on your shopping history. Or rephrased , the value of that data to merchants
http://www.tennessean.com/story/money/2015/05/22/att-fiber-c…
Nashville-area residents signing up for AT&T’s ultra-fast Internet speeds also will be evaluating how much their data privacy is worth to them.
AT&T is offering its new local fiber customers the choice of sharing their Web browsing history with the telecom company or paying more to keep it private — an additional $29 a month. By sharing Web searches and sites visited, fiber customers receive advertising based on their data.
I must be unusual because I can’t remember ever buying anything from an e-mail or pop up ad
The U.S. is likely to see massive shift in Internet service…
Currently there is oligopoly among proviers - Comcast and it cohorts in cable, AT&T and party with DSL and Verizon with its FiOS - all have friendly competition.
With Google fiber triggering of competition and wave of new technologies (DOCSIS3.1, WiFi and G.Fast), the next land grab will start. These AT&T gimmicks will take backseat to real competition…
Over next few years, we should see better service or lower price or both… I, for one, am looking forward to it!
2 Likes
I dont think you are unusual at all, unless we are riding in the same boat. I have never bought anything through a pop up ad or email. When I do get the targeted advertising on web sites or by email, it is for items that I have already researched and made a purchase decision on. It all seems fairly reactionary to me. My understanding is that advertising is supposed to spur me to want something, not rehash my previous decisions.
Bill
1 Like
When I do get the targeted advertising on web sites or by email, it is for items that I have already researched and made a purchase decision on. It all seems fairly reactionary to me. My understanding is that advertising is supposed to spur me to want something, not rehash my previous decisions.
Yes, I agree. I remember once, researching a particular item I wanted to buy a friend as a gift, looking at price differential on several sites. Found the best price for the item I wanted and purchased it. But then, for the next month, it seems that on 50% of the (unrelated) sites I visited, there was an ad for that same item from one of the sites where I did not purchase it. Rather than an enticing reminder to purchase an item I had once considered, I experienced it as annoying nagging. I mean, in my mind I kept telling that company: “Look, I’ve already purchased the item elsewhere at a better price. I’m not still interested in buying it. Stop annoying me.”
Even more relevant (to the Fool World, at least) I was recently targeted for FoolOne. Perhaps because each time it opens I do sign up as interested, because although not currently cost effective for me, I enjoy access to the all promo videos, stock discussions, and videos from events. For a month or so during the time ONE was open, almost every time site I visited (not stock related) a picture of Tom Gardner would show up inviting me to sign up for Fool One. He appeared so often on a variety of webpages I visited it almost felt like he was stalking me. It gave rise to a very strange feeling in me.
I have been a member of one Fool subscription service or another for more than a decade and feel exceptionally positive about it and really can’t imagine a time I would not be a member. I have met both David and Tom and have the utmost respect for both of them. However, seeing Tom’s face pop up appearing as if looking at me wherever I went on the web week after week really did feel like I was being stalked. It was strange!
As a result of my experiences with targeted marketing (these and others like them) I have very mixed feelings about investing in CRTO. I understand the positives of the business, but am conflicted about investing in something whose effective business strategy creates an effect in my own personal experience of it such uncomfortable strangeness.
okapimoon
4 Likes
AdBlock Plus will cure most of the problem in your own life, if you can forget what is happening to others.
Bottom line, advertising that works gets paid for. Advertising that doesn’t work stops being used.