[ehnto]

Modern advertising is an industry rife with abuse and coercion. The ad industry is to blame. Content creators can be evil to, but enabled by the ad industry who is happy to be in like company.

If I followed you around with a paper advertisement, wrote down where you frequent and who you talk to in my notebook, and left a copy of the advertisement everywhere you went, you would call the police. Online advertising does just that and much more and they do it with impunity.

[krisgenre]

You can't really draw parallels with the virtual and real world. Starting at someone's Facebook profile pic is not the same as standing next to the person and doing the same.

[ehnto]

But the tracking is in the real world. Adtech for tracking your presence in store and then online and connecting the dots has been in action for some time. You don't even need GPS enabled.