  The recording, aggregation, and exchange of personal data is necessary to the
development of socially-relevant machine learning applications. However,
anecdotal and survey evidence show that ordinary people feel discontent and
even anger regarding data collection practices that are currently typical and
legal. This suggests that personal data markets in their current form do not
adhere to the norms applied by ordinary people. The present study
experimentally probes whether market transactions in a typical online scenario
are accepted when evaluated by lay people. The results show that a high
percentage of study participants refused to participate in a data pricing
exercise, even in a commercial context where market rules would typically be
expected to apply. For those participants who did price the data, the median
price was an order of magnitude higher than the market price. These results
call into question the notice and consent market paradigm that is used by
technology firms and government regulators when evaluating data flows. The
results also point to a conceptual mismatch between cultural and legal
expectations regarding the use of personal data.
