If you ask somebody if they want personalized ads, of course they say no. That sounds creepy.
But in reality, those ads work, which means that people are more likely to make a voluntary economic transaction after seeing them than they would be in the base condition.
So this comes down to: do we believe what people say... or what they do?
You're missing a case, which is the one I fall into. I recognize that ads work and I don't want them too.
This is why I indiscriminately block or avoid them whenever I can. I would like to believe that I'm above the influence of ads but I'm not and I seem to have no control over my or my children's exposure to them. Sure, I could just not use the internet but that's only a small portion of the ads I see everyday; I can't watch TV, listen to radio, read newspapers or magazines, hell I can't even go out in public without being bombarded with them!
But on the internet I have at least a few tools to fight back, but they're slowly being eroded now that advertisers are paying for content itself.
The ads aren't targeted. Or, I'm a really odd target. For example, after this comment section, the next ad I saw was this ad[1] from Dice (served via Doubleclick); a variant of this ad is running on a Billboard in SF, too. Every single variant that I've seen depicts a white or Indian male, typically trying to look sexy but inevitably only looking awkward. All I can think when I see them is "Yes, good, let's continue to perpetuate the stereotypes the industry is trying so hard to fix…". I'll not be using anything from them anytime soon, because of those ads.
Dice is one of the "good" ones, too. Not like all the "Want to live forever? The one weird trick doctors don't want you to know!" or whatever. Do advertisers really think I going to click an obviously fraudulent ad? You might argue "some do!" … but this is targeted ads, right? So surely by now you would know…
At one point, the ads _had_ determined that I was interested in buying computer parts correctly — although I got ads for disks when I was buying motherboards — then continued to display for months after the purchase, when I was of course no longer interested.
Disclaimer: I work for Google, although on Cloud Platform. I've never spent any time working on ads or anything related to it.
That said, I would say yes, I do want targeted ads.
When I search for things with the intent of buying something, the ads I see tend to be for high end products. For example, if I search for 'gas range' (something for which I'm currently in the market), I get ads for Bosch, Viking, and Garland. If I open an incognito tab and search I see results for Frigidaire, KitchenAid, and Hotpoint. If I'm going to see ads[0] I'd like them to be ads for things I might actually consider buying.
I don't see how it's substantially different from the personal shoppers offered by places like White House/Black Market and Nordstorm (I picked those two because my wife uses both of their services, but it's a common practice at many brick and mortar retailers). In the targeted ads case it's a set of algorithms which have, over time, learned my tastes and when I'm interested in making purchases. In her case it's a person who's done precisely the same thing.
[0]: In general I'd prefer not to, but I refuse to use ad blocking as it takes away support for the sites I visit from impression-based ads. I do use Google Contributor (https://www.google.com/contributor/welcome/) to eliminate ads wherever possible without compromising on financial support.
> But in reality, those ads work, which means that people are more likely to make a voluntary economic transaction after seeing them than they would be in the base condition.
That's precisely why I make sure to never see them :)
I wonder what the system thinks that Mirimir wants?
This is a gross mischaracterization of the OP's post, done in the most offensive way possible, at the expense of people who have suffered one of the most violent and traumatizing of possible crimes. To even attempt to compare rape victim behavior to advertising efficacy is disgusting and dehumanizing.
You should be ashamed of yourself, but I doubt you are.
I never said anything about rape victim behavior. I am a feminist and a radical; I see nothing wrong with connecting the logic of a rapist ("consent is not important") to OP's comment and denigrating this destructive attitude wherever I find it. And yes, I believe the two ARE connected. I find your comment thoughtless and reactionary.
> I never said anything about rape victim behavior.
You certainly implied this.
> I see nothing wrong with connecting the logic of a rapist ("consent is not important") to OP's comment and denigrating this destructive attitude wherever I find it.
The fact that you equate these two even abstractly is very surprising.
> I find your comment thoughtless and reactionary.
I'm not one of the people who flagged the parent comment but: Believe it or not, people in an adult conversation are capable of agreeing with (or at least finding interesting) the general content of a comment without finding the way it was phrased to be helpful or appropriate. Even your (failed) attempt at adult conversation in this comment had more substance and was more illuminating of the actual point than the flagged comment was.
The thing is, actual educated, reasoned adults should be capable of understanding the point a person is making, without straining at a gnat, and without making a mountain out of a mole hill.
Our society, says everyone, is way too sensitive and "PC". And, yet, we continue to attack people over the slightest perception of wrong doing.
I realise that the argument upsets you (and frankly, it's difficult to figure the analogy), but that doesn't make it wrong. A different analogy (that's quite as offensive) might be slavery (""" = fake quote):
"""If you ask somebody if they want to be enslaved, of course they say no. That sounds evil.
But in reality, slavery works, which means that people are more likely to work hard after being enslaved than they would be in the base condition.
So this comes down to: do we believe what people say... or what they do?"""
But in reality, those ads work, which means that people are more likely to make a voluntary economic transaction after seeing them than they would be in the base condition.
So this comes down to: do we believe what people say... or what they do?