Five years ago, not much ‘bottom up’ empirical research into people’s thoughts, feelings and experiences of datafication had been undertaken. But a lot has changed in a short time, and recent years have seen a proliferation of surveys, polls and qualitative research about such matters. Drawing on a comprehensive review of academic and grey literature on this topic, I will comment on some emergent themes and identify future directions for research in this area. These include: the affective dimensions of living data; whether more trust in datafication should be the goal; ideas about fairness; the importance of social inequalities and their absence in much of this research; and how the way that research is undertaken shapes what is found.