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Disney+ demands users’ age and gender so it can “deliver targeted advertising”

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Re: Disney+ demands users’ age and gender so it can “deliver targeted advertising”

#31
post #3

Does ANYBODY EVER provide an accurate response to a question like that (except when there's reason to believe they can detect it and do something to your detriment if you lie)? If so, why? Anybody who asks deserves to be chaffed into oblivion with garbage data. Especially, who would be dumb enough to admit to being under 18, or, worse, under 13? An 8 year old should see the obvious reasons not to do that. A bright 6…

My "birthday" is January 1, 1970 (an homage to unix) for any database/system inappropriately asking. This way they don't have my data to leak or abuse, but I still know what I specified if I'm asked to verify it.

At 00:00:00 UTC, I assume?

I don't expect there's any reason for them to divide by a datetime...but one can hope that some ad server somewhere has crashed as a result.

My go-to birthday has always been January 1st of the year I was actually born. That way it doesn't raise any eyebrows if I want to convert something to a real account or interact with real people, but it fails verification if they mishandle my credentials.

That's worked great, except that one time when I inadvertently booked a flight on united.com (who should have my actual birthday, with whom I'd flown internationally several times before) with a session token or something set by a random travel search engine to whom I had given my fake January 1st birthday and then (I thought) abandoned before picking a different flight. Customs had pointed questions about the authenticity of my passport and driver's license, because their system showed that my documents should be different and they couldn't tell me why... They eventually let me back into the country, but that was not fun.

Re: Disney+ demands users’ age and gender so it can “deliver targeted advertising”

#32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have to mentally be 6 if you’re enjoying the garbage they’re chucking onto Disney+.

Andor is one of the better shows I've seen - ever. Their Star Wars offerings in general have been very well put together.

What about the other 99.999% of their content?

Re: Disney+ demands users’ age and gender so it can “deliver targeted advertising”

#34
post #14
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember playing Leisure Suit Larry at 8 or 9 years old. They'd test you to make sure you were over 18 but if you said you were over 99, it would just reply "No you're not" and boot you. I don't remember what they'd do if you said you were under 18, I don't know if I was dumb enough to ever try it once.

Here's Leisure Suit Larry's age quiz, consisting of pop culture questions that would have suggested adulthood back in 1987: https://allowe.com/games/larry/tips-manuals/lsl1-age-quiz.ht...

Getting through the age quiz as a kid was almost as fun as playing the game.

Re: Disney+ demands users’ age and gender so it can “deliver targeted advertising”

#37
post #29
post #22

Coppa "Children's Online Privacy Protection Rule ("COPPA")" If the kids is below 13, targeting would probably not be allowed. "The act, effective April 21, 2000, applies to the online collection of personal information by persons or entities under U.S. jurisdiction about children under 13 years of age, including children outside the U.S. if the website or service is U.S.-based.[1] It details what a website operator m…

Indeed. I don't understand the outrage at wanting to know the age of your customer, especially when: a) there are laws involved b) you have a variety of content/products specifically aimed at different ages I won't speak to gender, that's certainly a different concept, but age doesn't exact ring alarm bells for me here.

Disney: “Gendered stereotypes are harmful — be more inclusive!”

Also Disney: “Tell us your gender so we can target ads based on that!”

I would take DIE advocates more seriously if they reformed themselves — rather than lecturing the rest of us while engaging in such blatant hypocrisy.

Re: Disney+ demands users’ age and gender so it can “deliver targeted advertising”

#38
Why does Disney really need this information for advertising purposes when they already know what shows somebody is watching? I realize that any age/gender can watch any show, and of course a lot of Disney's catalogue is pretty universal to age/gender, but there's going to be some kind of a signal in anybody's viewing history.

If some profile is routinely watching a show about makeup or horses or ballet dances, you have a pretty good guess about the age/gender. Likewise if some profile is watching a lot of shows about monster trucks, little league baseball, and RPG games, you likewise can make a pretty reasonable guess about who they are.

Re: Disney+ demands users’ age and gender so it can “deliver targeted advertising”

#39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have to mentally be 6 if you’re enjoying the garbage they’re chucking onto Disney+.

Andor is one of the better shows I've seen - ever. Their Star Wars offerings in general have been very well put together.

Back in my day, we were waited 15 years for more Star Wars content, then immediately regretted it and asked what we'd been doing with our lives.

Re: Disney+ demands users’ age and gender so it can “deliver targeted advertising”

#40
post #22

Coppa "Children's Online Privacy Protection Rule ("COPPA")" If the kids is below 13, targeting would probably not be allowed. "The act, effective April 21, 2000, applies to the online collection of personal information by persons or entities under U.S. jurisdiction about children under 13 years of age, including children outside the U.S. if the website or service is U.S.-based.[1] It details what a website operator m…

Should we all just tell all platforms that we are under 13? Is that a new iOS setting to stop Meta and Google?
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