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Microsoft Search Advertisers Get Personal
Alascom writes "According to this AP report, Microsoft is raising privacy concerns by allowing search advertisers to use personal information. Yusuf Mehdi, a corporate vice president with the MSN unit, said Microsoft has gathered this personal information by tracking users who have logged into its Hotmail e-mail program or other Microsoft Web sites in order to allow advertisers to target their ads to a specific audience."
I guess we should have read the license agreement....
The following statement is true
The preceding statement is false
I got some really scary ads that have been keeping me up at night! How do they know I HAVE A SMALL PENIS! OMG this is a travesty. I should have given them a fake zip code and should have lied about my penis size on the questionnaire.
Targeted advertising? Wow, that Microsoft sure does always seem to innovate...
I'll turn into a supernova and burn up everything. Well I'll turn into a black little hole and you'll turn into string.
Yusuf Mehdi, a corporate vice president with the MSN unit, said Microsoft has gathered this personal information by tracking users who have logged into its Hotmail e-mail program or other Microsoft Web sites, and then matching the data they provided with publicly known demographics, such as average income for a particular ZIP code.
From Yusuf Mehdi bio:
In addition, Mehdi is also responsible for leading Microsoft's platform efforts for online advertising and digital marketing with responsibility for brand, direct marketing, pay for performance and business intelligence systems.
From the article:
Microsoft has made its name selling software, he (analyst David Garrity) said, and the new model of giving a product away and making money from advertising requires a steep learning curve.
and I love this name:
Chris Hoofnagle of the Electronic Privacy Information Center said Microsoft's efforts are part of an industrywide trend of using personal information to garner advertising dollars.
The rock, the vulture, and the chain
From the article: "That's probably the thing I feel worst about over the last few years -- not making our own R&D investment," Ballmer said. Umh, wasn't there a certain monkey dance that is regretted more?
1) Collect personal information for years with privacy notice consisting of twenty pages of legal language displayed in a 4"x1" scroll box. First line reads "Your privacy is our foremost concern." Last line reads "Terms may be changed at any time without notice."
2) Don't do anything until you've got enough information to be valuable.
3) Change terms without notice.
4) Sell personal information and PROFIT!
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
Being a convicted monopoly doesn't make everything they do illegal.
Yep.. I abandoned my hotmail account years ago when they came with additional terms of use and mandatory passport... as for yahoo, I went to yahoo.co.uk as at the time they didn't register all that much and they are still certain that I am 89 years old living in antarctica and I have an avid interest in receiving free information about birdwatching, these free informational mails are forwarded to my hotmail account, which I haven't even thought about since 1998...
-if at first you don't succeed, stay the heck away from paragliding.
I signed up for free email before hotmail was bought by microsoft. I remember the day I logged in and the little butterfly logo had landed on the page, sad day. The privacy agreements had to of changed.
On a side note I still think it's hilarious that microsofts mascot is a bug.
*DrugCheese rants*
How else would they know to show me ads for Linux servers?