Delete Cookies, Inflate Net Traffic Estimates

eldavojohn writes "In my browser, I regularly go to the tools menu and clear my private data. This includes my cookies. As a result, people like me who destroy cookies by the thousands may be inflating estimates of Web traffic by up to 150 percent. People have good reasons for clearing out cookies — we've heard about bad cookies before (and I think the FCC is still investigating the issue). But every time you delete cookies, many of the sites you've visited count you as a new visitor next time."

Comments

150%?

[catbutt]

That assumes an awful lot of people do that.

I don't do it because it is a pain to constantly log back in everywhere. But I seriously doubt more than 2% of the non-slashdot crowd does it.

Re:150%? Please

[w3woody]

There are also other ways of tracking people like IP addresses possibly in combination with browser UA string.

Unless you're on a corporate network behind a NAT with a standard-issue OS install with a standardized browser.

What I do in my computer is my business

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

I delete cookies, permit them, leave them on, it is all my business. I am under no obligation to provide web site operators reliable count of how many uniqie visitors they get. They should stop complaining and develop better ways to count unique visitors. If they cant, it is still not my problem.

CookieSafe is my current favourite

[KenAndCorey]

Cookiesafe allows me to keep my permanent cookies to a minimum, yet allow me all the functionality of session cookies. Of course, it does inflate the stats as the article mentions. In my previous job I worked with stats quite a bit (using WebSideStory/Hitbox), and it is such an inexact science that it ranks right up there with Lies and Damn Lies.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/249 7

Anyone have other suggested software they prefer?

Re:On the other hand...

[dattaway]

and be sure to set your browser to "googlebot"

That way no one has visited but another web spider!

Re:On the other hand...

[Anonymous Coward]

I just forward all my cookies on to Santa - I get good presents

Every time you delete cookies...

[chinard]

...god kills a kitten!

Re:Every time you delete cookies...

[DreamerFi]

Approximately 70,000 dogs and cats are born in the U.S. each day, or 25,567,500 each year. Of these, roughly 54%, or 13,806,450, are cats. Since 34.5% of cats don't live to see their first birthday, we can assume that about 4,763,225 kittens die each year in the United States alone. We'll take for granted that God in His divine Wisdom purposely smote each of these kittens.

Let's assume that the idiom is talking only about male masturbation. Let's further assume, highly conservatively, that males do not start masturbating until they reach age 15. Of the total U.S. male population, 107,199,356 would then be masturbation-age males. Again, let's conservatively estimate that teenagers masturbate no more frequently than adults, and that all men masturbate an average of 20 times each month or 240 times per year. This means that each man in the United States masturbates approximately every 1.5 days. It also means that there are approximately 25,727,845,440 male masturbation sessions in the United States each year.

There are nearly 26 billion male masturbation sessions in the U.S., yet there are fewer than five million kitten deaths annually. Far from a one-to-one correlation, there are 5401.5 masturbation sessions for every single kitten death. This means that the average American man can masturbate regularly for 22.5 years before he is responsible for the death of a single kitten. Indeed, with a life expectancy of less than 75 years, the average man will be responsible for only two or three kitten deaths in a lifetime of vigorous masturbation.

Re:On the other hand...

[Goldenhawk]

Hmmm. I wonder if this inflates the apparent popularity of Firefox (not that I consider that a bad thing, mind you).

After all,

1) it's geeks who tend to both use FF *and* block cookies
2) the FF extension architecture makes it easy to use selective cookie blocking tools
3) FF settings allow automatic cookie deletion each time it exits, unlike IE (=IE6, at least)

All in all, I suspect that (*IF* the subject article is accurate) FF users probably account for a disproportionately large chunk of those "re-visits".

I bet M$FT hates that.

Oh boy...

[Seoulstriker]

Dear Anonymous Coward,

So, you're the little bastard who keeps forwarding me that crap.

This year... no presents for you!!!

Sincerely,
Santa H. Claus
santa@northpole.net