Most of you have seen an online advertisement that seemed eerily appropriate. Maybe it was a discreet little Google text ad in your Gmail inbox selling you something you mentioned in a recent email, or perhaps an obnoxious pop-up ad reminding you to buy tickets for your favorite band. While it might have seemed scary once ("the internet KNOWS?"), it's commonplace now. Consider this trip, though: maybe you'll be in one of those ads soon. Facebook is rolling out a "Sponsored Stories" feature, which will turn your Likes and feed activity into sidebar ads for all of your friends to see. If businesses honing in on you with laser-like intensity as though you're some kind of human cash machine wasn't irritating enough, consider what it'll be like to become the advertisement. After all, who do we trust more to recommend the best products than our friends and family? Facebook's new form of advertising using your words might seem a bit extreme, but I fear it won't be in the future. And what's to stop advertisers from going further, distorting your words and sugaring things up even further? I hardly need to mention Facebook's track record of publicizing our information, and doing so in a more...shall we say, controlled manner isn't inconceivable.
Advertising has always been an art of psychological manipulation, of exposing the ad-viewer's deepest insecurities and wants, and of finding ways of creating new wants. In the age of targeted advertising, this is more personal than ever. The problem with this is how it not only detects our behavior, but also changes it. Cate Reid reported that she was more self-conscious about her weight when she started seeing more weight loss ads. Ads can get into our heads and feed off of our weaknesses and vulnerabilities, even without knowing our name and addressing us directly, and targeted advertising is even better at that. Imagine a future like the one in The Minority Report, where ad screens can scan our face and personalize an ad to us on the spot. For some, this is potentially harmful, and an invasion of privacy. Others might find this kind of advertising useful. Privacy is a subjective issue, and that's why choice is the most important element involved. Don't get me wrong - I'm not anti-advertising. Lots of things I use are free because of it, and I know advertising will never go away. What I'm against is the inability to retain one's data and privacy in the name of corporations making more money. Further down the line, that information can easily be seized by the government, and who knows to what end it could be used for? I'm not personally worried about an advertiser knowing my favorite movies, but who knows when that kind of information could become politically sensitive? As this hilariously insightful video points out, things are becoming so connected that we're running out of time to correct our course.
Choice, then, is key. Sites should let their users know what's on the table, and tell them loud and clear what data is up for grabs, especially by third parties. Certain organizations right now are trying to make it possible to opt out of all behavioral advertising, but this only works for compliant trackers. Let's put pressure on advertisers to comply with these standards so we can completely opt out. We can control organizations like this, but we can't control everyone without violating free speech. Sites like Report Your Ex give release to some senselessly hateful discourse, but shutting everyone up isn't a better alternative. Thankfully, libel laws exist and our current legal system does offer some choice in those situations. Incidents like that are smaller and more localized, and don't bother me nearly as much as large corporations who handle my information for money.
Of course, we're also responsible for what kinds of information we put on the internet, just as we are in life. Information is power, and the economy of information will always be a harsh one. For instance, it's probably not smart to post pictures of yourself doing something illegal on Facebook (as officer Iverson says in that last link, law enforcement does have to keep up with technology). Legally, though, most of our information that's out there on the internet is fair game. Ethically? Nobody can say for sure, but I know what I want to keep to myself. To that end, I know what kinds of companies I don't want to be handing my information to. If we all make selective choices, hopefully companies that toss around our information for a quick buck will be yesterday's news. Let's challenge companies like Google, who only stand to gain from abusing our information, to put forward a more concerted effort toward giving users choice and control over their data. On that note, we can also make an effort to be smart about what information we put out there. You probably don't need to declare your undying love of Starbucks on the internet; moreover, be careful about what you search for. As Andrew Grove of Intel once said, "Only the paranoid survive." Tools like Tor are hugely powerful for staying private. I just installed the Keep My Opt-Outs extension for Chrome, which keeps compliant advertisers from using my data. You don't have to go overboard, either; I never browse behind a proxy, I use Google regularly, and have accounts on various websites, and I don't even show up on Spokeo. Use your real name carefully. And you certainly wouldn't go to 4chan.org and post your home address, now would you?
"Of course, we're also responsible for what kinds of information we put on the internet, just as we are in life".
ReplyDeleteI strongly agree with your stand on this issue, and more specifically, with the quote above. I think many people fail to understand that if they put something out there on the Internet, such as a picture on Facebook, people are going to see it. And everyone should be aware and held accountable for what they post on the Internet.
You bring up excellent points! Ever hear the phrase, "there's no such thing as a free lunch?" Just because there is no monetary cost to using a search engine or having a FB page, doesn't mean it doesn't come with a price. That price, like you mention, is that the personal information we choose to put into cyberspace becomes "fair game" to be exploited. That being said, people definately should be held accountable for what they write about or what pictures they decide to post. Unfortunately there is no law against stupidity! But I don't think that people should be punished for what others write on their sites, which is sometimes the case. As for the "Sponsored Stories" idea, is that for real?? Are we going to have to copywrite and trademark everything that we write and the pictures that we post just to protect ourselves from possibly being misrepresented??!! That is ridiculous!
ReplyDeleteVery insightful, dense post with lots of great links. This is what blogging is about! Facebook tried the "Sponsored Stories" idea once before - without warning, and to great outcry - so we'll see how it pans out this time. It's certainly one thing to post targeted ads, and quite another to use your likeness for commercial gain. "Liking" a product does not equal a commercial endorsement.
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