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Google to Track TV Viewers More Closely
GalacticNoob writes "According to this post, Google is about to launch a TV advertising program that will let advertisers target audiences based on demographics including their household income. A satellite TV company called Echostar is working with credit-reporting company Equifax to cross-reference shows watched with income and buying habits (based on using Equifax's data)."
"Why yes Tina, that was a commercial for Ferrari, followed by a Tiffanys spot. What was that.., oh, your panties just semeed to have fallen to your shoes."
There's nothing Intelligent about Intelligent Design.
Echostar is Dish Network.
-- I have a private email server in my basement.
Targeted advertising based on our credit history and income?
I'm pretty sure this counts as "evil".
Desai stresses that all this data is made anonymous, so it certainly won't be possible to target specific households with ads...
... yet
Humanity has precious little time left before marketers become so astute at selling directly to each and every consumer that we become powerless to resist their offerings. The only defense we will have will be to hide from all advertising, which will require curling up into a tiny little ball in a dark corner.
...or debt management, or car finance, or "cheaper insurance", I'm gonna fucking throttle someone.
Operation Guillotine is in effect.
LEELA: Didn't you have ads in the twentieth century?
FRY: Well, sure, but not in our dreams. Only on TV and radio... and in magazines... and movies, and at ballgames, and on buses, and milk cartons, and T-shirts, and bananas, and written in the sky. But not in dreams, no sirree.
there's nothing I can do about Echostar tracking that data
Yes there is. Don't plug your DVR into the phone line (or internet.) The dish is receive only. Dish and DirecTV will both say that you NEED a land line, and the installers take a hit if there is not one connected when the box is activated, but it is not needed to have the DVR work.
I installed DirecTV for 16 months. They just want your viewing data and impulse Pay-per-view hits.
-- I have a private email server in my basement.
I know I'm not alone in this - lots of people are pretty quick with the mute button and it causes me to wonder.... Suppose you are an advertiser who pays for a really endearing ad that people love to watch. Maybe something like the slightly bewildered A&W proprietor they've been airing lately. So you go to the expense of creating ads that follow a story line and that are successful, if the audience sees and hears them.
Now imagine what happens if your ad follows one of those obnoxious ads people immediately mute. I suppose the only solution is to make sure your ad is always in the first slot - but that could get expensive.
In times of trouble, the smell of frying onions usually gives confidence and comfort.
Echostar is Dish Network but maybe the journalist didn't want people to associate the brand "Dish Network"
with what people could potentially perceive as evil. Most are not as sophisticated as you - and I'm not being
sarcastic towards you here -, they might just read the article, lean back and turn on their TV (powered by
Dish of course) and never make the connection nor would it occur to them to follow up and find out about
Echostar.
I think I'm going to call Dish support and have a conversation about this.
Have fun.
-- I have a private email server in my basement.
Commercials is one reason i tend to avoid TV. ( that and most content is dismal ).
None of their business who i am really.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
You know, maybe if companies would spend less time trying to figure out how to target me with ads for stuff I find lacking and actually, oh I dunno, make products I actually want to buy, then maybe I would. And they wouldn't need to waste their ad dollars.
Only if you have the HD DVR.
-- I have a private email server in my basement.
Or, *build your own* DVR. MythTV, SageTV - solutions for everyone, tracking free. What I'm more scared of is Equifax releasing credit information.
This is why I gave up TV and local radio a couple of years ago. It stopped being entertainment and just became an ad machine. Now, I just watch tv through the internet, ad free. MUHAHAHAHAHA.
So "do no evil" is pretty much over, right? Seems every new move Google makes these days is the same sort of thing we'd be criticizing other scumbag companies for.
Here is your citation ... me. They charged me the first month I had it in 2006, I complained, they waived it for 3 months; I even got the woman to admit that yes, I was being charged $5 for the right NOT to be tracked and as a PENALTY for not being able to spend money on PPV. At the end of 3 months I complained, they did nothing, I was lazy, and even with the $5 it was the best deal I had given that cable was not available and DirectTV cost more. Then I moved and used their dish mover deal because cable cost WAY more and I wasn't in the mood to switch to DirectTV which was no cheaper anyway (I also don't like their DVD UI). Funny thing though, the nice man on the other end of the line when I set up the install at my new place removed the $5 completely and that was that.
So I wonder if they have stopped that fee? In the end I would never have hooked it up anyway but I also don't have a landline so it wasn't even an option ... never will either in all likelyhood.
If you can't be good, be good at it!
I don't see why people view these things so harshly.
Think about it, now it means ads will actually hit their target audience
Would you rather see ads about things you have no care for, nor afford?
I, for one, welcome our Big Brother overlords.
/yes i know what echostar is
Do you? Wikipedia says DISH is a legally distinct entity from Echostar. The relevant bit reads "The company was formerly part of EchoStar Communications Corporation before DISH Network was separated in December 2007." A Google News search seems to support this. Even DISH Networks will tell you it is true. Plover pointed this out above, and I fact checked Wikipedia.
Well, for one thing...what the hell is a credit reporting service doing SELLING my fucking info??
I mean....I really don't like the idea that the big three track that stuff, but, I can reluctantly live with it as a means to give a reasonable (usually) score of a credit risk when you need a loan, etc.
However, I think this information should be restricted to only that use, and it should be treated as pretty much privacy act level information, and nothing of it should ever be given out without the expressed consent of the individual in question.
I'm not one to usually ask for new restrictive laws, but, in this case, I wish we could mandate that a person's information is THEIRS....and cannot be bought, sold, traded or used in a fashion such as this. I mean, c'mon, why not just also combine it with info that the IRS and SS has on us too in the US? Aside from the difference in it being a commercial vs governmental affair...the privacy intrusion is analogous.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Would you rather see ads about things you have no care for, nor afford?
Yes. They're very easy to ignore that way.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Ads which are right for someone economically may not be right for them in other ways. Take a couple who can easily afford to have several children and drive a big SUV - but imagine they are supporters of sustainable energy, zero population growth, and so on. They've already committed to having only one child, they want a fuel efficient vehicle, preferably a hybrid or better. They are not in the market for most of the things which are going to be targeted at them based solely on income.
How can the ads be targeted at them too? There are several (mostly bad) possibilities. The advertisers could write them off, as not a market. Right now, advertisers ignore whole age groups in just this way. Nobody is going to pitch Axe style body sprays at men old enough to think of Old Spice or Right Guard when they buy a deodorant. When they don't target ANY of the ads at you, they don't target ANY of the programs at you either. Trying to hit a few big groups with descressionary spending power is why shows such as Survivor spawn dozens of variants, or TV goes through phases where its all Hospital shows or Forensic shows.
Or they could get more data. If they only knew how that couple I made up had voted as well, maybe they could get a handle on what they want to buy. Even better, if they know how committed the couple was to their ideals, how much they were willing to spend supporting a candidate or cause, just think how useful that would be in determining how much they would spend on the right product. And, they are already getting one type of data most people think is private, why not go after voting or medical information too?
Who is John Cabal?
As far as I can tell, the Dish receivers DO come with such a mechanism.
It would seem all one would have to do in order to "switch off" as you suggest in order to ensure that no information goes back to Dish...
is unplug the RJ-11 cable from the receiver so it cannot "phone home".
The receivers work just fine without the so called "required" phone connection. Dish even has ways for you to purchase movies without the phone connection.