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this post was submitted on 03 Jul 2023
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While I hate the shady data harvesting practices of companies like Meta, I do want to play devil's advocate here, as far as the value of data goes, if only for the sake of me understanding the shortcomings of it better. If a company were to dig through your trash can to get an idea of what you want to eat, so to speak, they'd probably find data on a history of foods you have eaten, if you've been interested in burgers, or any other foods you've been interested in. Or if you've been an adventurous eater in general or if you prefer to stick to variants of the same stuff you normally eat.
It may not give you a foolproof way of knowing what your next actions will be, but wouldn't it give a company an educated guess, at the very least? Enough to improve the chances of targeted ads being more effective, as opposed to missing altogether.
If catching the user's interest is a dice roll, then wouldn't the data at least improve the odds of rolling a number you want?
Ok, think of it this way, if your friend ask you for a local restaraunt recommendation, would you dig through their trash to find their leftover to figure out what kind of food they like, or would you just ask them what they usually like to eat?
That's why people went to forums like reddit for help with everything, because people helping people with volunteered info always work better than being a creep.
Oh yeah, I agree it's more effective, by far. I imagine that's why Google has Opinion Rewards and other companies use surveys to directly understand the needs of their customers. Though getting people in mass to volunteer that info, especially without some small profit incentive like Opinion Rewards might be tricky.
At least in the realm of targeted advertising, the closest example to user input would be when you set up an account, you're prompted to select your interests. Like with Windows 10, when you're setting it up for the first time, you'll be asked about your interests, which Microsoft will then use to send ads and news pertaining to those categories.
But yeah, I see what you mean