The whole thing is an ad for a new service.
These days I expect nothing less from these "mea culpa" type of articles.
I left the ad industry because of data tracking
111–120 of 241 posts
Re: I left the ad industry because of data tracking
#112What are they doing with all this data tracking because it sure isn't giving me relevant ads. In addition to the often noted situation where you buy something online and then get ads for that thing you already bought, I routinely see totally irrelevant ads and recommendations. I've been on Facebook since around 2003. I've had an Amazon account for even longer. Their ads and recommendations for me are terrible. Two re…
Facebook isn't targeting you. The advetisers are.
Facebook's real sin is a garbage UI meant to confuse advertisers into spending money on audiences that don't align with the advertiser. Google is much, much worse with this.
The bid system means that the Christian Asians didn't do a good targeting job, and nobody else found you valuable enough to bid on, so the Christian Asians won the bid. You got served a penny ad because nobody else wanted to show you one.
Re: I left the ad industry because of data tracking
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
> There is no demand for personal data or de-anonymization because that stuff doesn't sell. Say what?? I’ve also worked in the ad industry and deanonymized personal data is shared and sold routinely . You speak of statistics and large segments but every advertiser I’ve interacted with is either doing individual-level targeting or striving towards it.
To wit, A few weeks ago there was a discussion here about a method by which you could figure out how fast a browser/machine could compute an SHA 512 hash, and that this was being used to fingerprint users even who had cookies, images, JavaScript disabled.
I would like to see more. How can you get their computer to compute the hash? Is it somewhere in the https interaction?
Re: I left the ad industry because of data tracking
#114Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is paranoid. I remember the story about Facebook doing emotional manipulation through the feed, but you go from there to hyper rich hedge funds and shadowy intelligence agencies at the reins of public life shaping the course of history through social media black magic. I don't doubt there are bad actors trying to do bad things via advertising and social media, but this is quite the claim. The rich and powerful a…
I don’t know about you, but the Snowden Revelations dramatically shifted my baseline of “paranoid schizo”. Before, I thought the prospect utterly bananas that “the government” was tapping every phone call, strong-arming ISPs, and intercepting mail en route to its destination. Then I found myself in a rabbit hole of Tuskegee experiments, Operation Northwoodses, MKULTRAs, human-animal hybrids, and so on. Now, the quest…
Read Manufacturing Consent & Surveillance Valley if you haven't already.
Re: I left the ad industry because of data tracking
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am curious given that I have an Ad-blocker for most websites and am not on FB. How do you even see ads? Have FB et al found a workaround for ad-blockers?
I have uBlock origin and I still occasionally see ads in Facebook feeds.
Facebook puts a lot of time and effort into obfuscation of course code. They generate random classes and IDs and interweave containers (divs, spans, custom HTML elements) on each page load so that software can't tell what is content and what is an ad.
It's actually a really neat trick.
Re: I left the ad industry because of data tracking
#116What are they doing with all this data tracking because it sure isn't giving me relevant ads. In addition to the often noted situation where you buy something online and then get ads for that thing you already bought, I routinely see totally irrelevant ads and recommendations. I've been on Facebook since around 2003. I've had an Amazon account for even longer. Their ads and recommendations for me are terrible. Two re…
Ad targeting is intentionally fuzzy to avoid creeping you out. Companies like Acxiom have an incredible amount of data on you. https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-targ...
> to avoid creeping you out
I assume in terms of "how did they know this about me?" a la Tom Cruise being advertised a particular brand of alcohol based on an automatic eye-scan whilst walking through a public space ["Minority Report"].
I used to be "creeped out" about this about 10 years ago. Now-a-days I am not.
To be honest, a part of me wants this type of thing. I'm all for exploring knew products and "discovery" and so forth. However, if the "Check out this product you just bought" problem could be solved, I'd be chips in for "Hi User, check out this neighbouring product" should that actually be relevant; Amazon is almost OK for example, but that's an "almost ok".
Extreme Example: If I don't drive and have less than zero interest in sports cars, why would or should I get ads for a Ferrari? Today, I have no doubt I'd receive such an ad for somebody's giggles on the penny. Tomorrow, I dream not to.
Re: I left the ad industry because of data tracking
#117Good, as software engineers, machine learning researchers, etc. we have the real power here. Just stop working for these companies. There are jobs and good incomes to be had in other industries. Tell recruiters you are not interested in ad industry.
Somebody else will work for them though. While I'm not saying "so it might as well be you" (unless you're going undercover), "not doing it" might not be enough. Actively undermining their efforts may be necessary.
Actively undermining is good! Specifically fighting for new regulations and laws around this issue.
I think people in tech have an obligation around this. We understand it better than most people. It's our responsibility to explain it in ordinary terms and champion reigning it in.
Re: I left the ad industry because of data tracking
#118I have yet to see a real whistleblower report by someone deep into the ad industry revealing whats really going on there. There are almost no details about what's really happening on a technical level (beyond the little things we already know), and whether large data sets are abused in the sense that they get routinely de-anonymised.
What the author is referring to is usually branded, so it's difficult for people on the sales side to give details without revealing who it is unless you're in the weeds (technically), and I'm sure you can appreciate why they might not want to, so here's the gist: - Companies collect a number of "records" keyed to an email address. How they do this varies from running microsites/forms that collect data directly from…
It's much worse than that.
I've been approached by a company that trades e-commerce transaction data, for personal data tied to IPs.
As in, you give me your customer data, and I'll tell you who visited your site based solely on the IP address.
We declined, but it's tempting.
Re: I left the ad industry because of data tracking
#119What are they doing with all this data tracking because it sure isn't giving me relevant ads. In addition to the often noted situation where you buy something online and then get ads for that thing you already bought, I routinely see totally irrelevant ads and recommendations. I've been on Facebook since around 2003. I've had an Amazon account for even longer. Their ads and recommendations for me are terrible. Two re…
Relevant ads were never the goal, it's just the least creepy sounding excuse for spying.
> Relevant ads were never the goal
That, then, is "targeted advertising" against this non-goal?
Re: I left the ad industry because of data tracking
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is paranoid. I remember the story about Facebook doing emotional manipulation through the feed, but you go from there to hyper rich hedge funds and shadowy intelligence agencies at the reins of public life shaping the course of history through social media black magic. I don't doubt there are bad actors trying to do bad things via advertising and social media, but this is quite the claim. The rich and powerful a…
It is weird that he comments on that, and not that it's become the most advertised interracial coupling even tho IRL it's the 2nd least common interracial coupling? Or are you just trying to ad-hominem him?
It's weird that he (and you) comment on that because if someone is extremely concerned about the media promoting miscegenation, that's usually a good proxy for them being a racist cretin.