My understanding is that the information gathered is used not to uniquely identify people but to place them in interest buckets, people that fit a desirable demograhic, so that targeted advertising can be delivered to those groupings. Is that true in your situation? And if so, how small are the groupings of people? Hundreds of thousands? Hundreds? Dozens?
Interesting point. Here's another angle: Are they increasing compared to the number of brands? I suspect that the number of cybersquatting instances out there has grown faster (in percentage terms) than the growth in the number of brands that could be targeted.
Cybersquatters tend to focus on the bigger, more well known brands. Instances of cybersquatting against the more well known brands is, apparently, still on the rise.
The blanked out image in the image gallery shows two Lego people engaged in a rear-guard action sex act.
If you owned a company that had spent decades building a reputation for quality children's toys would you sit idly by while someone appropriated the name for a site dedicated to using your building blocks to create pornographic images and stop-motion animation movies for people with a Lego fetish?
Yes, many of the technologies have been around for years. The problem, fleet owners told me when writing this story, is that up until recently they haven't gotten much traction with fleets. For some technologies, design improvements and lower costs have made the difference. In other cases rising fuel prices have drawn increased attention by fleet owners.
--Robert L. Mitchell
Anonymous Coward's wry list - a sendup of my open letter to Diebold - is a hoot. I love #2. And hiring the working dead is a great idea. It might also help explain away situations where phantom voters appear in e-voting tabulations.
Slashdot Mirror
My understanding is that the information gathered is used not to uniquely identify people but to place them in interest buckets, people that fit a desirable demograhic, so that targeted advertising can be delivered to those groupings. Is that true in your situation? And if so, how small are the groupings of people? Hundreds of thousands? Hundreds? Dozens?
Still not great for the brand, but this site has more of a case that it's parody than did freelegoporn.
Interesting point. Here's another angle: Are they increasing compared to the number of brands? I suspect that the number of cybersquatting instances out there has grown faster (in percentage terms) than the growth in the number of brands that could be targeted. Cybersquatters tend to focus on the bigger, more well known brands. Instances of cybersquatting against the more well known brands is, apparently, still on the rise.
The blanked out image in the image gallery shows two Lego people engaged in a rear-guard action sex act. If you owned a company that had spent decades building a reputation for quality children's toys would you sit idly by while someone appropriated the name for a site dedicated to using your building blocks to create pornographic images and stop-motion animation movies for people with a Lego fetish?
I visited this site. There was nothing on the site to suggest it was parody. It looked like a site serving those with a Lego fetish.
Yes, many of the technologies have been around for years. The problem, fleet owners told me when writing this story, is that up until recently they haven't gotten much traction with fleets. For some technologies, design improvements and lower costs have made the difference. In other cases rising fuel prices have drawn increased attention by fleet owners. --Robert L. Mitchell
Anonymous Coward's wry list - a sendup of my open letter to Diebold - is a hoot. I love #2. And hiring the working dead is a great idea. It might also help explain away situations where phantom voters appear in e-voting tabulations.