19 march 2026
I got an email from Vercel earlier today pointing out changes to their ToS and privacy policy. Surprise, surprise, they're going to start using their users' data to train their agentic models. I will say, it's nice of them to give us a way to opt-out, but Hobby plans are default to opt-in while Pro plans are opt-out by default.
Look, I get it, Hobby plan users are using their services for free. I can't hate Vercel for wanting to squeeze some value out of people who aren't paying but by stealing their code to train their models, I can't in my right mind respect them or even stay with them anymore. I've deleted all my projects, and my account from them. It wasn't a difficult decision, though. I stopped using Vercel years ago. I held onto it in case Netlify didn't work out.
Yes, it's good that they let us know ahead of time, and yes, it's nice they gave us the option to opt out anyway. I think I've reached a point where I realized I'm going to have to check my settings to make sure no one else tried to sneak in AI training opt-in into my account. I don't think I like any one company enough to be okay with them training off of my data, whatever form that data takes.
It doesn't help that I'm lazy x_x and having to get rid of stuff from places I had been for a long time feels kind of bad, not gonna lie.
I won't lie, I'm also on the fence about using AI. I think I'm largely okay with people using it locally, rather than relying on companies. I don't like giving these parasitic companies justification to build out their AI datacenters like they will literally die if they don't.
So, yeah. Those are my thoughts on it so far. I think AI can be useful but where we are right now as a people, we're just not ready. It seems the majority of us don't have the self-control to do much beyond chasing the next big money-maker. I feel bad for the academics that worked on projects that brought AI where it is now. I doubt they wanted it to be corrupted this way.