Last month, the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) came into force, triggering a wave of panic among unprepared tech companies. This month, why not harness the power of that legislation to calm your own worries and get a good night’s sleep?
Meditation app Calm provides what it calls “bedtime stories for grown-ups” (an eclectic mix of lullabies, fairy tales, and short stories in audiobook form). But it’s now added highlights from the GDPR legislation to its roster, narrated aloud by former BBC radio announcer Peter Jefferson, who is famous in the UK for his readings of the Shipping Forecast — a nightly maritime weather report that’s cherished by non-maritime listeners for its repetitive and ritual qualities.
Jefferson doesn’t read the entire legislation (“which would take more than all night”), but he picks out more than half an hour of material, which is enough to send anyone to sleep. You can listen to an excerpt for yourself below, or download the app from Google Play or the App Store. Unfortunately, you have to pay to unlock the full GDPR reading (and a number of other Calm features), but you can test them all with a seven-day free trial.
Comments
The Verge is a little too obsessed with this whole GDPR thing.
By scott 3000 on 06.03.18 11:47am
The fact you’re referring to it as "GDPR thing" seems to mean they haven’t covered it enough.
By cthuluface on 06.04.18 4:52am
Have you even read what rights and protections it provides? It seems insane to me that it passed in its current state. We should be having freaking parades in the street. Please at least educate yourself to the stage where you understand how little you understand.
By Indefinite Implosion on 06.04.18 8:15am
You mean you non-Europeans should parade because you got nothing like it!?
The GDPR is a very good thing. I looked forward to it, even though it meant more work for me as a Webdev.
By Hyppokrates on 06.04.18 8:40am
Well I am European, but even still, many companies are just implementing the same policies worldwide, because if it’s on the internet, someone in Europe probably uses it.
I do not envy you needing to implement it, however.
By Indefinite Implosion on 06.04.18 9:27am
The fact that you say "in Europe" means you don’t know this regulation either.
Europeans are protected by this regulation everywhere. Not only in Europe, but in America, Australia, Asia, Africa.
This kind of transitive regulation makes everything easier for every company: they have to comply. Period.
Not serving in Europe does not protect them at all.
This, is a good thing. Personal data protection should be a major concern, everywhere…
By Karreg on 06.05.18 6:30am
However I think I did not understand your point, so that’s 1-1
By Karreg on 06.05.18 6:36am
It Is a lovely idea.
People might learn useful stuff and it’s is cutely tongue in cheek
By dEcmir on 06.03.18 6:13pm
It can be as long as it wants
Considering how many pages of tick boxes I have to go through for every site I look at these days it is scary how many measurements, tracking and ‘trusted’ advertising partners these sites cosy up with previously only ever letting us know in the tiniest of tiny small print tucked away on a page somewhere 15 links down
By big-ted on 06.03.18 6:35pm
Sure, the GDPR is long, but who cares when what really matters is the length of the T&Cs that you have to read. Thanks to GDPR us consumers have far less to read when we actually want to use a product/service.
By Indefinite Implosion on 06.04.18 8:12am