Slashdot Mirror
New Technique for Tracking Web Site Visitors
bigtallmofo writes "According to Jupiter Research, 58% of web surfers deleted cookies from their system in 2004. This has sent a loud message to marketers in regard to consumer's preference as to tracking their online activities. The marketers have responded with PIE. Persistent Identification Element (PIE) is a technology that uses Macromedia's Flash MX to track you even without using cookies. Macromedia has created a page to instruct users on how to disable this."
Who modded this crap up?
I routinely go through Firefox's cookie manager and delete any cookie that isn't necessary for logins and keeping preferences. My fiancee does the same thing with Mozilla.
On that note, it's obnoxious that some webshites require cookies just to browse. It's at least as annoying as saying "Sorry, you're not using NS 4.0 or IE 4.0; go away." Bestbuy.com is an example of this.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
If flash was used to really implement 1) as you purport I would agree, but 99% of the stuff out there is to add animation to the navigation (example : most official game site those day) and other gimmick, and frankly up until now, a dozen web page with a few picture isn't taking you 1200K as far as I know. Plain old html is the easiest to navigate, and read and load.
Plain Old English is also the easiest to understand. Look into it.
Sinch
Favorite piece of TFA:
... Well, he is CEO of this company, whatever the hell that is worth ...
"Mookie Tanembaum, founder and chief executive of United Virtualities, says the company is trying to help consumers by preventing them from deleting cookies that help website operators deliver better services."
First of all, what the hell kind of name is Mookie? And when your last name is ALREADY 'Tanembaum' why would you pair that up with Mookie? To torture your kids? You sadistic bastards
Back to the subject at hand: I love how they are "helping" me by circumventing my own decision to keep my web viewing habits anonymous to certain sites. They make it sound like we're all addicted to heroin, and this is their version of a rehab clinic. People delete cookies for a reason. And that reason isn't to get high. I prefer to remain anonymous for a majority of the websites that I visit on a daily basis. If you want to persist my information across multiple sessions, then create an account system. If I want to use the extra features, to order something, or to post in discussions, then I'll log in. Otherwise, leave me the hell alone and just use normal cookies for tracking same-day or same-week visits.