I'm There’s no such thing as a free lunch. Back in 2010, a MetaFilter user said, “If you are not paying for it, you’re not the customer; you’re the product being sold.” (via Life Hacker)
Spending time on Facebook just makes money for them in the form of ads. Gmail skims your email to target ads. Both are free services.
And now two other free services, Path and Pinterest, are in the news today. Path supposedly uploads your Address Book from your iPhone (without telling you). And Pinterest is modifying affiliate links that users post.
If it’s free, you are the user product; plain and simple. These companies owe you nothing.