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Google and Mastercard Cut Ad Deal to Track Retail Sales

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Re: Google and Mastercard Cut Ad Deal to Track Retail Sales

#151

Post by reitanqild »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #128
donarb wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can buy Amazon gift cards with cash anywhere like drug and grocery stores.

However, you have other problems: If you have an account, or even a consistent shipping address, Amazon knows what you're buying. So you'd need to anonymize where you're shipping packages to, the names on those packages, and you'd need to register new Amazon accounts regularly with new email addresses to avoid them profiling your purchasing habits.

> If you have an account, or even a consistent shipping address, Amazon knows what you're buying.

Still a huge difference betwen that and the alternative where all three of:

- Amazon - Google - and MasterCard

knows what you've bought IMO.

Re: Google and Mastercard Cut Ad Deal to Track Retail Sales

#153

Post by aslkdjaslkdj1 »

leereeves wrote: post #126
Skunkleton wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The privacy aspects are important, but it is also worth considering the impact this sort of stuff has on society. We like to think of ourselves as semi-immune to advertisement (and manipulation), but we really aren't. The 2016 presidential election proved that. Putting more and more data into the hands of Google and others just gives them more power over the public at large. Are we OK with that? Is the discussion eve…

I'd say the 2016 election proved how hard we are to manipulate. Hillary lost despite spending more and having nearly the entire media (with only a few exceptions like Fox) on her side.

Hillary received far more negative coverage across the media than Trump did.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2017/08/...

>A December report from Harvard University’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy delivered some sobering news for all those investigative reporters who may have supposed that their Trump exclusives were changing the world: None of them were breaking from the pack. “Clinton’s controversies got more attention than Trump’s (19 percent versus 15 percent) and were more focused,” noted study author Thomas E. Patterson. “Trump wallowed in a cascade of separate controversies. Clinton’s badgering had a laser-like focus. She was alleged to be scandal-prone. Clinton’s alleged scandals accounted for 16 percent of her coverage—four times the amount of press attention paid to Trump’s treatment of women and sixteen times the amount of news coverage given to Clinton’s most heavily covered policy position.”

Re: Google and Mastercard Cut Ad Deal to Track Retail Sales

#154

Post by tonylemesmer »

witten wrote: post #150
i1856511 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of attention in the press is given to Google et. al. about purchase profiling and tracking for ads. But the concept of purchase profiling has existed really since the invention of the credit card. As others have mentioned hedge funds have brokered this data for decades - but for some reason it has not been covered as excruciatingly as it has for tech companies. While I disapprove of the practice overall I would…

If you want to still use a "credit card" online without being tracked by the MasterCards or Visas of the world (or even individual merchants), then check out https://privacy.com/ .. It lets you generate a new credit card number for every transaction if you want. I'm not affiliated with them.. Just a satisfied user. (Although happy to hand out referral links.)

Anyone know if there's a similar service to Privacy in the UK?

Re: Google and Mastercard Cut Ad Deal to Track Retail Sales

#156

Post by acct1771 »

mrep wrote: post #140
CynicalDio wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The limit is not 10,000. There may be an official number where that starts happening but I have seen it happen (completely anecdotal) with amounts as low as $800.

Care to tell your story because that is totally fucked up if a cop took a measly $800 in cash from you?

You don't read much about police abuse of power, huh.

Re: Google and Mastercard Cut Ad Deal to Track Retail Sales

#157

Post by eyeareque »

reacharavindh wrote: post #155

This is precisely why "going cashless" is silly. At least leave the option to those citizens that care about their privacy to be able to pay with cash and not be tracked the heck out of them.

Sure you can pay with cash. But you better turn off your phone because they also track you with your WiFi MAC address when you walk into stores.

Re: Google and Mastercard Cut Ad Deal to Track Retail Sales

#158

Post by ehnto »

rrdelaney wrote: post #143
ehnto wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can be extremely ethical about your factory farm but it's still a factory farm. Google is in the business of utilising your data in the interest of advertising. No matter how you sugar coat it, the core of the business is tracking people and exploiting that data. Are they doing their best to be careful and ethical? It sure seems like it, but that doesn't solve the issue. The free services they and many tech compa…

Google is not in the business of selling your data. Google does not sell your data. It’s pretty clear in their privacy policy: https://privacy.google.com/how-ads-work.html Disclaimer: I work at Google.

You are right, selling is the wrong term. I will update my comment to use the word "utilising" instead.

Re: Google and Mastercard Cut Ad Deal to Track Retail Sales

#159

Post by kyboren »

rrdelaney wrote: post #143
ehnto wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can be extremely ethical about your factory farm but it's still a factory farm. Google is in the business of utilising your data in the interest of advertising. No matter how you sugar coat it, the core of the business is tracking people and exploiting that data. Are they doing their best to be careful and ethical? It sure seems like it, but that doesn't solve the issue. The free services they and many tech compa…

Google is not in the business of selling your data. Google does not sell your data. It’s pretty clear in their privacy policy: https://privacy.google.com/how-ads-work.html Disclaimer: I work at Google.

Oh, of course. Google is actually really benign. They don't sell your data. They just automatically scrutinize it in unfathomable detail to make as much money as possible when they pimp you out to anybody else who wants to manipulate you.

Please accept our sincere apologies--Google is such a nice company with a 100% ethical business model!

Re: Google and Mastercard Cut Ad Deal to Track Retail Sales

#160

Post by laumars »

ma2rten wrote: post #148
Gaelan wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right–people often conflate "selling" with "using internally to sell ads." There's a difference, and it's meaningful, but the point is that Google's business model is based on gathering and exploiting as much data about you as possible

That's not true either, but that's a common misconception. Google makes the bulk of it's ad revenue from search ads. Two people issuing the same search query will see the same ads (for the most part). Hence, Google could still make money without user targeting - unlike Facebook.

Two people making the same search query wouldn't even produce the same search results, let alone adverts.
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