What it does? The website says:
Welcome to 23andMe, a web-based service that helps you read and understand your DNA. After providing a saliva sample using an at-home kit, you can use our interactive tools to shed new light on your distant ancestors, your close family and most of all, yourself.
So with this analysis you can find out who is related to you, what your health problems you might get and so on.
Now think of the possibilities for Targeted Advertising! Websites will know which medicine you need to buy, they might need what flights you want to book because all your family comes from country X. And this is just the start. With every advance in decrypting the human genome advertisers will get more and more possibilities!
Now I wonder why the articles in the german blogosphere are not that positive?!? Do they worry too much about our past and what people wanted to do with genetics back then? Did they read too much Huxley or watch movies such as Gattaca?
According to german blogger Robert Basic the main problem during this presentation was the throughout positive description of the project. No word about risks, privacy and all that.
BTW, it might also be a new front for DataPortability ;-)
So what’s your take on this project?