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  • Des sites réalisés avec MediaSPIP

    2 mai 2011, par

    Cette page présente quelques-uns des sites fonctionnant sous MediaSPIP.
    Vous pouvez bien entendu ajouter le votre grâce au formulaire en bas de page.

  • La file d’attente de SPIPmotion

    28 novembre 2010, par

    Une file d’attente stockée dans la base de donnée
    Lors de son installation, SPIPmotion crée une nouvelle table dans la base de donnée intitulée spip_spipmotion_attentes.
    Cette nouvelle table est constituée des champs suivants : id_spipmotion_attente, l’identifiant numérique unique de la tâche à traiter ; id_document, l’identifiant numérique du document original à encoder ; id_objet l’identifiant unique de l’objet auquel le document encodé devra être attaché automatiquement ; objet, le type d’objet auquel (...)

  • MediaSPIP version 0.1 Beta

    16 avril 2011, par

    MediaSPIP 0.1 beta est la première version de MediaSPIP décrétée comme "utilisable".
    Le fichier zip ici présent contient uniquement les sources de MediaSPIP en version standalone.
    Pour avoir une installation fonctionnelle, il est nécessaire d’installer manuellement l’ensemble des dépendances logicielles sur le serveur.
    Si vous souhaitez utiliser cette archive pour une installation en mode ferme, il vous faudra également procéder à d’autres modifications (...)

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  • How to convert rtmp hevc video stream to srt av1 endpoint with ffmpeg ?

    20 juin 2024, par Lulík

    i want use ffmpeg to listen rtmp stream and send to srt endpoint.

    


    Flow : smartphone (camera) -> laptop (ffmpeg script) -> desktop (obs studio)

    


    ffmpeg script show warning message and in obs stuido i can see any video only audio.

    


    Thank you in advance.

    


    Console output while running script (error in the end is bcs i stoped sending data from phone) :

    


    ffmpeg version git-2024-06-20-8d6014d Copyright (c) 2000-2024 the FFmpeg developers
  built with gcc 12 (Debian 12.2.0-14)
  configuration: --enable-libsvtav1 --enable-libsrt
  libavutil      59. 24.100 / 59. 24.100
  libavcodec     61.  8.100 / 61.  8.100
  libavformat    61.  3.104 / 61.  3.104
  libavdevice    61.  2.100 / 61.  2.100
  libavfilter    10.  2.102 / 10.  2.102
  libswscale      8.  2.100 /  8.  2.100
  libswresample   5.  2.100 /  5.  2.100
Input #0, flv, from 'rtmp://192.168.0.194/s/streamKey':
  Duration: 00:00:00.00, start: 0.000000, bitrate: N/A
  Stream #0:0: Video: hevc (Main), yuv420p(tv, smpte170m/bt470bg/smpte170m), 1080x1920, 10240 kb/s, 30 fps, 120 tbr, 1k tbn
  Stream #0:1: Audio: aac (LC), 44100 Hz, stereo, fltp, 131 kb/s
Stream mapping:
  Stream #0:0 -> #0:0 (hevc (native) -> av1 (libsvtav1))
  Stream #0:1 -> #0:1 (aac (native) -> mp2 (native))
Press [q] to stop, [?] for help
Svt[info]: -------------------------------------------
Svt[info]: SVT [version]:   SVT-AV1 Encoder Lib 595a874
Svt[info]: SVT [build]  :   GCC 12.2.0   64 bit
Svt[info]: LIB Build date: Jun 20 2024 14:25:08
Svt[info]: -------------------------------------------
Svt[info]: Number of logical cores available: 12
Svt[info]: Number of PPCS 76
Svt[info]: [asm level on system : up to avx2]
Svt[info]: [asm level selected : up to avx2]
Svt[info]: -------------------------------------------
Svt[info]: SVT [config]: main profile   tier (auto) level (auto)
Svt[info]: SVT [config]: width / height / fps numerator / fps denominator       : 1080 / 1920 / 120 / 1
Svt[info]: SVT [config]: bit-depth / color format                   : 8 / YUV420
Svt[info]: SVT [config]: preset / tune / pred struct                    : 10 / PSNR / random access
Svt[info]: SVT [config]: gop size / mini-gop size / key-frame type          : 641 / 16 / key frame
Svt[info]: SVT [config]: BRC mode / rate factor                     : CRF / 35 
Svt[info]: SVT [config]: AQ mode / variance boost                   : 2 / 0
Svt[info]: -------------------------------------------
Svt[warn]: Failed to set thread priority: Invalid argument
Output #0, mpegts, to 'srt://192.168.0.167:9998?mode=caller':
  Metadata:
    encoder         : Lavf61.3.104
  Stream #0:0: Video: av1, yuv420p(tv, smpte170m/bt470bg/smpte170m, progressive), 1080x1920, q=2-31, 120 fps, 90k tbn
      Metadata:
        encoder         : Lavc61.8.100 libsvtav1
  Stream #0:1: Audio: mp2, 44100 Hz, stereo, s16, 384 kb/s
      Metadata:
        encoder         : Lavc61.8.100 mp2
[mpegts @ 0x55ec921d9540] Stream 0, codec av1, is muxed as a private data stream and may not be recognized upon reading.
[in#0/flv @ 0x55ec9219cc40] Error during demuxing: Input/output error1990.7kbits/s speed=0.967x    
[out#0/mpegts @ 0x55ec922247c0] video:4431KiB audio:1138KiB subtitle:0KiB other streams:0KiB global headers:0KiB muxing overhead: 6.374870%
frame=  723 fps= 31 q=35.0 Lsize=    5923KiB time=00:00:24.12 bitrate=2011.3kbits/s speed=1.04x


    


    I send video stream from mobile app over rtmp encoded with hevc to my laptop where running script ffmpeg -f flv -listen 1 -i rtmp://192.168.0.194/s/streamKey -c:v libsvtav1 -f mpegts srt://192.168.0.167:9998?mode=caller. On the desktop i have obs with media source input srt://192.168.0.167:9998?mode=listener.

    


    When i run ffmpeg script without video codec option (-c:v libsvtav1) its working fine and in obs i can see video from my phone camera. With the option i can not see video only audio.
I clearly dont understand warning message : [mpegts @ 0x55ec921d9540] Stream 0, codec av1, is muxed as a private data stream and may not be recognized upon reading..
Do I need specify codec (av1) in obs media source or my ffmpeg script is wrong ?

    


  • Unveiling GA4 Issues : 8 Questions from a Marketer That GA4 Can’t Answer

    8 janvier 2024, par Alex

    It’s hard to believe, but Universal Analytics had a lifespan of 11 years, from its announcement in March 2012. Despite occasional criticism, this service established standards for the entire web analytics industry. Many metrics and reports became benchmarks for a whole generation of marketers. It truly was an era.

    For instance, a lot of marketers got used to starting each workday by inspecting dashboards and standard traffic reports in the Universal Analytics web interface. There were so, so many of those days. They became so accustomed to Universal Analytics that they would enter reports, manipulate numbers, and play with metrics almost on autopilot, without much thought.

    However, six months have passed since the sunset of Universal Analytics – precisely on July 1, 2023, when Google stopped processing requests for resources using the previous version of Google Analytics. The time when data about visitors and their interactions with the website were more clearly structured within the UA paradigm is now in the past. GA4 has brought a plethora of opportunities to marketers, but along with those opportunities came a series of complexities.

    GA4 issues

    Since its initial announcement in 2020, GA4 has been plagued with errors and inconsistencies. It still has poor and sometimes illogical documentation, numerous restrictions, and peculiar interface solutions. But more importantly, the barrier to entry into web analytics has significantly increased.

    If you diligently follow GA4 updates, read the documentation, and possess skills in working with data (SQL and basic statistics), you probably won’t feel any problems – you know how to set up a convenient and efficient environment for your product and marketing data. But what if you’re not that proficient ? That’s when issues arise.

    In this article, we try to address a series of straightforward questions that less experienced users – marketers, project managers, SEO specialists, and others – want answers to. They have no time to delve into the intricacies of GA4 but seek access to the fundamentals crucial for their functionality.

    Previously, in Universal Analytics, they could quickly and conveniently address their issues. Now, the situation has become, to put it mildly, more complex. We’ve identified 8 such questions for which the current version of GA4 either fails to provide answers or implies that answers would require significant enhancements. So, let’s dive into them one by one.

    Question 1 : What are the most popular traffic sources on my website ?

    Seemingly a straightforward question. What does GA4 tell us ? It responds with a question : “Which traffic source parameter are you interested in ?”

    GA4 traffic source

    Wait, what ?

    People just want to know which resources bring them the most traffic. Is that really an issue ?

    Unfortunately, yes. In GA4, there are not one, not two, but three traffic source parameters :

    1. Session source.
    2. First User Source – the source of the first session for each user.
    3. Just the source – determined at the event or conversion level.

    If you wanted to open a report and draw conclusions quickly, we have bad news for you. Before you start ranking your traffic sources by popularity, you need to do some mental work on which parameter and in what context you will look. And even when you decide, you’ll need to make a choice in the selection of standard reports : work with the User Acquisition Report or Traffic Acquisition.

    Yes, there is a difference between them : the first uses the First User Source parameter, and the second uses the session source. And you need to figure that out too.

    Question 2 : What is my conversion rate ?

    This question concerns everyone, and it should be simple, implying a straightforward answer. But no.

    GA4 conversion rate

    In GA4, there are three conversion metrics (yes, three) :

    1. Session conversion – the percentage of sessions with a conversion.
    2. User conversion – the percentage of users who completed a conversion.
    3. First-time Purchaser Conversion – the share of active users who made their first purchase.

    If the last metric doesn’t interest us much, GA4 users can still choose something from the remaining two. But what’s next ? Which parameters to use for comparison ? Session source or user source ? What if you want to see the conversion rate for a specific event ? And how do you do this in analyses rather than in standard reports ?

    In the end, instead of an answer to a simple question, marketers get a bunch of new questions.

    Question 3. Can I trust user and session metrics ?

    Unfortunately, no. This may boggle the mind of those not well-versed in the mechanics of calculating user and session metrics, but it’s the plain truth : the numbers in GA4 and those in reality may and will differ.

    GA4 confidence levels

    The reason is that GA4 uses the HyperLogLog++ statistical algorithm to count unique values. Without delving into details, it’s a mechanism for approximate estimation of a metric with a certain level of error.

    This error level is quite well-documented. For instance, for the Total Users metric, the error level is 1.63% (for a 95% confidence interval). In simple terms, this means that 100,000 users in the GA4 interface equate to 100,000 1.63% in reality.

    Furthermore – but this is no surprise to anyone – GA4 samples data. This means that with too large a sample size or when using a large number of parameters, the application will assess your metrics based on a partial sample – let’s say 5, 10, or 30% of the entire population.

    It’s a reasonable assumption, but it can (and probably will) surprise marketers – the metrics will deviate from reality. All end-users can do (excluding delving into raw data methodologies) is to take this error level into account in their conclusions.

    Question 4. How do I calculate First Click attribution ?

    You can’t. Unfortunately, as of late, GA4 offers only three attribution models available in the Attribution tab : Last Click, Last Click For Google Ads, and Data Driven. First Click attribution is essential for understanding where and when demand is generated. In the previous version of Google Analytics (and until recently, in the current one), users could quickly apply First Click and other attribution models, compare them, and gain insights. Now, this capability is gone.

    GA4 attribution model

    Certainly, you can look at the conversion distribution considering the First User Source parameter – this will be some proxy for First Click attribution. However, comparing it with others in the Model Comparison tab won’t be possible. In the context of the GA4 interface, it makes sense to forget about non-standard attribution models.

    Question 5. How do I account for intra-session traffic ?

    Intra-session traffic essentially refers to a change in traffic sources within a session. Imagine a scenario where a user comes to your site organically from Google and, within a minute, comes from an email campaign. In the previous version of Google Analytics, a new session with the traffic source “e-mail” would be created in such a case. But now, the situation has changed.

    A session now only ends in the case of a timeout – say, 30 minutes without interaction. This means a session will always have a source from which it started. If a user changes the source within a session (clicks on an ad, from email campaigns, and so on), you won’t know anything about it until they convert. This is a significant blow to intra-session traffic since their contribution to traffic remains virtually unnoticed. 

    Question 6. How can I account for users who have not consented to the use of third-party cookies ?

    You can’t. Google Consent Mode settings imply several options when a user rejects the use of 3rd party cookies. In GA4 and BigQuery, depersonalized cookieless pings will be sent. These pings do not contain specific client_id, session_id, or other custom dimensions. As a result, you won’t be able to consider them as users or link the actions of such users together.

    Question 7. How can I compare data in explorations with the previous year ?

    The maximum data retention period for a free GA4 account is 14 months. This means that if the date range is wider, you can only use standard reports. You won’t be able to compare or view cohorts or funnels for periods more than 14 months ago. This makes the product functionality less rich because various report formats in explorations are very convenient for comparing specific metrics in easily digestible reports.

    GA4 data retention

    Of course, you always have the option to connect BigQuery and store raw data without limitations, but this process usually requires the involvement of an advanced analyst. And precisely this option is unavailable to most marketers in small teams.

    Question 8. Is the data for yesterday accurate ?

    Unknown. Google declares that data processing in GA4 takes up to 48 hours. And although this process is faster, most users still have room for frustration. And they can be understood.

    Data processing time in GA4

    What does “data processing takes 24-48 hours” mean ? When will the data in reports be complete ? For yesterday ? Or the day before yesterday ? Or for all days that were more than two days ago ? Unclear. What should marketers tell their managers when they were asked if all the data is in this report ? Well, probably all of it… or maybe not… Let’s wait for 48 hours…

    Undoubtedly, computational resources and time are needed for data preprocessing and aggregation. It’s okay that data for today will not be up-to-date. And probably not for yesterday either. But people just want to know when they can trust their data. Are they asking for too much : just a note that this report contains all the data sent and processed by Google Analytics ?

    What should you do ?

    Credit should be given to the Google team – they have done a lot to enable users to answer these questions in one form or another. For example, you can use data streaming in BigQuery and work with raw data. The entry threshold for this functionality has been significantly lowered. In fact, if you are dissatisfied with the GA4 interface, you can organize your export to BigQuery and create your own reports without (almost) any restrictions.

    Another strong option is the widespread launch of GTM Server Side. This allows you to quite freely modify the event model and essentially enrich each hit with various parameters, doing this in a first-party context. This, of course, reduces the harmful impact of most of the limitations described in this text.

    But this is not a solution.

    The users in question – marketers, managers, developers – they do not want or do not have the time for a deep dive into the issue. And they want simple answers to simple (it seemed) questions. And for now, unfortunately, GA4 is more of a professional tool for analysts than a convenient instrument for generating insights for not very advanced users.

    Why is this such a serious issue ?

    The thing is – and this is crucial – over the past 10 years, Google has managed to create a sort of GA-bubble for marketers. Many of them have become so accustomed to Google Analytics that when faced with another issue, they don’t venture to explore alternative solutions but attempt to solve it on their own. And almost always, this turns out to be expensive and inconvenient.

    However, with the latest updates to GA4, it is becoming increasingly evident that this application is struggling to address even the most basic questions from users. And these questions are not fantastically complex. Much of what was described in this article is not an unsolvable mystery and is successfully addressed by other analytics services.

    Let’s try to answer some of the questions described from the perspective of Matomo.

    Question 1 : What are the most popular traffic sources ? [Solved]

    In the Acquisition panel, you will find at least three easily identifiable reports – for traffic channels (All Channels), sources (Websites), and campaigns (Campaigns). 

    Channel Type Table

    With these, you can quickly and easily answer the question about the most popular traffic sources, and if needed, delve into more detailed information, such as landing pages.

    Question 2 : What is my conversion rate ? [Solved]

    Under Goals in Matomo, you’ll easily find the overall conversion rate for your site. Below that you’ll have access to the conversion rate of each goal you’ve set in your Matomo instance.

    Question 3 : Can I trust user and session metrics ? [Solved]

    Yes. With Matomo, you’re guaranteed 100% accurate data. Matomo does not apply sampling, does not employ specific statistical algorithms, or any analogs of threshold values. Yes, it is possible, and it’s perfectly normal. If you see a metric in the visits or users field, it accurately represents reality by 100%.

    Try Matomo for Free

    Get the web insights you need, without compromising data accuracy.

    No credit card required

    Question 4 : How do I calculate First Click attribution ? [Solved]

    You can do this in the same section where the other 5 attribution models, available in Matomo, are calculated – in the Multi Attribution section.

    Multi Attribution feature

    You can choose a specific conversion and, in a few clicks, calculate and compare up to 3 marketing attribution models. This means you don’t have to spend several days digging through documentation trying to understand how a particular model is calculated. Have a question – get an answer.

    Question 5 : How do I account for intra-session traffic ? [Solved]

    Matomo creates a new visit when a user changes a campaign. This means that you will accurately capture all relevant traffic if it is adequately tagged. No campaigns will be lost within a visit, as they will have a new utm_campaign parameter.

    This is a crucial point because when the Referrer changes, a new visit is not created, but the key lies in something else – accounting for all available traffic becomes your responsibility and depends on how you tag it.

    Try Matomo for Free

    Get the web insights you need, without compromising data accuracy.

    No credit card required

    Question 6 : How can I account for users who have not consented to the use of third-party cookies ? [Solved]

    Google Analytics requires users to accept a cookie consent banner with “analytics_storage=granted” to track them. If users reject cookie consent banners, however, then Google Analytics can’t track these visitors at all. They simply won’t show up in your traffic reports. 

    Matomo doesn’t require cookie consent banners (apart from in the United Kingdom and Germany) and can therefore continue to track visitors even after they have rejected a cookie consent screen. This is achieved through a config_id variable (the user identifier equivalent which is updating once a day). 

    Matomo doesn't need cookie consent, so you see a complete view of your traffic

    This means that virtually all of your website traffic will be tracked regardless of whether users accept a cookie consent banner or not.

    Question 7 : How can I compare data in explorations with the previous year ? [Solved]

    There is no limitation on data retention for your aggregated reports in Matomo. The essence of Matomo experience lies in the reporting data, and consequently, retaining reports indefinitely is a viable option. So you can compare data for any timeframe. 7

    Date Comparison Selector
  • Google Analytics Privacy Issues : Is It Really That Bad ?

    2 juin 2022, par Erin

    If you find yourself asking : “What’s the deal with Google Analytics privacy ?”, you probably have some second thoughts. 

    Your hunch is right. Google Analytics (GA) is a popular web analytics tool, but it’s far from being perfect when it comes to respecting users’ privacy. 

    This post helps you understand tremendous Google Analytics privacy concerns users, consumers and regulators expressed over the years.

    In this blog, we’ll cover :

    What Does Google Analytics Collect About Users ? 

    To understand Google Analytics privacy issues, you need to know how Google treats web users’ data. 

    By default, Google Analytics collects the following information : 

    • Session statistics — duration, page(s) viewed, etc. 
    • Referring website details — a link you came through or keyword used. 
    • Approximate geolocation — country, city. 
    • Browser and device information — mobile vs desktop, OS usage, etc. 

    Google obtains web analytics data about users via two means : an on-site Google Analytics tracking code and cookies.

    A cookie is a unique identifier (ID) assigned to each user visiting a web property. Each cookie stores two data items : unique user ID and website name. 

    With the help of cookies, web analytics solutions can recognise returning visitors and track their actions across the website(s).

    First-party vs third-party cookies
    • First party cookies are generated by one website and collect user behaviour data from said website only. 
    • Third-party cookies are generated by a third-party website object (for example, an ad) and can track user behaviour data across multiple websites. 

    As it’s easy to imagine, third-party cookies are a goldmine for companies selling online ads. Essentially, they allow ad platforms to continue watching how the user navigates the web after clicking a certain link. 

    Yet, people have little clue as to which data they are sharing and how it is being used. Also, user consent to tracking across websites is only marginally guaranteed by existing Google Analytics controls. 

    Why Third-Party Cookie Data Collection By GA Is Problematic 

    Cookies can transmit personally identifiable information (PII) such as name, log in details, IP address, saved payment method and so on. Some of these details can end up with advertisers without consumers’ direct knowledge or consent.

    Regulatory frameworks such as General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe and California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) emerged as a response to uncontrolled user behaviour tracking.

    Under regulatory pressure, Big Tech companies had to adapt their data collection process.

    Apple was the first to implement by-default third-party blocking in the Safari browser. Then added a tracking consent mechanism for iPhone users starting from iOS 15.2 and later. 

    Google, too, said it would drop third-party cookie usage after The European Commission and UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) launched antitrust investigations into its activity. 

    To shake off the data watchdogs, Google released a Privacy Sandbox — a set of progressive tech, operational and compliance changes for ensuring greater consumer privacy. 

    Google’s biggest promise : deprecate third-party cookies usage for all web and mobile products. 

    Originally, Google promised to drop third-party cookies by 2022, but that didn’t happen. Instead, Google delayed cookie tracking depreciation for Chrome until the second half of 2023

    Why did they push back on this despite hefty fines from regulators ?

    Because online ads make Google a lot of money.

    In 2021, Alphabet Inc (parent company of Google), made $256.7 billion in revenue, of which $209.49 billion came from selling advertising. 

    Lax Google Analytics privacy enforcement — and its wide usage by website owners — help Google make those billions from collecting and selling user data. 

    How Google Uses Collected Google Analytics Data for Advertising 

    Over 28 million websites (or roughly 85% of the Internet) have Google Analytics tracking codes installed. 

    Even if one day we get a Google Analytics version without cookies, it still won’t address all the privacy concerns regulators and consumers have. 

    Over the years, Google has accumulated an extensive collection of user data. The company’s engineers used it to build state-of-the-art deep learning models, now employed to build advanced user profiles. 

    Deep learning is the process of training a machine to recognise data patterns. Then this “knowledge” is used to produce highly-accurate predictive insights. The more data you have for model training — the better its future accuracy will be. 

    Google has amassed huge deposits of data from its collection of products — GA, YouTube, Gmail, Google Docs and Google Maps among others. Now they are using this data to build a third-party cookies-less alternative mechanism for modelling people’s preferences, habits, lifestyles, etc. 

    Their latest model is called Google Topics. 

    This comes only after Google’s failed attempt to replace cookie-based training with Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLoC) model. But the solution wasn’t offering enough user transparency and user controls among other issues.

    Google Topics
    Source : Google Blog

    Google Topics promises to limit the granularity of data advertisers get about users. 

    But it’s still a web user surveillance method. With Google Topics, the company will continue collecting user data via Chrome (and likely other Google products) — and share it with advertisers. 

    Because as we said before : Google is in the business of profiting off consumers’ data. 

    Two Major Ways Google Takes Advantage of Customer Data

    Every bit of data Google collects across its ecosystem of products can be used in two ways :

    • For ad targeting and personalisation 
    • To improve Google’s products 

    The latter also helps the former. 

    Advanced Ad Personalisation and Targeting

    GA provides the company with ample data on users’ 

    • Recent and frequent searches 
    • Location history
    • Visited websites
    • Used apps 
    • Videos and ads viewed 
    • Personal data like age or gender 

    The company’s privacy policy explicitly states that :

    Google Analytics Privacy Policy
    Source : Google

    Google also admits to using collected data to “measure the effectiveness of advertising” and “personalise content and ads you see on Google.” 

    But there are no further elaborations on how exactly customers’ data is used — and what you can do to prevent it from being shared with third parties. 

    In some cases, Google also “forgets” to inform users about its in-product tracking.

    Journalists from CNBC and The New York Times independently concluded that Google monitors users’ Gmail activity. In particular, the company scans your inbox for recent purchases, trips, flights and bills notifications. 

    While Google says that this information isn’t sold to advertisers (directly), they still may use the “saved information about your orders in other Google services”. 

    Once again, this means you have little control or knowledge of subsequent data usage. 

    Improving Product Usability 

    Google has many “arms” to collect different data points — from user’s search history to frequently-travelled physical routes. 

    They also reserve the right to use these insights for improving existing products. 

    Here’s what it means : by combining different types of data points obtained from various products, Google can pierce a detailed picture of a person’s life. Even if such user profile data is anonymised, it is still alarmingly accurate. 

    Douglas Schmidt, a computer science researcher at Vanderbilt University, well summarised the matter : 

    “[Google’s] business model is to collect as much data about you as possible and cross-correlate it so they can try to link your online persona with your offline persona. This tracking is just absolutely essential to their business. ‘Surveillance capitalism’ is a perfect phrase for it.”

    Google Data Collection Obsession Is Backed Into Its Business Model 

    OK, but Google offers some privacy controls to users ? Yes. Google only sees and uses the information you voluntarily enter or permit them to access. 

    But as the Washington Post correspondent points out :

    “[Big Tech] companies get to set all the rules, as long as they run those rules by consumers in convoluted terms of service that even those capable of decoding the legalistic language rarely bother to read. Other mechanisms for notice and consent, such as opt-outs and opt-ins, create similar problems. Control for the consumer is mostly an illusion.”

    Google openly claims to be “one of many ad networks that personalise ads based on your activity online”. 

    The wrinkle is that they have more data than all other advertising networks (arguably combined). This helps Google sell high-precision targeting and contextually personalised ads for billions of dollars annually.

    Given that Google has stakes in so many products — it’s really hard to de-Google your business and minimise tracking and data collection from the company.

    They are also creating a monopoly on data collection and ownership. This fact makes regulators concerned. The 2021 antitrust lawsuit from the European Commission says : 

    “The formal investigation will notably examine whether Google is distorting competition by restricting access by third parties to user data for advertising purposes on websites and apps while reserving such data for its own use.”

    In other words : By using consumer data to its unfair advantage, Google allegedly shuts off competition.

    But that’s not the only matter worrying regulators and consumers alike. Over the years, Google also received numerous other lawsuits for breaching people’s privacy, over and over again. 

    Here’s a timeline : 

    Separately, Google has a very complex history with GDPR compliance

    How Google Analytics Contributes to the Web Privacy Problem 

    Google Analytics is the key puzzle piece that supports Google’s data-driven business model. 

    If Google was to release a privacy-focused Google Analytics alternative, it’d lose access to valuable web users’ data and a big portion of digital ad revenues. 

    Remember : Google collects more data than it shares with web analytics users and advertisers. But they keep a lot of it for personal usage — and keep looking for ways to share this intel with advertisers (in a way that keeps regulators off their tail).

    For Google Analytics to become truly ethical and privacy-focused, Google would need to change their entire revenue model — which is something they are unlikely to do.

    Where does this leave Google Analytics users ? 

    In a slippery territory. By proxy, companies using GA are complicit with Google’s shady data collection and usage practice. They become part of the problem.

    In fact, Google Analytics usage opens a business to two types of risks : 

    • Reputational. 77% of global consumers say that transparency around how data is collected and used is important to them when interacting with different brands. That’s why data breaches and data misuse by brands lead to major public outrages on social media and boycotts in some cases. 
    • Legal. EU regulators are on a continuous crusade against Google Analytics 4 (GA4) as it is in breach of GDPR. French and Austrian watchdogs ruled the “service” illegal. Since Google Analytics is not GDPR compliant, it opens any business using it to lawsuits (which is already happening).

    But there’s a way out.

    Choose a Privacy-Friendly Google Analytics Alternative 

    Google Analytics is a popular web analytics service, but not the only one available. You have alternatives such as Matomo. 

    Our guiding principle is : respecting privacy.

    Unlike Google Analytics, we leave data ownership 100% in users’ hands. Matomo lets you implement privacy-centred controls for user data collection.

    Plus, you can self-host Matomo On-Premise or choose Matomo Cloud with data securely stored in the EU and in compliance with GDPR.

    The best part ? You can try our ethical alternative to Google Analytics for free. No credit card required ! Start your free 21-day trial now