Word Count: 976

• You could have done more if you had written more simply. The first three sentences of the last paragraph, for example, could have been combined into one, reducing 53 words to 20. At least a third, probably almost half, of the essay is air that could be deflated away. The theme, reduced to a sentence (which all good themes can be), is: "Because more data of every kind is now being collected and remains accessible forever, people need to be more careful about correcting data on file about them, and exercising whatever rights they are given to control its use." This is true, and can't be said often enough, but the reader expects you to say something about how this is to be done by Americans who are neither expert with data management nor burdened with immense amounts of free time that could be put into the effort. Moreover, though you are clear about the fact that more information is collected, you aren't equally clear in stating that the US is being turned, because of its singularly weak version of market regulation, into the data-trading capital of the world, where everyone's efforts to control access to and marketing of their data are actively fought by the richest and best-informed organizations in the global economy. So the how questions are of the highest importance, and if you said more simply what you do say here, you would be better able to get to the parts you don't discuss.