I wouldn't expect this at all. Being visually recorded, maybe. I'd hope governments step in and prevent creating private databases around that.

I absolutely disagree that coherent data means people provide anything asked for.

You are more than making up for my "can" with your suppositions.

Cookies &c are examples of tech that got away without regulation when it was needed. This is regulation. It's needed.

People going bankrupt through credit abuse is a separate issue from learning how to technically use such instruments. Many know how to "properly" use it, but have a weakness where the only solution may be to impose limitations. Many others are taken in by misleading tactics. Fine grained digital approaches can help those situations.

It is partially how you look at it. I want information systems to become coherent á la the semantic web, but in a specifically user-specific way (which is one of the ideas of Solid). I think that well defined digital credentials are an opportunity to give people a better view of the information they hold, and to enable ways to make issuers more accountable with a fine grained approach; eg evaluable axioms per credential fashioned after "law as code" approaches. This could be connected to a neuro-symbolic AI so the user can discuss scenarios outside transactions. Especially with an increase in inter-related credentials, that will make it easier to manage and less of a separate world that some institutions and companies control, which I think is incredibly valuable. Some of these ideas aren't possible yet, but we aren't going to get there by continuing to produce grey goo systems.

While credit has harmed some people (which is regrettable and should be resolved) it has enabled the vast majority of users to build better lives past other forms of capital. With digital systems and well defined data, the user can walk through clear, directly relevant, and private scenarios of what their next action will yield, without any dependency on a particular provider. But only if there is a forceful move to coherent data.

I don't know what you're imagining as an alternative.

This is not true. But there are human factors issues to solve. Personal AI will help.

Most of what google &c possess is inference and real-time metadata, which is the real dark magic. Giving people precise control over their identity and information via standards will be a huge gain, but it's not an easy task.

I'm sticking with Thinkpads for now, I like the function-dictates brutality of their design and I think carbon/magnesium and some plastic is a good approach for a much lighter result. A Macbook Pro is not only heavy, but slippery. A lot of carbon is used recycling and even shipping aluminum, and the decreasing factor of being able to easily upgrade/repair components. I don't know ultimately what the environmental impact is between the materials, but Apple has advantages of consistency and scale; as much as I like Thinkpads, I don't like that there are a dozen different models each year, which would be impossible to effectively recycle even if they had a program in place.

We're pretty much into a blog here (here's a picture of a beach), but I tried a Macbook, had to return it because of ergonomic factors including weight; I got a pretty great 16" Thinkpad with the same weight as the 14" MBP, I don't even want to think about the weight of the 16" MBP. It's frustrating other top tier companies or the industry can't find a way to have efficient product cycles (Framework is getting there). I guess it doesn't help that Apple has patented their unibody design, which shows how much they care about environment in the larger sense.