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by beowulfey 1941 days ago
On the contrary—I’m not sure if you’ve ever watched Mad Men, but there are some pretty good examples of ads in there that didn’t use tracking at all.

Calling tracking a cardinal rule of ads is like calling HTML a cardinal rule of communication. Sure it might be ubiquitous now, but if HTML were to suddenly disappear I guarantee communication between humans won’t stop — it would adapt. Tracking isn’t a foundation, it is merely what has worked this past decade or so.
1 comments
throw_away892 1941 days ago
I enjoyed Mad Men. But comparing web advertising today to the 70-80s is disingenuous.

Fact of the matter is, advertising today / web marketing relies on user tracking. I'm yet to see anyone debunk this.

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beowulfey 1940 days ago
My point is that advertising right now uses tracking because it can be used, and it makes money.

But in no way does it need it. We could easily go back to untargeted, reasonably effective ads that appeal to broad markets instead of extremely specific ones.

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zepto 1940 days ago
> advertising today / web marketing relies on user tracking.

It’s ‘disingenuous’ to claim that as some cardinal rule.

It’s not - it just happens to be the most popular business fad of the 2010s.

What works in business changes over time. That is a cardinal rule.

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Teever 1941 days ago
I think what is disingenuous is calling what goes on in the modern internet as 'advertising'

Let's call it what it is -- stalking.

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