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I live in a small country with multiple languages. Every site knows the country from the IP, and the language from my language headers. Even so, I don't think

I live in a small country with multiple languages. Every site knows the country from the IP, and the language from my language headers. Even so, I don't think 10% of the ads I see give me something I can actually buy in my country, and in the correct language. Youtube is the worst. I get the same 2 ads every few minutes, for weeks, generally for things not applicable to me. The ad networks serve you whatever ads they happen to have laying around, and generally that's a 1 size fits all dumb generic thing. All those metrics exist not because they work, but so the marketeers can convince themselves and their bosses they are doing their job by shoving ads around. Nobody even has to look as long as the illusion someone is looking still holds.

mike_hock 3y ago
They exist so a global surveillance network can be built with ad companies as a front. Ads are perceived as a nuisance but benign and non-threatening. > so the marketeers can convince themselves and their bosses they are doing their job by shoving ads around That's highly plausible. Plausible deniability needs to be plausible.
- fomine3 3y ago
  #conspiracy
  - mike_hock 3y ago
    It's more consistent with observations than the inefficient-advertisers hypothesis, which requires extra excuses to make it work, such as the one presented here: It doesn't work but ill-informed executives want it anyway. We would expect market forces to rout out advertising companies that need to charge extra to run a useless surveillance network that doesn't actually increase conversion rates.
    - hyperman1 3y ago
      We can be both 'right' and 'wrong' at the same time, because the world isn't absolute. Different interests apply their forces, push and pull. Sometimes their interests align. I have no problem believing advertisers lie to their bosses, they do it to everyone else and assuming they don't do it when their interests are served best of all is not an extra excuse. I have also no problem believing todays intelligences see a lovely buildup of information, and decide they want that pile to grow and they want access. Surely rich corporations see dollar signs selling access to this info, and every possible use of it must be looked at at every angle by teams of spindoctors andthink tanks. In fact, I can belizve Google and Facebook accidentally found out they sat on a mountain of info. While not the initial plan, they decided to use and grow it because why not. Undoubtly there are 100's more of these small stories. The world just goes on, and the human brain finds meaning in the complex random patterns that appear, self reinforce, and disappear again. The biggest illusion of all is there is a story to it. Some of us might be more powerfull than others, but no person or group is that influential on its own.
      - mike_hock 3y ago
        That's obviously true. And the NSA has quite a comfortable budget to allow it to push and pull as it pleases. So obviously I agree, except for the subliminal message that just because the NSA doesn't have absolute power and doesn't get its way every single time, we should just ignore it, don't worry and just go home.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

mike_hock 3y ago

They exist so a global surveillance network can be built with ad companies as a front. Ads are perceived as a nuisance but benign and non-threatening. > so the marketeers can convince themselves and their bosses they are doing their job by shoving ads around That's highly plausible. Plausible deniability needs to be plausible.

fomine3 3y ago
#conspiracy
- mike_hock 3y ago
  It's more consistent with observations than the inefficient-advertisers hypothesis, which requires extra excuses to make it work, such as the one presented here: It doesn't work but ill-informed executives want it anyway. We would expect market forces to rout out advertising companies that need to charge extra to run a useless surveillance network that doesn't actually increase conversion rates.
  - hyperman1 3y ago
    We can be both 'right' and 'wrong' at the same time, because the world isn't absolute. Different interests apply their forces, push and pull. Sometimes their interests align. I have no problem believing advertisers lie to their bosses, they do it to everyone else and assuming they don't do it when their interests are served best of all is not an extra excuse. I have also no problem believing todays intelligences see a lovely buildup of information, and decide they want that pile to grow and they want access. Surely rich corporations see dollar signs selling access to this info, and every possible use of it must be looked at at every angle by teams of spindoctors andthink tanks. In fact, I can belizve Google and Facebook accidentally found out they sat on a mountain of info. While not the initial plan, they decided to use and grow it because why not. Undoubtly there are 100's more of these small stories. The world just goes on, and the human brain finds meaning in the complex random patterns that appear, self reinforce, and disappear again. The biggest illusion of all is there is a story to it. Some of us might be more powerfull than others, but no person or group is that influential on its own.
    - mike_hock 3y ago
      That's obviously true. And the NSA has quite a comfortable budget to allow it to push and pull as it pleases. So obviously I agree, except for the subliminal message that just because the NSA doesn't have absolute power and doesn't get its way every single time, we should just ignore it, don't worry and just go home.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]