• My Stuff, My Self: You Are What You Own
    More than a decade into the behavioral method of targeting audiences rather than content, we still explore new data points and test which previous actions are most predictive of future consumer behaviors. What qualifies a person as "in-market"? For how long? As more aspects of our lives move to digital platforms, more and different kinds of human action get translated into material that can be tracked and used in new ways. o wit, what can be done with the data about what people already own, as opposed to the desire for new stuff they express through search, shopping carts and …
  • Opting Out Of Providing Information About Me
    On a recent visit to the hospital for a routine check-up, a hospital worker asked me to fill out forms stating my ethnicity, information she said the government would aggregate. She also told me to stop adding my social security number on hospital paperwork, stop giving it to medical workers when signing in for procedures, and stop providing the information to outpatient surgery centers. Too many people have access to the information and patients can no longer be guaranteed that the government-issued numbers won't end up in the wrong hands and sold to someone else, she said.
  • Is Anybody There? Does Anybody Care? Some Early Returns On Ad Choice Icons
    Transparency. Choice. Control. These have been the rallying cries of the self-regulatory efforts the online ad industry started deploying late last year around online behavioral advertising (OBA). The most visible piece of this effort is supposed to be the appearance of the Advertising Options icon supported by the Digital Advertising Alliance. I am still trying to capture one of these things in the wild, although I know that ad units powered by Evidon and DoubleVerify are out there.
  • MediaMind To Build Online Measurement Similar To GRP
    What if advertisers relied on metrics to measure online advertising, reach and cookie deletion similar to those used to measure TV advertising? Ariel Geifman, principal analyst at MediaMind Research, says the company will create a platform for online advertising that measures reach and frequency similar to Gross Rating Points (GRP), a metric used to determine how many people viewed a show on television.
  • Browser Solutions: The Geeks Rush In
    Opt-Out Man may have to go in for a name change soon. The venerable method for removing oneself from behavioral targeting online is morphing quickly into a move towards more universal Do Not Track and even ad blocking tools. As our own Wendy Davis reports this morning, Microsoft will issue a refresh of its Internet Explorer browser today that goes beyond merely Do Not Track functionality. The new tools actually will let the user block content from some sites, especially third-party ads. The blocking will be based on blacklists established by TRUSTe, Abine and Privacy Choice.
  • Psychographic, Demographic or Geographic Ad Targeting
    I must admit to being bewildered when first hearing the word "psychographic" ad targeting. A student of literature deconstructing the word might get the wrong impression. I mean, please, the prefix "psycho" attached to the word "graphic." It's enough to scare anyone into running in the opposite direction. Whew.
  • Opt-Out Man Visits the Mall Cops
    It's been a while since Opt-Out Man has dusted off the browser and spied on the opt-out and privacy management tools in the field. This season brought with it a new crop of self-regulatory initiatives and a more earnest attempt by the industry to cut off regulation with greater transparency. What do some of these things look like, though?
  • Will Data Provide The Fabric For Online Advertising?
    There has been a lot of noise for marketers to absorb about behavioral targeting and data, according to BlueKai CEO Omar Tawakol. He says marketers and advertisers hear about an evolution, but there is a need to boil it down to essentials.
To read more articles use the ARCHIVE function on this page.