I know it mainly from the standpoint of an investment firm, and I can tell you that I have yet to meet anyone who understands how compliance would work. I hear musings that people should just ignore the EU in marketing efforts (which will not be the outcome, I'm sure).

In terms of the data you give to Facebook, it is not yours anymore. It is the price you paid for admission. That was the cost. Whether or not they have the right to monitor your whereabouts and who you call to target advertising, that's a little dicier. Even if it was disclosed in the fine print. But outlawing that invasion of privacy would not require an indecipherable morass like GDPR. It might require no regulation at all - the marketplace may impose the change on Facebook if they want to stay in business.

A few weeks ago I had to scramble to find a flight to Toronto online. Now every time I go online I am presented with a laundry list of flight options between NY and Toronto. It's a little creepy I'll grant you, but doesn't strike me as a particularly egregious invasion of my privacy. It's also very ineffective targeted advertising, as it's not like I'm constantly going to Toronto.

If your location services are on while you are walking around with your phone, than the GPS marker is out there. It's not just Facebook who could see it. And perhaps mine it. You can choose not to use Facebook if you don't like the price of admission (which I think Facebook now sees as a risk). You can turn off location services while walking around with your phone. You already have control of a lot of these things if you choose to exercise it.

I am not a knee-jerk anti-reg guy. I think new regs will be shaped for many years to come to deal with this rapidly changing tech environment. But GDPR was a hastily constructed poorly thought out set of regs. So, yeah, struck me as funny that a supposed small govt guy would trumpet it.

I don't use Facebook because I don't like my life online in that way. I don't have the app on my phone. But if I did, I don't think I'd flip out over targeted advertising anymore from that than I did over my Toronto airline search. That's the price I paid to use it. I am in control of it. As are you.