[greazy]

This is called observational bias.

Imo the truth is much scarier: advertises know us better than we known ourselves. There's also the idea that we are so alike, advertises can generalize to great success.

[Kye]

This is especially blatant when you don't fit into any category advertisers understand. Most of them think I'm either a hip urban youth or a well-off exurban housewife. I don't think they know what to do with someone who has associations, friendships, and interests that cross countless geographic and socioeconomic boundaries.

[tqi]

I think the truth is actually that we are MUCH less unique than we would like to believe, and that some combination of age + gender + location probably predicts like 80% of our interests.

[hammock]

Curious if any reader here has a data point on that - the # of data points required to predict some larger fraction of your profile.

[technothrasher]

> This is called observational bias.

I think you mean confirmation bias. Observer bias is similar, but relates to being non-blinded during a scientific study.

[a3w]

Confirmation bias means that you want to look for examples of proofing something, instead of seeking counterexamples. That's not it, either.

Baader-Meinhof phenomenon or Frequency illusion could be what we were seeking?