal data will necessarily decrease if more and more outlets collect it: it will become public knowledge and data mining existing databases such as LinkedIn or Facebook will already provide lots of information.
