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What's with all the tinfoil hats? Google != Facebook. Unpopular opinion perhaps, but I believe they use the information I share to enrich my user experience. I

What's with all the tinfoil hats? Google != Facebook. Unpopular opinion perhaps, but I believe they use the information I share to enrich my user experience. It seems less about monetization and more about providing customized services. What am I missing?

fwdpropaganda 8y ago
> I believe they use the information I share to enrich my user experience. Manifestly false. They use your information to target ads. The pages that you've browsed will affect the ads you see on youtube and the paid search results you get. That's right, the paid search results you get are modified not to enrich your experience, but because some advertisers pay more for people with your browsing profile. Does that improve your experience, or does that improve google's advertiser's experience?
- relics443 8y ago
  YMMV but it improves my experience because I get to use all these great products and features Google has, without lifting a finger, and in most cases without paying a penny. All I have to do is ignore the ads on my screen (which my brain seems to already do).
  - fwdpropaganda 8y ago
    > all these great products and features Google has My post wasn't meant to dissuade anyone who's happy with being tracked from using google. I was merely pointing out that the post I was responding to tone of "google is tracking me for my sake" is in most instances based on nothing but faith, and in other cases known counter-examples exist.
- repolfx 8y ago
  It does both. I'm going to see ads no matter what, if I'm not paying. Seeing ads that might be occasionally relevant to me is better an the prior status quo of seeing seizure-inducing punch the monkey ads. These days I mostly see ads for programmer tools: I'm a happier web user as a result. This idea that ad targeting is some kind of shady evil is a very recent one and, as far as I can tell, artificially created by the press as part of a proxy fight against Google and Facebook as disintermediators. It doesn't seem based on anything real.
  - fwdpropaganda 8y ago
    > This idea that ad targeting is some kind of shady evil is a very recent one and, as far as I can tell, artificially created by the press as part of a proxy fight against Google and Facebook as disintermediators. It doesn't seem based on anything real. Just to be clear, are you saying that the claim that google and facebook have vast amounts of information about you doesn't seem based on anything real?
    - repolfx 8y ago
      You're not arguing with what I said. I argued that ad targeting is not evil or shady. But to answer the argument you put in my mouth, I have accounts on both services and use them plenty, so yes, these firms have plenty of data created by me and about me. But if I didn't, they'd just have a few anonymous ad profiles linked to random cookie IDs. I've seen such profiles. That's not very much.
      - fwdpropaganda 8y ago
        Ok I understand. Well, I would argue that it might not be "evil" but it definitely is "shady". But I suspect that from here this conversation would go into the definitions of words, so there's really no point.

fwdpropaganda 8y ago

> I believe they use the information I share to enrich my user experience. Manifestly false. They use your information to target ads. The pages that you've browsed will affect the ads you see on youtube and the paid search results you get. That's right, the paid search results you get are modified not to enrich your experience, but because some advertisers pay more for people with your browsing profile. Does that improve your experience, or does that improve google's advertiser's experience?

relics443 8y ago
YMMV but it improves my experience because I get to use all these great products and features Google has, without lifting a finger, and in most cases without paying a penny. All I have to do is ignore the ads on my screen (which my brain seems to already do).
- fwdpropaganda 8y ago
  > all these great products and features Google has My post wasn't meant to dissuade anyone who's happy with being tracked from using google. I was merely pointing out that the post I was responding to tone of "google is tracking me for my sake" is in most instances based on nothing but faith, and in other cases known counter-examples exist.
repolfx 8y ago
It does both. I'm going to see ads no matter what, if I'm not paying. Seeing ads that might be occasionally relevant to me is better an the prior status quo of seeing seizure-inducing punch the monkey ads. These days I mostly see ads for programmer tools: I'm a happier web user as a result. This idea that ad targeting is some kind of shady evil is a very recent one and, as far as I can tell, artificially created by the press as part of a proxy fight against Google and Facebook as disintermediators. It doesn't seem based on anything real.
- fwdpropaganda 8y ago
  > This idea that ad targeting is some kind of shady evil is a very recent one and, as far as I can tell, artificially created by the press as part of a proxy fight against Google and Facebook as disintermediators. It doesn't seem based on anything real. Just to be clear, are you saying that the claim that google and facebook have vast amounts of information about you doesn't seem based on anything real?
  - repolfx 8y ago
    You're not arguing with what I said. I argued that ad targeting is not evil or shady. But to answer the argument you put in my mouth, I have accounts on both services and use them plenty, so yes, these firms have plenty of data created by me and about me. But if I didn't, they'd just have a few anonymous ad profiles linked to random cookie IDs. I've seen such profiles. That's not very much.
    - fwdpropaganda 8y ago
      Ok I understand. Well, I would argue that it might not be "evil" but it definitely is "shady". But I suspect that from here this conversation would go into the definitions of words, so there's really no point.