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There is no such thing as privacy focused ad tech. The purpose of ads is to know you and influence your future.

browningstreet 2y ago
Or to let you know about a market option. I think there’s a need for a business to let customers know they exist. I’m not against ads per se, but certainly against tracking and poorly integrated and over-stuffing of ads into content. And at times I’ve wished there was a non-tracking, “tasteful” ad company.
- ndriscoll 2y ago
  A business directory or trade magazines are legitimate ways for people to find out about businesses, services, and products they're interested in. i.e. a pull model. A push model inevitably is used not just to inform, but to manipulate people's desires to increase consumptive behavior, turning them into worse humans. Many businesses prey upon and amplify people's insecurities to do this, making people deeply unhappy. The spying is evil. The actual messages delivered are evil. The entire industry is rotten to the core.
  - Groxx 2y ago
    I completely agree that pull vs push is a core, super-relevant distinction and pull is vastly less dubious in basically every way... ... but isn't a search engine's response basically a pull? You've explicitly stated that you're interested in X by searching for it. "An x" vs "The x" is of course relevant, but you can't reliably infer that. Or do you mean that the difference is whether you're looking in advertising-focused places? Like having a dedicated "include ads" option on search or something.
    - mikeiz404 2y ago
      When people place a search query their intent is not always to purchase something (though the search results these days often seem to suggest otherwise).
  - JohnFen 2y ago
    Generally speaking, advertising is necessary and can be done in a way that benefits everyone. In practice, how advertising is actually done (and particularly how it's done online) is utterly despicable. > The entire industry is rotten to the core. I tend to agree.
creer 2y ago
There is no fundamental privacy issue with "influencing your future" without disclosure to the advertiser. The question is what is it that this ad tech company claims to offer? And then does run in practice? There is certainly space for more vendors in this direction. There are other issues but not so much privacy. For example a self-hosted ad platform which offers to run ads based on internal browsing profile would be let through at this site at least. In reasonable amount, bandwidth overhead and annoyance to the human. The issue currently is that there seems to be much more money in selling all the data outright - and that gets a sharp no.

Or to let you know about a market option. I think there’s a need for a business to let customers know they exist. I’m not against ads per se, but certainly against tracking and poorly integrated and over-stuffing of ads into content. And at times I’ve wished there was a non-tracking, “tasteful” ad company.

ndriscoll 2y ago
A business directory or trade magazines are legitimate ways for people to find out about businesses, services, and products they're interested in. i.e. a pull model. A push model inevitably is used not just to inform, but to manipulate people's desires to increase consumptive behavior, turning them into worse humans. Many businesses prey upon and amplify people's insecurities to do this, making people deeply unhappy. The spying is evil. The actual messages delivered are evil. The entire industry is rotten to the core.
- Groxx 2y ago
  I completely agree that pull vs push is a core, super-relevant distinction and pull is vastly less dubious in basically every way... ... but isn't a search engine's response basically a pull? You've explicitly stated that you're interested in X by searching for it. "An x" vs "The x" is of course relevant, but you can't reliably infer that. Or do you mean that the difference is whether you're looking in advertising-focused places? Like having a dedicated "include ads" option on search or something.
  - mikeiz404 2y ago
    When people place a search query their intent is not always to purchase something (though the search results these days often seem to suggest otherwise).
- JohnFen 2y ago
  Generally speaking, advertising is necessary and can be done in a way that benefits everyone. In practice, how advertising is actually done (and particularly how it's done online) is utterly despicable. > The entire industry is rotten to the core. I tend to agree.

creer 2y ago

There is no fundamental privacy issue with "influencing your future" without disclosure to the advertiser. The question is what is it that this ad tech company claims to offer? And then does run in practice? There is certainly space for more vendors in this direction. There are other issues but not so much privacy. For example a self-hosted ad platform which offers to run ads based on internal browsing profile would be let through at this site at least. In reasonable amount, bandwidth overhead and annoyance to the human. The issue currently is that there seems to be much more money in selling all the data outright - and that gets a sharp no.