Web and app services like Facebook, Google Search, and Instagram are free to use because you, the user, are the product. They build services that capture your data and your attention (e.g., say “Happy Birthday!” to a friend), and then sell your data and your attention to marketers, ad tech companies, research companies, and often governments.
The model is purely parasitic.
Well, it's 2025 and AI agents are all the rage. Offers are pouring in to have any number of AI agents work for your home, personal or business to help solve problems. That's wonderful. What do you have to lose?
security issues
Yes, there are data security issues. IT professionals tell us not to use confidential or proprietary information in open large-scale language models. But more than that, why not take advantage of the amazing assistance provided by AI agents? What's the downside?
There can be many potential drawbacks when it comes to business applications. Why should we expect the business model for AI agents to be different from what we've seen in consumer web and app services over the past 20 years, or what we've seen with numerous ad tech providers?
Many of these companies focus first on themselves. While ostensibly working for you, their agents may be exploiting you as much as they are helping you, if not more.
For many people and many applications, that may be fine. Hundreds of millions of us continue to use Facebook even though we know what it's doing. The important thing is to know what it's doing.
So when you wonder how “your” AI agent can make money, remember that you are the product. Selling you and your data pays their bills.
this story It was first published mediapost.com Republished with permission of the author.
Dave Morgan is a lawyer by training and is the CEO and founder of Simulmedia. He previously founded and ran both TACODA, Inc., an online advertising company that pioneered behavioral online marketing and was acquired by AOL for $275 million in 2007, and Real Media, Inc., one of the world's first ad serving and online ad network companies and the predecessor to 24/7 Real Media (TFSM), which was later sold to WPP for $649 million. Follow him on Twitter @davemorgannyc
