• Are Signs of Behavioral Network Growth Real or Mere Illusion?
    The behavioral targeting network concept is gaining ground. Well, maybe. From the network side it looks that way, anyway. Announcements this week from Claria and Tacoda, at least, indicate that they see growth in their respective behavioral targeting (BT) ad network offerings. Tacoda, what you might call a BT-veteran, unveiled new partnerships with Burst Media and Akamai. Burst will be providing customized ad serving and inventory management technology for use in a large-scale network environment. And Akamai's EdgeSuite technology will apparently bolster Tacoda's network response time capabilities and broaden its geographic reach. From the looks of it, Tacoda's getting …
  • Is Your Data Dead-on or Just Plain Dead?
    Last June, in an effort to illustrate to its readers just how much data could be gleaned about an individual without his knowledge or explicit permission, Reason magazine sent its subscribers personalized issues with satellite photos pinpointing their residential locations right on the cover. A subscriber at the time, I received a copy displaying the roof of my house surrounded by others. Lincoln Park was north a few blocks. But the park's cricket players and shaved ice vendors, the guy grilling spicy pork kebabs across the street -- the vibrant characters of my Jersey City neighborhood weren't revealed.
  • A Cookie, Wrapped in a Mystery, Inside an Enigma
    Last week I tried to get all literary in my approach to the cookie deletion problem that's been irking behavioral marketers and other online ad folk. But there's no need to liken cookies and privacy infringement to homeland security issues, or anything else for that matter. A very real example of how one company's potential cookie nightmare could be used to its benefit -- and perhaps the benefit of all companies relying on the legitimate use of cookies -- exists today.
  • The Homeland Security-Cookie Connection
    Last week I took the PATH train from Jersey City to lower Manhattan on my way to catch my favorite Brooklyn band. On the heels of the London attacks, the threat of terrorism on that train or near my neighborhood has nestled itself in the front of my mind once again after years of slowly regressing. And the tradeoffs between civil liberty-squelching security strategies and protection against further strikes are all too real. Sure, I resent the fact that heightened security robs me of civil liberties. But I'll tell you this much, when I saw four cops in my …
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