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So, I assume you also avoid purchasing things with your credit card? Or with any kind of club card? Or interacting with any company that sells any of their business records to third parties (like, for example, car dealerships)? Or generally interacting with the civilized world?

Yes, I avoid such things. My credit card is for emergencies and rare online purchases (though sometimes I use Simon Gift Cards for anonymity except for the whole delivery address thing). I opt out of information sharing when given the option (this is usually a legally required option). What's wrong with cash? When they ask you for address or zip information in the store, you can always say "no thanks."

Look, here's the deal: the privacy genie was out of the bottle long before Google was ever conceived of. Companies like Axciom and Experian already know, and have known for decades, what demo you're in, what products you buy, whether or not you have a lease on your car that's about to expire, and probably a million other things I haven't even thought of. In short: they already know you better than you know yourself. So who really cares about Google, honestly?

I disagree. Corporations have been collecting data, but at a snail's pace, and largely on far less sophisticated equipment. This limits the relational and learning algorithms that are economically feasible. Even today, few corporations have the penetration and computing power (and engineering prowess) to collect that volume of data and pull off massive statistical crunching like Google. Also, those other corporations don't read your email, monitor what you read on a word-for-word basis, or tap your television (youtube) and phone (gtalk). Google does. The internet is instantaneous and all-encompassing, whereas mail-order, phone order, and physical shopping doesn't give anywhere near the same level of detail, and the little detail it yields is very slow-flowing.

Oh, and as an aside, with things like social networking out there, even if you try to disengage from the rest of the world, your friends and family probably haven't, and right now, they're posting pictures about you, writing stories about you, and generally divulging things about you that you probably wish they wouldn't. So, if I were you, I'd find yourself a nice cabin in the woods and hide out there, because frankly, I don't see that you have any other option.

My friends and family have been respectfully asked not to post photos of me. So far, this has worked (for the most part). I don't have an account on centralized blog sites like livejournal, and while I do have accounts on slashdot and even facebook, they don't say too much about me personally. I understand that we're losing our privacy, but I want to control how that happens and limit its damage, specifically as it pertains to how I am targeted through advertising. Your friends must be jerks if you think like that.

You don't actually have an independently functioning brain. Instead, apparently your brain is a slave to the whims of whatever advertisement happens to be presented to you.

So, nevermind. In fact, ignore this post entirely. It probably just confused you.

Oh, good. Now we're throwing around insults. Recall how I said I know a thing or two about statistics. I also know about brand-building and marketing in general. I date a psychology PhD. Let's just say that nobody's brain functions independently; we are all biased by our environments. If you like, I can obtain a dozen peer-reviewed papers that present compelling evidence to that fact. Just consider: why do companies advertise? why do those advertisements often do nothing but say the company name? The answer is that they are building a brand, which equates to trust.