Targeted Advertising Coming To Cable TV 171
The New York Times reports that Cablevision Systems is testing a new project in Brooklyn, the Bronx, and some areas of New Jersey to bring targeted advertising to television audiences. "The technology requires no hardware or installation in a subscriber's home, so viewers may not realize they are seeing ads different from a neighbor's. But during the same show, a 50-something male may see an ad for, say, high-end speakers from Best Buy, while his neighbors with children may see one for a Best Buy video game." The test deployment includes 500,000 households, and separates viewers by demographic data from Experian. "Experian has data on individuals that it collects through public records, registries and other sources. It matches the name and address of the subscriber to what it knows about them, and assigns demographic characteristics to households. (The match is a blind one: advertisers do not know what name and address they are advertising to, Cablevision executives said.)"
OK fine. (Score:5, Interesting)
A little weird, but I'm not really alarmed that this is being used. It (for better or worse) is public data - Taking advantage of it to bore me as little as possible with ads seems perfectly appropriate. Frankly, if I have to watch ads, I'd rather see ads for computer equipment and stuff than for My Little Pony Playhouse...
Once again it's time to suggest (Score:5, Interesting)
That we do a DMCA on people's personal information.
Remove the concept of 'public records' and make it all PRIVATE.
If Experian wants to collect personal information on you, they should have to pay a fee to you and agree to a standard distribution restriction agreement that makes them come to you for permission to distribute the data elsewhere.
Now of course credit card companies have to ask and pay you for the right to get that information but they can also charge higher fees, too.
Violations bring the same penalties as with "pirating" a mp3.
Re:OK fine. (Score:5, Interesting)
Although this also goes in the opposite direction for some. It mentions that houses with children may see ads targetted towards games and the like.
So if you have a baby, are you going to be stripped of watching the "funny" advertisements... usually for more adult things like beer, and whatnot... and be forced to sit through baby-food and diaper commercials? I know they're far and few between, but some commercials are actually fun to watch. Why should being in a specific demographic strip you of that fun?
Sounds like a good idea (Score:3, Interesting)
Why should I watch commercials for tampons, tinned soup, and shampoo? Show me Apple ads, Best Buy ads, trailers to movies I might like, etc.
Re:Don't use their boxes (Score:3, Interesting)
Once the system goes digital, all subscribers will be identifiable by the MAC address or UID of the cable box. One could argue that ad targeting is one of the primary reasons it's going digital.
The really bad news is that although many cable boxes are hackable [usbjtag.com], and the UID can be changed, it would either be a telltale sign to the cable company that the box has been hacked, or you just end up getting someone else's targeted ads.
Re:OK fine. (Score:4, Interesting)
Something just occurred to me. You know there's going to be cases where a couple's baby dies, and the cable company's records don't get updated for a while...
That could be potentially embarrassing for some... (Score:4, Interesting)
The content of the ads could be a little TOO revealing about people. Imagine this conversation after the Super Bowl party:
"Did you notice that the Smiths had a lot of ads for bankruptcy lawyers? I wonder what's going on with them..."
It's not an invasion of privacy, but it is a subversion of privacy.