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New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

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Re: New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

#91

Post by larnmar »

takeda wrote: post #83
malvosenior wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if you discount people's ability to think for themselves. Both these candidates had been in the public eye for decades. People decided based on what they've witnessed with their own eyes.

You work in advertising in >20 years, you really think you would have job if it didn't work? Everyone who you will ask will absolutely say they aren't influenced by advertising, yet the branded products are still successful despite being more expensive. For example medication, people still are buying Tylenol, Mortin, Aleve despite there being cheaper alternatives that are essentially the same thing: Acetaminophen, Ib…

Personally, I buy the big brand name drugs over generics for the somewhat-rational reason that I trust the quality control and deep pockets of a Johnson and Johnson or GlaxoSmithKline more than I trust whatever random company makes those generics. It’s probably a minuscule extra risk but my medication budget is a few bucks a year and I am happy to have the extra peace of mind of knowing that a $300 billion company’s reputation is resting on these pills not being contaminated.

Re: New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

#92

Post by deltron3030 »

pier25 wrote: post #50
shadowgovt wrote: post #8

Probably the most useful takeaway from CA's approach is that it's useful to realize how malleable opinions are of large swaths of "independent" voters. Ad experts and entertainment companies have known this for decades, but I get the sense the average American citizen still thinks of themselves as a free and independent thinker and not a product of their environment. Problem is, even if they are a free and independen…

The biggest issue in democracy is that the majority of people vote irrationally. For example a lot of people will vote the same party no matter what or will vote for a candidate because they like him/her regardless of the program.

They vote ingroup first, whatever that means for them. What changed is that the're virtual ingroups these days, and that the limitations through location that once existed, where many connections just weren't possible, don't exist anymore.

Re: New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

#93

Post by malvosenior »

dfxm12 wrote: post #88
malvosenior wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably not. In fact Obama did more or less exactly what Cambridge Analytica did: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/feb/17/obama-digital-... > "Consciously or otherwise, the individual volunteer will be injecting all the information they store publicly on their Facebook page – home location, date of birth, interests and, crucially, network of friends – directly into the central Obama database. The only differen…

I'm not sure if you're arguing in bad faith or you misunderstand how either the Obama app or how Cambridge Analytical got their data. Obama's app was advertised as an app for the Obama campaign. People who used the app consented that the Obama campaign would get access to data about them and their friends. For better or worse (better for marketers, worse for the friends of these app users), this was all within how Fa…

> People who used the app consented that the Obama campaign would get access to data about them and their friends. For better or worse (better for marketers, worse for the friends of these app users), this was all within how Facebook was expected to work.

I see no material difference here. People shared their data and it was used accordingly. This is how Facebook is expected to work. It's not like the Obama app had a big button that said "upload your friends list to Obama's database!". That was covertly done behind the scenes.

Irregardless, all Facebook users should assume all of their data is being sold and sliced and diced a million different ways.

The main point here is that the media has tried to turn CA in to a scandal while they very much did not do that for very similar actions Obama was taking.

Re: New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

#94

Post by linusnext »

Jakawao wrote: post #70
linusnext wrote: post #42

The story incorrectly reports the company was hired for the trump campaign to do data work. As per https://youtu.be/yjn6wK01cqk?t=1878 only staff were hired. edit: provide link, and clarify.

Fine, I will bite. https://www.wired.com/story/what-did-cambridge-analytica-rea... Cambridge worked both for the Trump campaign and a Trump-aligned Super PAC. Cambridge Analytica was paid $5.9 million by the Trump campaign, according to Federal Election Commission filings If you have a source that shows otherwise, please share.

5 Million was for ad buys on TV. The rest was just for support staff that actually were not employees of CA.

Re: New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

#95

Post by Scoundreller »

cm2012 wrote: post #27
shadowgovt wrote: post #8

Probably the most useful takeaway from CA's approach is that it's useful to realize how malleable opinions are of large swaths of "independent" voters. Ad experts and entertainment companies have known this for decades, but I get the sense the average American citizen still thinks of themselves as a free and independent thinker and not a product of their environment. Problem is, even if they are a free and independen…

I'm a professional FB marketer and have managed both large budgets for private companies and also done political campaigns. I guarantee the trump campaign doesn't use the low quality Cambridge Analytica scraped data in their targeting. They either use voter file records or lookalikes (like everyone else does). All CA data so released so far has been useless, untargeted stuff. Think about where the data originally cam…

> You know what's better than targeting 87 mil loosely connected people? Using the FB algorithm, which targets 330m much, much more accurately and with more connections!

Depends on how much of a premium you pay for that precision.

Re: New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

#96

Post by cm2012 »

mbesto wrote: post #87
cm2012 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure people claim you can find the best voters using their special astrology method also. The FB algorithm already takes in 1000s of black box factors that are going to work better than some unproven personality score hogwash.

> And the FB algorithm already takes in 1000s of black box factors that are going to work better than some unproven personality score hogwash. 1. My understanding is that CA wasn't just executing FB ads. Is your assumption that this was their only technique? 2. Are you aware of the specific techniques CA used? 3. What would be the purpose of CA obtaining the data then?

1) That kind of targeting is even less useful outside of FB. You can upload gmail addresses to Google to target, or use something like LiveRamp to target on display networks, but both options suck compared to FB.

2) Nothing beyond whats publically available.

3) It's not unusual to test different audiences, I've definitely tested all sorts. I'm sure thats how it started for Cambridge. Of course now, tin pot dictatorships hire them all around the world now to be basically a subpar FB agency, so they're happy with the PR.

Re: New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

#97

Post by mbesto »

cm2012 wrote: post #96
mbesto wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And the FB algorithm already takes in 1000s of black box factors that are going to work better than some unproven personality score hogwash. 1. My understanding is that CA wasn't just executing FB ads. Is your assumption that this was their only technique? 2. Are you aware of the specific techniques CA used? 3. What would be the purpose of CA obtaining the data then?

1) That kind of targeting is even less useful outside of FB. You can upload gmail addresses to Google to target, or use something like LiveRamp to target on display networks, but both options suck compared to FB. 2) Nothing beyond whats publically available. 3) It's not unusual to test different audiences, I've definitely tested all sorts. I'm sure thats how it started for Cambridge. Of course now, tin pot dictatorsh…

So are you saying CA wasn't effective at all? Or just as effective as any other agency is/could have been. I'm confused...

Re: New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

#98

Post by bart_spoon »

shadowgovt wrote: post #8

Probably the most useful takeaway from CA's approach is that it's useful to realize how malleable opinions are of large swaths of "independent" voters. Ad experts and entertainment companies have known this for decades, but I get the sense the average American citizen still thinks of themselves as a free and independent thinker and not a product of their environment. Problem is, even if they are a free and independen…

> Probably the most useful takeaway from CA's approach is that it's useful to realize how malleable opinions are of large swaths of "independent" voters. Ad experts and entertainment companies have known this for decades, but I get the sense the average American citizen still thinks of themselves as a free and independent thinker and not a product of their environment.

I would dispute this claim, as it has yet to be proven any of the work Cambridge Analytica did was in any way influential or effective. As someone who has worked extensively in data science, including on marketing campaigns, I'm becoming increasingly convinced that the effectiveness of advertising, or at least targeted advertising, is so overstated as to be bordering on snake-oil. Others working in the space agree [0].

[0] https://thecorrespondent.com/100/the-new-dot-com-bubble-is-h...

Re: New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

#99

Post by RandomTisk »

3fe9a03ccd14ca5 wrote: post #89
larnmar wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still remain unconvinced that was really “Russia” (as opposed to, say, some bored Russian teens). The reason for my skepticism is the crappy podunk nature of the leaked material. The FSB spends billions every year spying on US politicians, surely they’ve managed to find stuff a lot more embarrassing than the boring emails of some dude whose password was “passw0rd”?

I'm extremely interested in learning more about the crowdstrike arrangment. As someone who is interested in both politics and cybersecurity, it leaves a lot of open questions. Here's some dangling questions brought out from the Mueller report: * Mueller’s decision not to interview Assange – a central figure who claims Russia was not behind the hack – suggests an unwillingness to explore avenues of evidence on fundame…

On top of all that, Obama's campaign had the same or better data directly supplied to them via facebook API's, with facebook's knowledge and approval.

CA 'outrage' stories are nothing more than the media wagging the dog.

Re: New Cambridge Analytica Leaks

#100

Post by cm2012 »

mbesto wrote: post #97
cm2012 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) That kind of targeting is even less useful outside of FB. You can upload gmail addresses to Google to target, or use something like LiveRamp to target on display networks, but both options suck compared to FB. 2) Nothing beyond whats publically available. 3) It's not unusual to test different audiences, I've definitely tested all sorts. I'm sure thats how it started for Cambridge. Of course now, tin pot dictatorsh…

So are you saying CA wasn't effective at all? Or just as effective as any other agency is/could have been. I'm confused...

CA as an agency might be effective, but this big data scrape is not part of that (beyond marketing themselves as nefarious propagandists to skeezy buyers).
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