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Considering that Target can tell whether you're pregnant or not before you do based on your purchases, I'd assume that online habits encode your preferences a l
by swsieber 11y ago
Considering that Target can tell whether you're pregnant or not before you do based on your purchases, I'd assume that online habits encode your preferences a lot more strongly that one would like to think.
More info on that weird pregnancy story: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/magazine/shopping-habits.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/magazine/shopping-habits.h...
- maxerickson 11y agoYou've over stated things, Target makes the pregnancy prediction based on pregnancy related purchases, someone making those purchases is going to be aware they are pregnant. In the article, a father is outraged that his teenaged daughter received an ad for baby clothes and complained to a store manager, he didn't know his daughter was pregnant.
- vonmoltke 11y agoThey can't tell "before you do". They can tell before you tell people, but the woman needs to know she's pregnant before her habits change.
- IanCal 11y agoThat's definitely true in this story, but is this general statement true? > the woman needs to know she's pregnant before her habits change. There are always stories of people who don't realise they're pregnant, do their habits change in a reasonably identifiable way? This wasn't particularly relevant to the point, I just wondered and thought it was an interesting question.