5 ms·

As someone working for a company that is big on personalization (but working on totally different things): Yes! Thank you! Even if personalization worked, I wo

by larsrc 4y ago

As someone working for a company that is big on personalization (but working on totally different things): Yes! Thank you! Even if personalization worked, I wouldn't want it. Not just for the obvious privacy reasons, but because it would not be relevant to my current context most of the time. If I'm looking at a camera review page, I don't want ads for flower bulbs or shirts or whatever else I may be interested in. If there has to be ads, make them relevant to the context. I would be much more likely to buy some camera accessories from such a page than something irrelevant and distracting.

the_gipsy 4y ago
The thing is, you don't want ads, period. There are no relevant ads you would want, it's either unbiased information or someone trying to con you into buying their crap.
- nebulous_two 4y ago
  And yet we are bombarded with them. Thanks, market. You really gave us what we wanted. Oh wait -- that's not actually your objective!
- bluGill 4y ago
  That is false. If I have a mouse problem I want to know about your better mousetrap. It doesn't do me any good if you invent it but I never find out about it. Most ads are for garbage I don't want/need, and many are scams, but there are still a number of ads out there for things that I would buy if only I knew they exists.
  - amelius 4y ago
    But do you want to be distracted by mouse traps every time you search for work related things? Why not put all ads into a website that is dedicated to ads, so that users who want them can look them up?
  - shkkmo 4y ago
    If you have a mouse problem, you want to hear from an expert which trap works best in which circumstance. Having each mouse trap company bombard you with half truths and lies about their traps isn't really helpful.
    - mattw2121 4y ago
      How does the expert know what traps exist? How do we know the expert isn't being paid by the companies to give favorable reviews? Do we need a team of experts that certify the expert reviewers so we can trust the reviewers results? How do we know both sets of experts are being bribed?
      - shkkmo 4y ago
        None of those problems make advertising any better of a solution for getting information.
        robbedpeter 4y ago
        Advertising incentivizes lying. The best presentation wins, in this current ad market. Metrics that track good faith interactions are needed, like eBay reputation - if someone isn't 98% or higher, they're going to be overlooked or bypassed in favor of someone with a higher score. Product reviews and ratings get gamed, because current systems don't reward good faith transactions - Amazon and Google customers purchase attention and shuffle facts around top maximize purchases. If quality reviews and curation were incentivized, there would be a thriving class of reviewers and experts playing a role in the marketplace. Their absence is glaring, and the horde of product influencers and professional reviewers underscore the deep corruption of adtech. Those people leech money from the market by selling the ability to lie. The lies are sanctioned by adtech firms, and often laundered through otherwise reliable data sources. Any legitimate attempt to compete threatens the entire adtech ecosystem, so a majority of all consumer marketplaces are incentivized to cultivate the corruption and prevent any changes or reform that threaten the sanctified lies. Things like Angie's List and product review vlogs and expert podcasts are stuck within the system, regardless of their intent or functionality when they start. They eventually converge into niches that support the system as a whole. Even reddit, requiring individual human dialog and interaction, has been infested by professional reviewers shilling crappy products. You can't trust the data sources because trustworthy sources are incompatible with adtech. Google has sufficient data to fix it, but they'd lose money by allowing reform, so they maintain the ethically gray areas ferociously. Their business is not quality search, it's maximizing advertising profits, and it's more profitable to have 50 people paying a premium for scraps than 5 high quality vendors with vetted products earning those spots through quality and service. The system is working as intended.
troupe 4y ago
I see some companies working to personalize things in ways that you don't see is personalized. Target can tell if you are pregnant by your buying habits but they found that sending people mailers with just baby stuff creeps them out. (And creeps out the parents of pregnant teens that might not know their daughter is pregnant yet.) So now they send mailers with just enough random things to make it look like a generic mailer, but as much baby related stuff as they can get away with adding. That way you don't know that Target knows you are pregnant, but they still can target the mailer to you.
- ece 4y ago
  Buying habits seem like 1st party data, and this seems more like a recommender system that is opt in, if you get mailers. But, by your own admission, if it's creepy, it's not working. Does targeting help Target sell more baby stuff, or does putting baby stuff next to the women's department sell more? Maybe an in person helper could do better.
  - troupe 4y ago
    I believe it is tied to their rewards program of some type or a Target credit card. But yes it does help sell more. If they are keeping track of what people by to target advertising, I'm sure they are measuring the return. An expectant mother seeing car seats in a flyer from Target is going to be more likely to go look for a car seat there than someone who doesn't think about Target having a car seat and orders it off Amazon or else where simply because they didn't think to go look at the car seat section in the store.
    - ece 4y ago
      1st party data and the customer being receptive (opt-in/looking to see what's in a Target flyer) seem like two advantages that an ad on the internet will never really have. Ad retargeting and such seem like multiple points of contact at best. Ads based on context seem like they could get closer in both ways. In the context of this article, I would just like to see 3rd party cookie alternatives that do some of this better without tracking.
marcinzm 4y ago
Fun question: If someone was doing context aware personalization would you even notice or would you simply assume they're doing no personalization?
- larsrc 4y ago
  Depends. If I was looking at a comparison of different camera brands and only saw ads for things for my brand, I might wonder. But that would be much, much, _much_ better than the current personalization.

by larsrc 4y ago

the_gipsy 4y ago

The thing is, you don't want ads, period. There are no relevant ads you would want, it's either unbiased information or someone trying to con you into buying their crap.

nebulous_two 4y ago
And yet we are bombarded with them. Thanks, market. You really gave us what we wanted. Oh wait -- that's not actually your objective!
bluGill 4y ago
That is false. If I have a mouse problem I want to know about your better mousetrap. It doesn't do me any good if you invent it but I never find out about it. Most ads are for garbage I don't want/need, and many are scams, but there are still a number of ads out there for things that I would buy if only I knew they exists.
- amelius 4y ago
  But do you want to be distracted by mouse traps every time you search for work related things? Why not put all ads into a website that is dedicated to ads, so that users who want them can look them up?
- shkkmo 4y ago
  If you have a mouse problem, you want to hear from an expert which trap works best in which circumstance. Having each mouse trap company bombard you with half truths and lies about their traps isn't really helpful.
  - mattw2121 4y ago
    How does the expert know what traps exist? How do we know the expert isn't being paid by the companies to give favorable reviews? Do we need a team of experts that certify the expert reviewers so we can trust the reviewers results? How do we know both sets of experts are being bribed?
    - shkkmo 4y ago
      None of those problems make advertising any better of a solution for getting information.
      - robbedpeter 4y ago
        Advertising incentivizes lying. The best presentation wins, in this current ad market. Metrics that track good faith interactions are needed, like eBay reputation - if someone isn't 98% or higher, they're going to be overlooked or bypassed in favor of someone with a higher score. Product reviews and ratings get gamed, because current systems don't reward good faith transactions - Amazon and Google customers purchase attention and shuffle facts around top maximize purchases. If quality reviews and curation were incentivized, there would be a thriving class of reviewers and experts playing a role in the marketplace. Their absence is glaring, and the horde of product influencers and professional reviewers underscore the deep corruption of adtech. Those people leech money from the market by selling the ability to lie. The lies are sanctioned by adtech firms, and often laundered through otherwise reliable data sources. Any legitimate attempt to compete threatens the entire adtech ecosystem, so a majority of all consumer marketplaces are incentivized to cultivate the corruption and prevent any changes or reform that threaten the sanctified lies. Things like Angie's List and product review vlogs and expert podcasts are stuck within the system, regardless of their intent or functionality when they start. They eventually converge into niches that support the system as a whole. Even reddit, requiring individual human dialog and interaction, has been infested by professional reviewers shilling crappy products. You can't trust the data sources because trustworthy sources are incompatible with adtech. Google has sufficient data to fix it, but they'd lose money by allowing reform, so they maintain the ethically gray areas ferociously. Their business is not quality search, it's maximizing advertising profits, and it's more profitable to have 50 people paying a premium for scraps than 5 high quality vendors with vetted products earning those spots through quality and service. The system is working as intended.

troupe 4y ago

I see some companies working to personalize things in ways that you don't see is personalized. Target can tell if you are pregnant by your buying habits but they found that sending people mailers with just baby stuff creeps them out. (And creeps out the parents of pregnant teens that might not know their daughter is pregnant yet.) So now they send mailers with just enough random things to make it look like a generic mailer, but as much baby related stuff as they can get away with adding. That way you don't know that Target knows you are pregnant, but they still can target the mailer to you.

ece 4y ago
Buying habits seem like 1st party data, and this seems more like a recommender system that is opt in, if you get mailers. But, by your own admission, if it's creepy, it's not working. Does targeting help Target sell more baby stuff, or does putting baby stuff next to the women's department sell more? Maybe an in person helper could do better.
- troupe 4y ago
  I believe it is tied to their rewards program of some type or a Target credit card. But yes it does help sell more. If they are keeping track of what people by to target advertising, I'm sure they are measuring the return. An expectant mother seeing car seats in a flyer from Target is going to be more likely to go look for a car seat there than someone who doesn't think about Target having a car seat and orders it off Amazon or else where simply because they didn't think to go look at the car seat section in the store.
  - ece 4y ago
    1st party data and the customer being receptive (opt-in/looking to see what's in a Target flyer) seem like two advantages that an ad on the internet will never really have. Ad retargeting and such seem like multiple points of contact at best. Ads based on context seem like they could get closer in both ways. In the context of this article, I would just like to see 3rd party cookie alternatives that do some of this better without tracking.

marcinzm 4y ago

Fun question: If someone was doing context aware personalization would you even notice or would you simply assume they're doing no personalization?

larsrc 4y ago
Depends. If I was looking at a comparison of different camera brands and only saw ads for things for my brand, I might wonder. But that would be much, much, _much_ better than the current personalization.