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GDPR will pop the adtech bubble

blogs.harvard.edu

211–220 of 454 posts

Re: GDPR will pop the adtech bubble

#212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly think this is very, very user dependent. Mainly because if Google's ad tech wasn't working, they wouldn't be making so much money.... You, I, and everyone else on this site don't represent the average user. Personally whenever I Google something out of curiosity as a one-off thing (e.g. "lyrics to Rasputin by Boney M" or "0-60 of a Golf GTI") I switch to in-cognito, just because I've noticed that Google is…

> I switch to in-cognito, just because I've noticed that Google isn't currently tracking stuff like that by IP. This way I don't get recommended Boney M videos in YouTube or adverts for cars I don't actually have an interest in elsewhere. If you go through all that trouble, why don't you simply turn off personalized ads? https://adssettings.google.com/

I already have. But I like to double up on my privacy controls where possible, just in case. Opening up incognito takes a fraction of a second more, it's become part of my workflow.

Re: GDPR will pop the adtech bubble

#213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Requiring them to check an "I agree to be tracked" checkbox and signing an agreement (which has just happened to me yesterday in an EU country in accordance to GDPR) before they can use a product/service is hardly much better. That's specifically not allowed under the GDPR. Either the information is needed to provide the service (and needed means actually needed, not "my business model depends on it"), in which case…

How is "my business model depends on it" not a bona fide legitimate purpose for information collection? Nobody is forcing anyone to patronize a business that relies on data collection for profitability. I'm extremely skeptical of regulation that interferes with consensual deals between economic actors. You want transparency? Fine. But you don't get to randomly outlaw certain entire classes of business.

> How is "my business model depends on it" not a bona fide legitimate purpose for information collection?

Business models are arbitrary and orthogonal to services provided.

> But you don't get to randomly outlaw certain entire classes of business.

Why not? Some business models are clearly antisocial and don't deserve to exist. GDPR is only outlawing business models based on large-scale abuse of people's private and identifying information. If you can obtain proper consent from enough percentage of your users, then your business model will be fine. If that's a problem for you, then ask yourself why.

I find it funny to see people complaining that their business model will be in trouble under GDPR. GDPR literally only outlaws being a huge asshole (in context of users' data).

Re: GDPR will pop the adtech bubble

#215

Oddly, I think the article underestimates the size of the change coming. I think one side affect of the surge of IT into advertising, is that it has become easier to measure exactly how well advertising works. By and large, it doesn't, very well. I am reminded of this, from Paul Graham, about his time at Yahoo: http://www.paulgraham.com/yahoo.html "...The reason Yahoo didn't care about a technique that extracted the…

> By and large, it doesn't, very well.

Compared to what?

It may be easy to provide evidence for:

* Time and resource intensive prebiased word of mouth has a higher conversion rate.

* Conversion rates for mass advertising are very low numbers.

It is also easy to provide numbers for:

* Conversion rates for targeted advertising are significantly higher than non-targeted advertising.

* Having a non-existent marketing strategy for scale markets has a high probability of failure.

What is your position exactly?

Consider also some of what is implied throughout the article, that changes implied may price smaller companies out of the market. This doesn't bode well for competition, particularly for less funded competition. Small p&l organizations typically need to market to drive revenue, they're rarely in a position to push brand marketing strategies alone. Indeed this is a common huge difference between fine and coarse targeted platforms - when did you last see a small p&l trying to advertise on cable? What about on fine target platforms such as Facebook? Do you want such companies to become competitors to brand giants?

Re: GDPR will pop the adtech bubble

#216
post #190

I'll play the devil's advocate and say that I'm actually disappointed by this development. A very long time ago when AdSense was young I was thrilled by the idea that instead of being bombarded by stupid ads designed to cater to morons people (including myself) will be getting relevant ads - ideally, ads about stuff that I am actually willing to buy right now. Kinda like legilimency. Too bad that this will be impossi…

Hmmm...just target it to the content of the site? Just like targeting search ads to be relevant to the search?

There are many sites which are topic agnostic, others which have less text and therefore are more difficult to classify by ad crawlers and target based on topic.

It's also difficult to conceive enough advertisers on the demand side for many niches. In this scenario targeted advertisement would fill in for the lack of demand

Re: GDPR will pop the adtech bubble

#217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right, if a EU resident decides to visit your website and you're tracking them (Google Analytics etc) you have to comply with GDPR when handling his/her data. The IP block has a logic to it because the law applies to people in the EU rather than EU citizens.

Really? I was under the impression that it applies to EU residents, regardless of where they are accessing the website from.

It's the other way around. The law protects according to point of access (EU soil), not according to nationality. So an American tourist in France would be protected, but not a French tourist in the US.

This is just like most laws, when you're a tourist in a foreign country you have to follow the local laws, not the ones from your passport country.

Re: GDPR will pop the adtech bubble

#218

Oddly, I think the article underestimates the size of the change coming. I think one side affect of the surge of IT into advertising, is that it has become easier to measure exactly how well advertising works. By and large, it doesn't, very well. I am reminded of this, from Paul Graham, about his time at Yahoo: http://www.paulgraham.com/yahoo.html "...The reason Yahoo didn't care about a technique that extracted the…

The only way to eliminate all waste in advertising is to use an affiliate marketing model and that's the biggest cesspool of them all.

Re: GDPR will pop the adtech bubble

#219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a good question, I don't know if it's valid to offer discounts and such in exchange for consent. It goes against the EU principles ("personal information cannot be conceived as a mere economic asset"), but I'm not sure if the law actually prevents it.

> personal information cannot be conceived as a mere economic asset I wonder why not? Personal information is useless for most people, they give it away for free to the state institutions and the police wont even ask your consent. Some websites and services have found a way to make money off it, in exchange for free services etc. Why is this an ethically unacceptable proposition?

Because it ends up abused by marketers, and frequently ends up facilitating crime as well. GDPR as a law came out directly from the last decade of mass surveillance economy.

Re: GDPR will pop the adtech bubble

#220
Although I like the GDPR and would support similar legislation in my country, I honestly don't see the gloom and doom story. The EU market is a small part of the global story, and while this change clearly makes that market harder to enter, the article doesn't make the case that the EU represents a sufficient share of the adtech market to pop a bubble.

In general it's easy to believe negative press about hated entities (for example, see liberal credulity about Trump's vulnerability in the US). I don't see the argument passing the bar for evidende, whether or not I want to believe it.

edit: the argument that adtech stinks is not evidence in support of the article's thesis. crappiness is not a predictor of a bubble, and the author makes no attempt to connect the idea that ad tech stinks (which is stated ad nauseum) with the claim that the GDPR will bring about a global sea change for adtech)

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