4 ms·

Both the EU and US regulations will backfire badly. They both interfere with site optimization and advertising targeting, and both site optimization and advert

Both the EU and US regulations will backfire badly. They both interfere with site optimization and advertising targeting, and both site optimization and advertising targeting impact profits. Rather than taking the hit to their bottom line, publishers will adjust by making explicit user opt-in mandatory. Since explicit opt-in is nice and unambiguous, the targeting itself can then be a lot more invasive. I really don't understand the desire to mess with the current system we have today, which works well enough. The small percentage of users who truly care about tracking have simple and effective technical solutions available to them. Publishers turn a blind eye to these unprofitable users, since their numbers are small. Finally, since most ad targeting currently falls in a policy 'grey area', the ad industry self-polices reasonably well. At least there's going to be some interesting startup opportunities in detecting tracking circumvention and forcing compliance.

Silhouette 16y ago
I couldn't disagree with you more. The current system does not work. Tracking people around the Internet is shady behaviour any way you cut it, and a lot of people don't like it. A lot more people don't even know about it, which is why the effect on sites today is still relatively small. Try sampling a population who have been fully informed about what is going on and see the reaction you get. Ultimately, businesses do not have carte blanche to engage in whatever shady practices they like in the interests of increasing profits. This is why we have laws and why we punish businesses that break those laws. If publishers who want to spy on everyone make opt-in mandatory in response to measures like this, they will just create a market for publishers who are willing to share their content with ads based on that content alone rather than on tracking individual visitors' personal details. This worked well enough to establish things like Google ads in the first place, after all. I have about as much sympathy for any company hit by these measures as I have for cigarette companies who are forced to display a warning about the proven health implications of their product in big letters on the packet.
- gyardley 16y ago
  Try sampling a population who have been fully informed about what is going on and see the reaction you get. I've yet to see a 'fully informed' sample from anyone. While people don't like getting tracked, they don't like getting tracked in contrast to an imaginary situation where they can access all the same content with no tracking whatsoever, which simply isn't possible. Whenever people complain about ad targeting, you should think of the guy who spends all his time grousing about taxes while still wanting the government to pay his for roads and his Medicare and his Social Security. Same thing. Ultimately, businesses do not have carte blanche to engage in whatever shady practices they like in the interests of increasing profits. Of course. This is why online businesses will end up doing what, for example, a credit card provider or a magazine publisher does - they'll tell you that they're going to sell your information six ways as a condition of receiving the service, and the public will say 'well, I want the service, so what choice do I have?' Unless, of course, the government makes the very practice of ad targeting illegal, in which case the content goes behind a paywall where the poor don't get to read it. If publishers who want to spy on everyone make opt-in mandatory in response to measures like this, they will just create a market for publishers who are willing to share their content with ads based on that content alone... Now this argument is like the guy who thinks the government can balance its budget and lower taxes just by getting rid of some sort of vague unspecified 'waste'. You are more than welcome to try to make real money through contextual advertising alone. Unless you own a search engine or are churning out made-for-AdSense content tailored specifically to search queries, you will fail. Brand advertisers doesn't do much contextual, so say goodbye to agency CPMs. The contextual stuff itself performs horribly when users aren't explicitly in 'search' mode. Why do you think those 'three weird tips to losing belly fat' ads are everywhere instead of Google AdSense? Yes, even that spray-and-pray CPA stuff outperforms contextual. Now picture all your brand advertising going away and trying to subsist solely on the pittance you get from education loan and car insurance ads. Now picture doing this while trying to produce quality content. Good luck. I get that people don't like advertising, and I get that they don't like analytics. People expect the web to be like a backlit newspaper, and when they find out that their reading material is reading them back, they're disconcerted. However, they're just going to have to get over it, because that's the real price of 'free'. The alternative is paying for it, which helps turn the internet into a place for the privileged. I've yet to see a scenario that's going to end up better than the muddling-through we're doing now. You can effectively opt-out just by installing an extension, as can anyone else who really, truly cares about a website knowing they're a college-educated male between the ages of 25 and 34. Stop trying to fix the world, you're simply going to make it worse.

Silhouette 16y ago

I couldn't disagree with you more. The current system does not work. Tracking people around the Internet is shady behaviour any way you cut it, and a lot of people don't like it. A lot more people don't even know about it, which is why the effect on sites today is still relatively small. Try sampling a population who have been fully informed about what is going on and see the reaction you get. Ultimately, businesses do not have carte blanche to engage in whatever shady practices they like in the interests of increasing profits. This is why we have laws and why we punish businesses that break those laws. If publishers who want to spy on everyone make opt-in mandatory in response to measures like this, they will just create a market for publishers who are willing to share their content with ads based on that content alone rather than on tracking individual visitors' personal details. This worked well enough to establish things like Google ads in the first place, after all. I have about as much sympathy for any company hit by these measures as I have for cigarette companies who are forced to display a warning about the proven health implications of their product in big letters on the packet.

gyardley 16y ago
Try sampling a population who have been fully informed about what is going on and see the reaction you get. I've yet to see a 'fully informed' sample from anyone. While people don't like getting tracked, they don't like getting tracked in contrast to an imaginary situation where they can access all the same content with no tracking whatsoever, which simply isn't possible. Whenever people complain about ad targeting, you should think of the guy who spends all his time grousing about taxes while still wanting the government to pay his for roads and his Medicare and his Social Security. Same thing. Ultimately, businesses do not have carte blanche to engage in whatever shady practices they like in the interests of increasing profits. Of course. This is why online businesses will end up doing what, for example, a credit card provider or a magazine publisher does - they'll tell you that they're going to sell your information six ways as a condition of receiving the service, and the public will say 'well, I want the service, so what choice do I have?' Unless, of course, the government makes the very practice of ad targeting illegal, in which case the content goes behind a paywall where the poor don't get to read it. If publishers who want to spy on everyone make opt-in mandatory in response to measures like this, they will just create a market for publishers who are willing to share their content with ads based on that content alone... Now this argument is like the guy who thinks the government can balance its budget and lower taxes just by getting rid of some sort of vague unspecified 'waste'. You are more than welcome to try to make real money through contextual advertising alone. Unless you own a search engine or are churning out made-for-AdSense content tailored specifically to search queries, you will fail. Brand advertisers doesn't do much contextual, so say goodbye to agency CPMs. The contextual stuff itself performs horribly when users aren't explicitly in 'search' mode. Why do you think those 'three weird tips to losing belly fat' ads are everywhere instead of Google AdSense? Yes, even that spray-and-pray CPA stuff outperforms contextual. Now picture all your brand advertising going away and trying to subsist solely on the pittance you get from education loan and car insurance ads. Now picture doing this while trying to produce quality content. Good luck. I get that people don't like advertising, and I get that they don't like analytics. People expect the web to be like a backlit newspaper, and when they find out that their reading material is reading them back, they're disconcerted. However, they're just going to have to get over it, because that's the real price of 'free'. The alternative is paying for it, which helps turn the internet into a place for the privileged. I've yet to see a scenario that's going to end up better than the muddling-through we're doing now. You can effectively opt-out just by installing an extension, as can anyone else who really, truly cares about a website knowing they're a college-educated male between the ages of 25 and 34. Stop trying to fix the world, you're simply going to make it worse.