[mr__y]

Maybe this will encourage switching to context-based ads. If I'm reading blog post about Rust, I might be interested in buying books or online training in Rust. Or, if I'm watching a video on how to take care of kitten, food or vaccination for kitten might be of interest for me. Nobody needs to track all my activity to guess that.

[reaperducer]

If I'm reading blog post about Rust, I might be interested in buying books or online training in Rust

I have been repeatedly assured by ad tech experts on HN that Facebook (and Google's) advertisements which are custom-tailored to my tabulated interests are far superior to the ads I would get through traditional context advertising.

You can tell by all the ads I see on Facebook for feminine hygiene products for the lady parts I don't have, the concert ads for bands I don't like, and the restaurant ads for cities where I don't live in places I've never been.

Life is so much better with the ad tech algorithms in charge.

[mr__y]

>advertisements which are custom-tailored to my tabulated interests are far superior to the ads I would get through traditional context advertising.

actually my post is not arguing with that, however facing the reality where interest tracking/profiling will become harder or impossible good old context-based ads might at some point become better alternative. Not because they're inherently more efficient but because, with changes like that, interest tracking might become infisible or too resource consuming

[nottorp]

Don't forget the ads following you across websites for the expensive product (that you only need one of) you just bought.

[aaaxyz]

I'm not sure if it's intentional or not but this is what some online stores appear to do (poorly). E.g. suggesting me office chairs after I just ordered one, suggesting motherboards incompatible with a CPU I'm looking at...

[lancesells]

If you're seeing ads from the same company for office chairs it's most likely a poor marketing campaign setup. It could also be if you're running third party blockers in your browser when you check out and then use the mobile apps you might not have been counted by the Facebook pixel.

[FridgeSeal]

"Oh that's because they set their campaign up poorly, they should have done xyz" yes but they didn't - a statement that holds for most campaigns we encounter. It is the ad-tech equivalent of "just don't write code that does <insert unsafe behaviour here>". It's a flawed argument, because demonstrably, in the vast majority of cases, people simply don't.