[ExI] 23andME - Company issues: privacy

[spike]

From: extropy-chat [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of William Flynn Wallace
Sent: Wednesday, October 15, 2014 1:58 PM
To: ExI chat list
Subject: Re: [ExI] 23andME - Company issues: privacy

 

I'd like to see your alternative to 23 and me.

bill w

 

 

 

OK.  For the time being, 23andMe is not allowed to give you the results of all those medical-info questionnaires people filled out.  The FDA was squirmy about proles having all that information.  They run the risk of hordes of citizen scientists figuring out things the FDA doesn’t know.  Can’t have that you know: that could threaten high-paying government jobs.

 

Without that medical research function, the only reason I can think of to do a DNA test is for genealogy purposes.  People interested in genealogy do not want privacy; just the opposite.  They want to find and be found by family.  Ancestry.comDNA is better for that purpose by an order of magnitude, for many reasons.  One of those is that a prole can use this software I wrote to figure out the most recent common ancestor with the people on your cousins list.  It is flat out wicked cool.  I used it to figure out and prove that I am directly descended from this guy:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Howard,_21st_Earl_of_Arundel

 

Oh I feel so noble.  Of course our branch of the family is all the ig variety, but better that than no nobility at all.

 

spike

 

 

 

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