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by barbazfoo12 5144 days ago
"Facebook can now use data on users to serve them ads when they are not on the Facebook website."

"This could generate billions."

Or it could prime even more users for a privacy-respecting alternative.

1 comments

Google does the same thing. So what? If I'm going to have to look at ads, I'd rather they be relevant. I've actually found Facebook ads genuinely useful on a few occasions. I even applied for a job that I heard about on a Facebook ad once. What I hate is when my friend uses my computer to search for tents, then all I see is tent ads all over the internet for the next month.
lol. I hear ya. (But I think Google and Facebook's data are qualitatively a bit different.)

It's anyone's guess whether this online privacy stuff really means anything to most people. Obviously Google, Facebook, et al. are hedging their bets that it's not a big deal.

As users we can only speak for ourselves. This is because we generally don't watch others, looking over their shoulder as they use a computer to see exactly what they do... which raises an interesting question: Does that imply that we are recognising some sort of right to privacy? A lot of effort goes into trying to figure out how others use a computer. But unless it's study of volunteers it's not done by just standing behind them and watching.