The Advertisers are Watching You

pcause noted that the New York Times is running a story about the information being collected about you by internet advertisers. Of course much of this is not news to you, but it's important that the mainstream media is more aware of the issues surrounding this.

Mainstrem media attention not "important" or good

[elrous0]

It's not good news that the mainstream media has picked it up, because they just use if for a lot of sensationalist fear-mongering that only serves to scare the uninformed public even more. I was watching CSPAN this morning and they were talking about this. People were calling in who obviously had no clue about the internet saying things like "My wife refuses to buy anything online because of stuff like this" and talking out of their asses.

Stuff like this doesn't really inform the general public, it only frightens them and makes them even more irrational. It's like the occassional story about the kidnapped kid or terrorist attack that causes everyone to freak out and start demanding irrational laws.

I see dead ads

[Nomen Publicus]

If they are watching, why is it that I never see any "targeted" adverts? TV can be excused for just throwing everything into the aether and hoping that something sticks, but on the web why do I see all kinds of ads in which I have no interest in at all?

Re:Get it over with...

[Anonymous Coward]

There exists a solution to this problem and lots of people are happily enjoying it. Cue the bitches who say "there's only one way to have an actual discussion, and that's my way".

Re:That may be...

[Mox-Dragon]

I use adblock, too, and in the time before I did, I *never* clicked on an online ad. Not once. Nor can I imagine a situation in which I would. ever. So why shouldn't I adblock not only slashdot, but every website?

Privacy is the next killer ap

[Presto Vivace]

The person who makes privacy as easy and intuitive as Google search will make a bundle. The public isn't ready yet, but when the time comes, the market for privacy will be huge.

Re:That may be...

[gnick]

It's intention is to delude you into purchasing something on issues aside from the products qualities.

I feel filthy standing up for advertisers - Ads have become a blemish on the planet and I'm sick of being attacked in every possible venue by random images telling me that I need random things. In fact, I'm of the opinion that prescription drug ads should be illegal.

However, I still think it's a little inaccurate to say that all ads are trying to get you to buy something based "on issues aside from the products qualities". That's often true - Fear-mongering / Band-wagon attacks / etc are common. But ads do exist that do nothing more than try to make you aware of a product's qualities rather than trying to delude you.

I'm not saying, I'm just saying...

Re:That may be...

[misleb]

I also use Adblock (I'm sure that a lot of this audience does), but try to use it responsibly. If you completely Adblock pages that you like that rely largely in ad revenue to stay afloat, you are ensuring that the level of service will degrade or that other (possibly more invasive) methods of generating revenue will be implemented. For sites you want to keep going (e.g. slashdot), especially ones with well-targeted ads, remember the white-list option.

I still don't get the supposed benefit of "well-targeted" ads. Every time I hear that phrase I think of the book/movie Minority Report.

As for sites like slashdot shutting down... meh. I like slashdot and all, but quite frankly, if it went under because a few people who don't like to see ads block them, then so be it. There was an internet before massive amounts of advertising. There will continue to be an internet with massive amounts of ad blocking. If they invent more invasive methods, we'll block those too and you suckers who feel morally obligated to look at them will just have to suck it up.

-matthew

Re:That may be...

[CastrTroy]

The difference is that Slashdot doesn't have "massive amounts of advertising". The front page has exactly 1 ad on each page. If that's too much for you, then fine. But I find it to be unobtrusive, and a very good way at generating cash. People are probably far more likely to remember and click on an ad, when they only see a single advertisement.

Re:Privacy is the next killer ap

[gsslay]

Well in the mean time; do this;

  - use Firefox.
  - use Adblock. Constantly update it. Mercilessly add all sites that push annoying, irrelevant ads onto your screen.
  - regularly clear your cookies. Block any cookie forever from any website you don't immediately recognise.
  - use NoScript. Honestly, you'll be amazed by the source of all the scripts that attempt to run on your computer. How many of them do you care about?
  - lie on every stupid compulsory registration you encounter. If you have no immediate interest in entering a business arrangement with them, they often have no legitimate reason for demanding you answer these intrusive questions. Lie. Tell them you're a 80 year old widow from Vietnam (always good, they don't appear to be able to verify Zip/Post codes) with an interest in snowboards. That'll look good on their graphs. Tell the next website a completely different story.

Re:Mainstrem media attention not "important" or go

[PReDiToR]

How can we educate the general public into being able to raise their voices against something like Phorm [phorm.com] without scaring the crap out of them?

Once you know that every character in your page request has been sent through an adware service, you kinda lose control of your bowels ...