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The Human Listing Site: Zillowfying Your Privacy Under the Guise of Transparency

Published by Joseph Ferrara (2) April 5th, 2007 in The Human Listing Site. Comments

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Hey homeowners, don’t want a stranger listing your home for sale on Zillow? Too bad. Don’t want photos of your backyard posted for all to see? Tough. Don’t want questions and answers about your home? You say it’s not for sale. It doesn’t matter. This doesn’t concern you Mr. & Mrs. Owner. The consumer needs to know all about your home because one day you may sell it. We need to create a public record of your asset. What about your privacy? It’s called transparency. Get used to it. Oh, and by the way, we’re telling people what we think your house is worth (don’t try to stop us) and we’re going to make money selling ads around your house. Hey, a guy’s gotta make a buck.

Taking the lead from Zillow’s “let anyone post anything about anyone’s home” policy, we decided it’s high time for a Human Listing Site. We will scrape all the public data sources—we’ll start with the Census Department—-a lot of good stuff in there. We’ll post your name, address, telephone number, where you work, where you went to school, educational degrees, your criminal record (if the newspapers covered it)—-whatever the public data warehouse has on you. Then we’ll open it up to the community to post pictures of you, answer questions about you and post any information they have about you. It’s all for the public good, can’t you see? A person ought to know who they’re dealing with.

And you thought Big Brother was the Government—turns out it’s your neighbor.

P.S. You can’t Opt-Out, so don’t bother asking.

In the News: Devin James of Orlando, FL, publishes JAIL, a newspaper of mug shots of locals residents. He delivers 8,000 newspapers a week at $1 a pop.  Back in 1999 a Louisiana court ruled that the disclosure of a mugshot of Edward J. DeBartolo Jr., owner of the San Francisco 49ers. is an invasion of his privacy. Noting that mug shots are unflattering and lasting, the judge stated “for that reason, a mug shot’s stigmatizing effect can last well beyond that actual criminal proceedings.”  Maybe Eddie should be worried now.

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  • We agree. We do not believe writing or not writing about any site will matter. People will do what they want to do. The only purpose of writing may be that it may cause some people to think and exchange ideas. In any case, writing one post on anything will never change a thing--that's just a p--- in the ocean.
  • Wait until they post some false information and a transaction goes bad and we'll see what the courts have to say about all of this. I do not think it will be very pretty.

    It's almost like a blogger posting on local political candidates. A realible source sends such and such blogger a piece of information at 11:50 when the election is the next morning. She post that the said political candidate was arrested on charges of ummm drunk driving. Last minute voters change their minds and vote for the other guy. Truth is candidate 1 never was arrested - blogger gets sued!

    Blogger failed to verify accuracy of information in the above case. True she has no time at 11:50 pm as the court house was closed but still, image what the courts would say.

    Privacy laws are a risky subject and it wasn't intended for this type of stuff. If anyone really wants to make a stand about all this mess, stop writing and blogging about these sites. Let them die a normal death. Personally, I have no feelings towards these sites but if people were really worried they would stop giving them the free press on their sites.

    Sites like this want people to complain as they get what they want - free exposure. Sad that so many bloggers have not figured this one out yet. One post is fine - state your piece, why it will or will not work and let it die - if that is what you want or continue blogging if you want to support the measure.
  • I am waiting to see if consumers will consider the source or if they will beleive everything they read on Zillow. We might be selling them short. no pun intended.
  • We could one day merge Zillow, The Human Listing Site and the company that makes the little things you embed under your skin with a microchip and a GPS system.

    We would then know everything about the property, the people's backgrounds who currently own it and we could track them where ever they go and see what they do INSIDE the house as well.

    Imagine if you could influence your home buying decision by knowing what the current owner's lives were like and what they were doing inside of it as well!

    We could then create a zHestimate - a Zestimate combined with a rating from the Human Listing Site. The possibilities are endless!

    Big Brother is losing his throne. Everyone, not just Big Brother will be watching you in 2007 and beyond.
  • http://www.zabasearch.com/

    Search any name. Zaba found all my previous addresses. I found this site a long time ago, when it was completely free and wide open to get any information about any person. I see they have monetized it so at least your personal information is worth something...$49.95 to be exact.

    :( I thought I was worth more?
  • Great point John. We'll have to include a "what's in the trash" tab.
  • Any neighbor worth his salt would also include an expose of what's in your trash. I think you may have given me a strategy for the neighbor with never silent barking dog.
  • If those pics include compromising shots of the owners, we want them for Peeping Tom :)
  • Yikes,scary but I very thoughtful post. Some of the pictures realtors post of the inside of their clients houses are scary too.
  • Tim, it's only a matter of time before privacy becomes limited to what's behind your front door. All your public comings and goings will be fodder for a voyeuristic "community". The YouTubing of America is upon us.

    Zillow means well.
  • That's funny. I was thinking of having an online interactive telephone directory where people can join their neighbors in sharing information about everyone.

    Maybe criminals can get savvy and start sharing their observations with each other about the patterns of activity in a neighborhood. I'll case my neighbors house for you if you give me a cut of the loot.

    I kind of liked Zillow until they did this. What are they thinking?
  • We see limits to any information gathering and "sharing". As strong believers in individual rights, including the right to privacy, we feel citizens should be vigilent about the erosion of these rights, though those erosions seem trivial. (over time, the trivial can become a grand canyon). Don't let a friendly buzz word like "transparency" make you complacent and accept, without reflection & question, the effect of letting the community dictate the information they need to know about you. When it comes to individual rights, we're dead serious.
  • Don't State Departments of Real Estate gather the very information you cite? I suppose licensing is an implied endorsement that the personal information gathered makes a licensee "fit" for the public.

    All seriousness aside, this is a funny post
  • Christian,

    What was Phil shooting before houses :)
  • John,

    I don't believe you can put up comments or pics about the people you locate on peoplefinder. Can you?
  • Yeah...every time Phil goes to a porn site, I have a siren that goes off...all from data from G-Men.
  • I just came from a life in the intelligence community, so without giving George W. a reason to send the ninjas to my front door, I'll just say that you'd be REALLY surprised to know what the G-men have compiled about you in data bases.
  • It's been done. Peoplefinders.com. I used to contract there, and they weren't the only ones doing it.

    In fact, arguably the people data came out long before the house data did.
  • Transparency is so... last week. What we obviously need is translucency. Distorted views are so much more interesting. :)
  • Hell, I guess I should stop reading my Google Reader in the nude.

    Tobey, however, has nothing to hide.
  • ...geeze...I feel so naked...i think i need a Redfin to cover up...
  • Yes. Absolutely. We'll check the court records for lawsuits against you. We'll Google you, MySpace you and YouTube you. Maybe we'll have a rating system for you (0 stars for lowlife, 10 stars for saint).

    This information will be useful to employers who want to hire you or a girl who may be foolish enought to want to date you or (gasp) marry you.

    Before you move into a neighborhood you can do a "Peeping Tom" on your neighbors. Great fun. And a public service.
  • You know I just had another idea. We could turn this into a pretty powerful map mashup if we can get the cell phone companies to buy in. They could send us real time geo info on every cell phone user in the country
  • Haha! That a great idea! Are you a registered gun owner? Concealed weapon? Yeah that information is also public in many states.

    I think that a dating history is also very important. In fact it is critical.
  • :)
  • I think I had best start keeping my curtains closed...
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