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Marketers Back "Cookies Are Good For You" Campaign
Makarand writes "The increasing numbers of computer users
who regularly delete cookies downloaded by
their browsers is
worrying online marketers and Web
site publishers who feel that the changing
consumer attitude towards cookies is harming
cookie usefulness and unfairly lumping them
with spyware and viruses. This industry group
wants to persuade companies making antispyware programs
to spare legitimate cookies while sweeping hard drives clean
of unnecessary or harmful files.
Some marketers think that providing consumers more information about cookies and how they're used
might change their attitudes towards cookies.
Others are already busy experimenting with newer approaches to serve up targeted ads even if a user has deleted his cookies."
Brainlessly agreeing with what marketers say without seeking out more information is bad for you.
Not that I'm against cookies, I'm just against stupidity.
That's what my mom used to say... wait... no..
Well, if you can "serve up targeted ads even if a user has deleted his cookies," then the whole cookie thing is pretty much moot. You don't even need the cookies in the first place.
C is for cookie, it's good enough for me; oh cookie cookie cookie starts with C.
I wonder if I'm one of the people worrying them. I have cookies off by default, and only turn them on for sites that really need them by whitelisting.
Those that I don't want to use a cookie for but have to, I allow to set one but only for the session.
Firefox has been helpful in this, but I would like an easier method of whitelisting cookies than having to go through two layers of preference panels. And no, having it ask me every time a site wants to set a cookie is not the solution.
Error 404 - Sig Not Found
The fact that people get assaulted with a barrage of cookie requests everytime they visit a website makes for a bit of an annoying visit. Ever try telling Firefox to ask before accepting a cookie? What the hell do I need so many cookies for when I visit "your" website? Also, with all the recent headlines about consumer information being mishandled makes people all the more wary. Capitalism cares nothing about privacy, only money.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
There are sites out there requiring a cookie to get past ads - you know I always give up at that point. I have never needed to see something under those cases.
So honestly - one of you cookie advocates give me a good reason to accept your cookie just because I want to visit a page on your site.
I talk about stuff.
... although I should note that I *do* work in marketing, as a Webmaster. But cookies really do have a great number of uses, and often provide a good amount of convenience to users without having too many pernicious uses in practice. When people who don't know better are prompted by adaware to delete all of their cookies, the net effect is more likely to be frustration than anything--people don't tend to remember their passwords, for example, so being "forgotten" by some sites is likely to be a pain.
And while cookies might be used to 'serve up targeted ads', it seems to me that if you're going to be served ads *anyhow* then you might as well see things that might be of interest to you...
Cookies are used for storing your session information and preferences for sites. That's what the mechanism was designed for, and so far nothing better has come up to replace it.
In terms of tracking your preferences, I have mixed feelings. On one hand, I don't like someone keeping track of my browsing preferences for unrelated sites. On another, I'd rather see ads that may interest me than yet another "punch the monkey" or "refinance your home". Most people hate ads because they are annoying and uninteresting to them, not because they are selling something. This is why Google is successful: they are good at improving the chances that the ad you see is related to what you are looking for.
See charts for twitter trends on Trendistic
If marketers want to to keep cookies, then that's all the proof I need to delete them. If these are the people who brought us popups, popunders, flash adds, etc., then screw 'em. I will block their efforts at very turn.
I keep cookies enabled by default, but delete them regularly, adding the sites to my "block" list. It's sort of a hobby to see how many sites I can collect.
You do realize that your harmless login-only news sites, and quite possibly your bank too, sell your viewing habits to marketers as an additional source of revenue, right? Sure it won't identify you (I hope, for you) but you feed the marketting system all the same.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
And realizing that cookies aren't spyware, but rather a means by which marketing companies gather and compile data about me on my own computer so that they more effectively target me with their advertising makes me more attitudinally inclined too. . .
Ummm, where's that nuke button again?
See, that's the problem with marketers. They like marketing and think it's a good thing, so they think we like marketing and think it's a good thing.
Whereas most of us think that Bill Hicks was being a bit of a soft hearted wuss in his displayed attitude toward them.
He simply called upon them to kill themselves. We want to roast them, slowly, while we watch.
Pass the beer.
KFG
What a nifty trick.
n /flashplayer/help/settings_manager02.html
Looks as if flash gives each site a very small amount of local storage.
The article says it can be disabled, but doesn't link to any information.
A quick trip over to macromedia shows the web access controls... which is handy for setting global restrictions. Not really sure where my flash panel would be other then when the module is loaded, but here is a link to a web based method of setting those restrictions.
http://www.macromedia.com/support/documentation/e
"You should always go to other people's funerals; otherwise, they won't come to yours." -- Yogi Berra
I originally read that as "Monsters Back "Cookies Are Good For You" Campaign", as in the cookie monster. hah.
"Other [marketers] are already busy experimenting with newer approaches to serve up targeted ads even if a user has deleted his cookies."
.exe files in hidden parts of a website, hoping to take control of their customers' computers.
With attitudes like that, they wonder why people don't trust them?
These are the same people that discovered Flash could open popup windows even when you've disabled javascript. The same people that think nothing of attacking any security vulnerability they can find to display adverts. The same people that fill-up my "blocked webservers" list with dynamically-generated hostnames. The same people that put ActiveX controls with
Malicious use of anothers' computer without authorisation. Basically, "hackers" in the let's stop these criminals sense.
I have not yet turned javascript of (not permanently anyway), but i do block .swf and i have installed adblock.
Get it marketorid lusers - i dont want your porn*, propertary software or whatever. And i WILL block it, as i see it as a waste of my time, bandwidth and electricity.
*All good porn are free on usenet anyway.
Freedom or George Bush
It's what the title might as well be...
Tag lost or not installed.
Cookies are useful and necessary in many cases (or perhaps they avoid ugly workarounds for statefulness).
But here's what everybody should do:
1) Go to the W3C
2) Come up with a "standard" cookie
3) This standard would have plainly understandable fields that tell you *exactly* what is in that cookie
4) The browser makers and MS would make cookies easily visible and browsable
5) Users could then decide to keep a cookie based on (a) Who its from (b) its content
6) Cookies that don't adhere to the standard could be deleted by browsers without comment.
Can this be abused? Of course. But the answer to this isn't more marketing jargon, its to make the process more transparent so people understand what's going on.
This is simple stuff. Why do we have to make it so hard?
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
- When google tries to set third party cookie tied to a keyword in you search. You then may have cookie for a site you never visited and one you may never visit
- When a site tries to set a cookie before any content is loaded. This used to be standard for those firms trying to get traffic through mistyped URL. Now, unfortunately, even legitimate websites do this more than not.
- When a site sets 10 cookies on the home page
Business is about trying to set up a relationship between people offering a product or service and people willing to acquire the product or service. Reputable businesses do not ask to see the customer cash at the door. Even reputable car dealers do not ask it you are going to buy today.These cookies problems are largely caused by firms forcing users to make decisions about cookies on the home page, and secondarily, forcing users to make decisions about cookies when the user is browsering product. For content sites, it is appropriate to set a limited number of cookies when the user selects an option from the home page. For those selling a product, I do not see an issue with letting a user browse. Set a cookies when the user adds something to the cart.
One of the silliest things that I see is the brick and motor stores denying a user because cookies are not being accepted. This means that I cannot browse their products online, which means I will just travel to another store, a store where I am more sure product exists, rather than wasting time and gas going to a store that obviously does not want my money. Sale lost.
On more thing. If a firm chooses a third party tracking company, choose only one. The best argument against cookies is that many sites contract with two or more tracking companies. The tracking companies have known vulnerabilities. By contracting with multiple companies, the user basically has little choice but to deny cookies.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Just what is it about the people who have jobs in marketing that leads them to believe the public is something that they own? They seem to think that the 'market' is a giant ocean into which they are completely free to dip their nets or a giant forest through which they can just chop down the trees.
The market, or the public spaces on the web, is more like a holy space or temple that they, as recognized sleazy sinners, should enter in fear and humility, desperate to seek forgiveness for their arrogance, greed, and repulsiveness.
The idea that marketters should somehow be upset that ordinary web users would use software to keep them out of their computers is absurd. It's like rats complaining about homeowners putting up traps and poison to keep them out of the kitchen.
Marketing software 'cookies' are like rat droppings. Finding them on your PC is a sign that you could have serious health problems in your system unless you start to take serious steps to get rid of the source of the problem.
And, marketers who believe that they own you and your computer, is the source of the problem.
Most browsers (including Firefox and even IE) do this already, though you need to alter the settings to make it happen. The browser makers figure (probably rightly) that most users won't want to take the trouble to enable cookies for every site where they want a persistent login, so the default is usually just to accept them.
Another workaround is just to delete *all* cookies regularly, and let the browser remember usenames and passwords.
JavaScript can be completely accessable, if implemented correctly. For example, say a tree: You render the actual data in (X)HTML, allowing for any type of browser to access it. On top of that, you style it with CSS with all elements visible, incase someone who supports CSS has JavaScript disabled. Finally, you code the JS, which hides the elements by looping through the DOM and changing the "display" property of the elements.
If it's a screenreader, it gets a perfectly valid list of links; if it's a browser that supports CSS, a non-interactive tree; JavaScript, the completely dynamic tree.
Using cookies to store states such as that with JS is a completely valid use, preventing the person from having to click through the tree each time he refreshes.
Server side scripting is a nice alternative; but it is too slow for something like navigation. (Click on link, wait for reload, scroll back down, click on link, etc)
Its commonly done in travel sites to maintain statefulness between page renders.
Statefulness matters because unlike store inventory, there's not really the concept of a shopping cart. You want to travel between point A->B, but your choices from page to page will depend entirely on what happens with inventory completely separate from the web site itself (I realize in re-reading this paragraph that this is almost incomprehensible, but still...).
Are there workarounds? Yes, but they're ugly, complicated, and unreliable, and require huge application servers, particularly when you have people coming from a mega-proxy like AOL.
And these cookies are typically gone when you leave the site. They're simply used to track where you are in the purchasing process. Its nothing personal.
Plus, I do find it handy that certain sites remember me, but that's more of a convenience factor.
I'm sure there are many other reasons.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
I've found this configuration to be optimal for me:
1. Always keep "ask before setting cookies" checked.
2. When you go to a site you know would like to save relevant info on you (login status, online cart...), just check "allow sites to set cookies". Now you get to answer "yes" to its cookies or "no" if ad server cookies are sneaked in while you have this enabled.
3. Afterwards, and in all other cases, keep "allow sites to set cookies" unchecked.
You'll now never have sites annoyingly popup the "XYZ wish to set a cookie" dialog, and the only time you have to at all care for them is when you for the first time visit a site with cookies you want it to set. All other times, nothing will be set for stuff you don't want (disallow cookies in Firefox will still allow cookies you have formerly accepted) and nothing will be popped up about cookies.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
I've been using whitelisting with [first party] cookies (generally with sites I'm a member of) and javascript (only for sites I use that require it such as gmail). Normally this would be a tedious task, but I have some extensions to help me out when it comes to security in this manner.
Actually, I have probably over 40 extensions installed right now, but those are some of the most useful.
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'
That's a sample from a marketing recording that Negativland once used
that is apt to be pointed out here.
>See, that's the problem with marketers. They like marketing and think
>it's a good thing, so they think we like marketing and think it's a
>good thing.
In an environment where everything is up to the consumer, everything
becomes the fault of the consumer as well. This myopia of never, ever
focusing attention on the methods and history of marketing and
advertising is a sign of their manipulative and authoritarian nature.
"There is a culture of fear in the marketplace" when it comes to
consumer attitudes toward cookies, says Nick Nyhan, president of New
York-based Dynamic Logic Inc.[snip]
He takes an attitude of empowerment (for lack of a better term) and
turns it into a fault. His statement is just as legitimate when
inverted to acknowledge the reasons why people delete cookies:
There is a culture of abuse in the advertising industry.
This is built in to the profession. Advertising doesn't work at all
unless you are manipulated. Case in point: calling this a problem of
"marketing," which is more "behind the scenes" and perhaps a bit
mysterious, and not "advertising," which is what puts the cookies on
your computer. Advertising is what everybody knows. Commercials are
easy to dislike, and they know it. This was the genius of Bill Hicks'
bit: including marketing.
Marketers, meanwhile, counter that cookies serve plenty of useful
features consumers may not realize -- such as automatically filling in
a username on a site that requires logging in, or helping a weather
site remember a ZIP Code so that it can show a local forecast on
return visits.
None of which has anything to do with marketing and the cookies that
*ads* place on your machine. Personally, Firefox is great for me here.
It deletes all of my cookies at the end of a session, and I've
whitelisted all of the sites that I use passwords for. Good cookies
stay, bad cookies leave. It's that simple, and by looking at my
browser's cookie cache it's easy to see which are the good cookies and
which are the bad.
Mr. Hughes and others want software makers to draw a big
distinction between spyware and cookies.
How about good cookies and bad cookies? No distinction? Tiny
distinction? By the previous example of using irrelevant registration
sites as a reason to trust advertising cookies, Mr. Hughes already
betrays his bias, that he is speaking for and responsible to bad
cookies. To acknowledge this distinction would implicate himself, and
he knows it because he doesn't mention it. Does he think that nobody
would notice?
Interviewer: Why should we keep cookies?
Mr. Hughes: Because sites use them for things other than advertising.
Interviewer: What about cookies used for advertising?
Mr. Hughes: [sound of crickets]
The company has begun marketing a technology known as a persistent
identification element, or PIE. The tool uses features in Macromedia
Inc.'s popular Flash software, which is used for designing and viewing
animated online ads, to secretly make backup copies of a user's
cookies before they are deleted. A handful of Web publishers and
advertising companies are using the technology to track users,
according to Mr. Tenembaum, though he declines to name them.
Call me nutty, but not being willing to name the companies who are
tracking users is not a good way to engender trust. What is this
article about again?
When I was a kid, we only had one Darth.
These marketers should try looking at it from the consumer's point of view, who ask: why should I let you take up even a single byte of space on my hard drive? What benefit do I get from letting advertisers leave their mark on my system? If they want better results with their ads, then they should make some sort of an effort to display them on sites that are relevant to what they're selling. It is not my problem that my behavior is making life difficult for their business. Another important fact here is that internet advertisers have already used up all of people's trust and goodwill towards them long long ago. We are now in the age of spyware, adware, popups, popunders, and all sorts of other garbage. No offense to advertising companies, as I know they're not all scum, but there are more than enough bad apples in the industry for me to mistrust them all. Thus I will not let them put anything, even a harmless txt file on my computer (and I'm cynical enough to be paranoid about some new windows/IE exploit that can use cookies to install crap on my computer).
I think you have it backwards. The majority of times, cookies do things that are good for the end user. Cookies allow you to have a customized experience on a site, etc..
For ecommerce to work, a computer has to be able to track a session from product selection through payment. Cookies are the best way to handle such a task.
A large number of sites use cookies for tracking people within their site. I contend that this type of tracking is extremely valuable to web users and consumers. For example, if I see that no one is interested in a given page, I might pull the page and put something better in its place.
Stores spend a great deal of effort on tracking their advertising efforts...I contend that this is good for consumers. A store might track the result of different ad campaigns. They might spend less on campaigns that are attacting low quality users and spend more on those that attract high quality (visitors that result in sales). This type of tracking is beneficial for consumers as it helps the store optimize their ad spending dollars.
The one and only bad area of cookie usage comes from the big web firms that are trying to build massive data warehouses to track people across web sites. That means that there really is only one major area of cookie abuse.
I despise companies that were developing such technologies. Judging from the stock performance of these dot bombs...their efforts have proven to be a bust. Companies like double click will always continue to exist as long as marketing schools teach that the goal of business is total dominance of the market. My hope is that the market will continue to reject the dot bombs trying to acheive total market domination.
Basically, you have a technology that does good things...like allowing personalization in web sites. The technlogy has been abused by a small number of marketing firms. The market has largely rejected the things these companies were trying to do with the technology...we need to stay vigilant to abusive companies like DoubleClick and ValueClick. Cookie technology itself has proven beneficial to web surfers.
Get Privoxy. You know you want to.
I've been surfing the web, advertisement free, since 1998.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
If marketer's hadn't spent the last few decades making people feel as if they've been shot in the butt with a tranquilizer dart, poked, prodded, measured and sampled, then woke up with a tag affixed to their ear and a barcode tattoo on their forehead just for looking at an ad, perhaps more people might trust them today.
If marketers didn't spend so much time trying to figure out how to cram pop-up/under/over/whatevers down people's throats and how to track their every move through the web, often exploiting browser bugs in ways that would get them convicted if they were 15 and in school rather than mid 30's and marketers leading to many browser crashes and hogging a great deal of CPU/RAM (yes, the bugs shouldn't be there, but that doesn't grant a get out of jail free card), perhaps people wouldn't mind marketing so much.
If marketing would focus more on making sure new products ARE a great value and then letting people know rather than the current all too common mission of convincing people that bad to mediocre and overpriced products are somehow better than the competition's equally bad/mediocre overpriced products, perhaps people would be more inclined to listen to their message.
I have met marketers that really DO try to influence product design to give the people what they want and who really do want to tell the truth about a decent product, but unfortunatly, those don't seem to be in the majority anymore.
Of course, the absolute lowest is when a dozen or so PhDs in psychology gang up on 5 year olds to create reasonable (for a 5 year old) expectations that no product can possibly live up to.
Much like the legal profession, the marketing profession has come to be dominated by bottom feeders out to legally rob the public. No amount of "image rehabilitation" will improve their public image until they find a way to flush the bottom feeders out of the profession.
Sometimes cookies are good. Like it would be great if the UPS web site would remember my freakin country selection. I'm getting really tired of selecting it all the time...