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Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You

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Re: Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You

#231

Post by [deleted] »

autoexec wrote: post #209
bjtitus wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely, this seems illegal on several levels. At least one good thing about supermarket oligopolies is that they'll need to abide by the strictest unit pricing state laws for the region they operate in.

It's not illegal today. Grocery stores have already been testing it and it's common in other industries. > For example, ZipRecruiter, an online employment marketplace, indicates that it could increase profits by 84% by experimenting with personalized prices (Wallheimer 2018). Other players, such as travel sites (e.g., Orbitz, HotelTonight; DeAmicis 2015; Mattioli 2012), retailers (e.g., Amazon.com, Home Depot, Staple…

[deleted]

Re: Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You

#232

Post by refuse »

2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #152
refuse wrote: post #55

I know Kroger (or QFC) has been doing this for ~6 or 7 years. My wife would start getting targeted ads for things that were in areas we lingered around for more than a few seconds. FWIW Lowe's does the same exact thing. Probably IMEI harvesting but IIRC Lowe's is looking at or has implemented facial recognition. If not to identify your face outright, at least to see what you're focusing on in-store. More reason to sh…

Do you leave Bluetooth on all of the time?

IMEI is tied to cellular radio and has been used to track people's movements through stores for quite a while now.

/notanexpert

Re: Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You

#233

Post by Rury »

autoexec wrote: post #209
bjtitus wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely, this seems illegal on several levels. At least one good thing about supermarket oligopolies is that they'll need to abide by the strictest unit pricing state laws for the region they operate in.

It's not illegal today. Grocery stores have already been testing it and it's common in other industries. > For example, ZipRecruiter, an online employment marketplace, indicates that it could increase profits by 84% by experimenting with personalized prices (Wallheimer 2018). Other players, such as travel sites (e.g., Orbitz, HotelTonight; DeAmicis 2015; Mattioli 2012), retailers (e.g., Amazon.com, Home Depot, Staple…

The Robinson-Pactsman act makes this type of activity illegal today, but has largely gone unenforced with passing time due to the complexities of the act. There's talk that government agencies are thinking of returning their enforcement of the act. Anyhow, just because companies are testing things and getting away with it, doesn't make something legal... it could be a ripe opportunity for a lawsuit.

Re: Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You

#234

Post by raydiatian »

algoatecorn wrote: post #47
raydiatian wrote: post #8

Honestly… if we could figure out how to separate agriculture and groceries from the rest of the economy, we’d be a happier species. It’s so fucked up that the ability to feed yourself is tied to a dick measuring contest between a handful of ultra wealthy.

In what way? That's an interesting idea, but I can't think of how that would help. It's a balance between economies of scale without cartel formation vs fragmentation and inefficiency. Food prices are incredibly low due to consolidation and efficiency of farms and retailers. Just look at food spending as a percent of income over time.

> how would it help

Because there’s lots of evidence that correlates socioeconomic status with access to nutrition. It’s almost like you are what you eat, or something. Nobody is 300lbs eating daily the foods that trigger ketosis. It’s not the outrageous availability of corn that is driving demand for corn syrup, right?

I respect that to a degree people are responsible for their own nutrition. But there are plenty of people that lack life experience diff’ing how they feel on a week of McDonalds vs how they feel on a week of literally anything else.

> food prices are incredibly low

I.. they’re not, but please share where you’re living globally where this is true, because omw!

Also I get that basically the Soviet Union failed this exact idea.

Re: Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You

#236

Post by JohnFen »

grishka wrote: post #226
JohnFen wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand... What does blocking ads and third-party cookies have to do with it? How does doing that affect the usefulness of real-world data collection?

I may have said it wrong. I meant that, because of ad blocking, it's impossible to show you targeted ads, that data collection doesn't do anything bad to you personally. They can't use it to try to sell something to you in particular because that requires non-consensually shoving information into you, via your own devices. They can still use it for analytics, of course, but that's not nearly as worrying as creepily t…

Ah, I see. That doesn't address the issue for me. It's not the ads I care about, it's the data collection.

Re: Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You

#237

Post by JohnFen »

Zetice wrote: post #224
JohnFen wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You haven't justified the claim that "always being under surveillance" is categorically a bad thing. I don't have to. It's sufficient for me to say that I strongly dislike it. > Why share this belief if you can't defend it? Why do you think this is something that needs defending? Regardless, I think I have adequately defended it. It's an intrusion into my life that I don't consent to and I find highly objectionable…

If it doesn't matter to you if you're understood, then you're just commenting for attention, and there's no point in reading anything else you write...

Obviously, it does matter to me if I'm understood. What I'm not understanding is what it is I'm not being clear about.

Edit: I think part of the problem we're having in our communication is that we're both coming from angles that are alien to each other, and haven't really worked out what each other is saying.

For instance, the questions you are asking me are difficult for me to answer directly because they make no sense to me in the context of this issue. I've been trying to interpret them in such a way that I can provide useful answers, but clearly I've failed. I suspect that's because we each have very different underlying assumptions.

Re: Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You

#238

Post by el_don_almighty »

autoexec wrote: post #166

Stores are happy to sell all your data to advertisers for now, but what they really want is to use it themselves. Their wet dream is to get us to accept Personalized Dynamic Pricing ( https://www.researchgate.net/publication/338776528_A_special... ) which means that once the store knows who you are (either by your photo, or by detecting the phone in your pocket, or by your loyalty card) they will customize the prices…

Who cares?!

You are only correct in a SOCIALIST world where ONE market supplies everything.

Your nefarious visions ARE WRONG in a CAPITALST MARKET where the grocery store must COMPETE with another store down the street and the CONSUMER IS FREE TO CHOOSE where they purchase their goods.

All the regulatory barriers preventing new grocery stores from entering the marketplace reduce consumer's choices and drive the consolidation we see where Kroger buys up regional chains. These activities weaken labor negotiation power and consumer choice but somehow people call out for more intervention.

Increasing competition always and everywhere lowers prices and increases choice leading to higher living standards for consumers

Re: Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You

#239

Post by JohnFen »

mrguyorama wrote: post #193
AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better yet: find somewhere to shop that they don't do that.

Name a place.

I can name a dozen in my area, but you haven't heard of them unless you live here because none of them are chains.

Re: Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You

#240

Post by superkuh »

pixl97 wrote: post #159
superkuh wrote: post #44

No they aren't. I buy my food (and everything else) with cash. When my local grocer jacked up prices and introduced a customer loyalty card to drop the prices back down to normal I found out their online system for generating the card barcodes always followed the same couple URLs. So I could just skip the customer information page, type the next URL, and get the barcode without any information in their system. Eventu…

I would say the problem with your thinking is its very 2010 and not very 2030. The fact you tricked their (very poor) system doesn't really mean much to the potential systems that exist now, and the systems that can be built in the future. Imagine driving your car up and it's plate is identified and cross referenced with the state database of registered drivers names. The moment you step out of the car your face is i…

If it comes to this I can just park across the street. I'm already always wearing an N95 mask that obscures my face when I am going grocery shopping. 2030 will be no problem for me.
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