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Ads With Your Name On Them
eldavojohn writes "The NYTimes is running an interesting blog piece on the answers Microsoft, AOL, Yahoo, & Google gave to the question: Can they show you an ad with your name on it? The results: 'Microsoft says it could use only a person's first name [which it doesn't consider personal information]. AOL and Yahoo could use a full name but only on their sites, not the other sites on which they place ads. Google isn't sure; it probably could, but it doesn't know the names of most of its users.' Now whether or not they would use this information is a different story. AOL has no plans to, Yahoo is open to it, and Microsoft has implemented a technological barrier preventing it (despite behavioral and demographic data being served to the ad companies). Although Google might use name information at some point, they don't now do so; nor do they use behavioral or demographic data."
I imagine a crafted ad would be quite effective (although misleading). We've all gotten the Publishers Clearing House sweepstakes where they call us by name and say we won. Remember back to the first time, and you can know what it would be like to have that happen online.
One time on the news site forum I frequent they did that. The news posting/headline used a little trick to display who you were logged in as. Everyone assumed that the story was actually about them. The forums were chaos until everyone figured it out, and through-out the day new people would hurriedly make a comment and then get modded 'redundant' by everyone else.
Even though it was a simple echo of your login-name and not some great technical trick, it was effective enough to give everyone a bit of a startle.
--Welcome to the Realm of the Hawke--
Not that if someone broke into my home or faked the CLID to order pizza wouldn't know my name, or that they'd even care. But leave the opportunity for a stupid criminal to be stupid: The phone rang. He stopped the tape and answered it, then almost dropped the phone like an electric eel as he realized what he was doing. Hardly daring to breathe, he held the telephone to his ear.
"Rule One in housebreaking," said a voice. "Never answer the telephone when you're in the middle of a job. Who are you supposed to be, for heaven's sake?"
Richard froze. It was a moment or two before he could find where he had put his voice.
"Who is this?" he demanded at last in a whisper.
"Rule Two," continued the voice. "Preparation. Bring the right tools. Bring gloves. Try to have the faintest glimmering of an idea of what you're about before you start dangling from window ledges in the middle of the night.
"Rule Three. Never forget Rule Two."
"Who is this?" exclaimed Richard again.
The voice was unperturbed. "Neighborhood Watch," it said. "If you just look out of the back window you'll see..."
Trailing the phone, Richard hurried over to the window and looked out. A distant flash startled him.
"Rule Four. Never stand where you can be photographed.
"Rule Five... Are you listening to me, MacDuff?"
"What? Yes..." said Richard in bewilderment. "How do you know me?"
"Rule Five. Never admit to your name."
Richard stood silent, breathing hard.
"I run a little course," said the voice, "if you're interested..."
Richard said nothing.
"You're learning," continued the voice, "slowly, but you're learning. If you were learning fast you would have put the phone down by now, of course. But you're curious - and incompetent - and so you don't. I don't run a course for novice burglars as it happens, tempting though the idea is. I'm sure there would be grants available. If we have to have them they may as well be trained.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
Is this you?
Tupshin Harper
Director of Engineering
San Francisco Bay Area
First hit for the first name Tupshin.
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