I started to put this in the AI/energy thread, but it’s not totally on point there, so “A Thread Is Born.” (PS: One use would be to have this website stop telling me “this is similar to another post”, when I use the word “curtain” and it lists a bunch of posts about “The Iron Curtain”. Just sayin’)
I recently read a summary of what happens when you visit a website, and cannot find it right now, so my summary of a summary will have to do.
So you visit some random website, and it loads quickly, and a second or two later an ad is displayed on the site. Occasionally the ad loads slowly and you are hung up for an extra second or two, but no big deal, right?
So. You ask for the website. The site says to Google (or to itself, or some other intermediary) “here is a consumer ready to view an ad.” We all know that. What I didn’t know, or maybe knew but didn’t really comprehend is: “This consumer’s data profile is ….
And this is where it gets creepy, because the data vacuums know all about you. They know your address and phone, your credit score, what kind of car you drive. What neighborhood you live in, and who your neighbors are. Whether you have donated to a political candidate and if so, who. If you are religious or not, have kids in school, and at least some (perhaps not all) medical conditions you might have had*. They know what street you used to live on, and the street before that, and the street before that. Your education, your siblings, your, … well, you get the idea. There is a VAST data base just full of little-ole-YOU, ripe for the plucking.
And the data broker communicates to advertisers, who are waiting in a cyber auditorium, and they bid for the right to put their ad in front of your face. The auction takes microseconds, and the winner of the auction then decides which of its many ads it wants to serve you and offers it up.
This all happens in the blink of an eye, although there’s occasionally a logjam at one node or the auction takes a fraction longer than usual or whatever. The audition, of course, must be billed to the right advertiser, who has paid thousandths of a penny for the right to be in your face, so all that is happening too, in real time.
The point of the article was no “Wow, isn’t this technology great, and better ads are swell”, but to emphasize how much of a data trail we leave behind everywhere we go. And how it is used, and for me - in the context of the “power generation necessary for AI”, how much all of this “super efficiency” is really costing.
- Lots of stuff is hidden by HIPAA, but all your other drug store purchases are in there if they choose to look, so painkillers, asthma meds, cold sores, cushion insoles, whether you bought a cane or not, ALL THAT is available, at a price, to whoever bids the highest. Yeah, creepy.