Cook proceeded to lay into the very foundation of the attention merchant's model, which, since the early 2000s, had become dominant on the web. "You might like these so-called free services, but we don't think they're worth having your email, your search history and now even your family photos data mined and sold off for god knows what advertising purpose. And we think someday, customers will see this for what it is." There was reason to suppose so, since "[a] few years ago, users of Internet services began to realize that when an online service is free, you're not the customer. You're the product."

Tim Wu, The Attention Merchants, loc. 1116