Why are targeted ads a bad thing, they sound fine on paper?
In: Other
Another thing to consider is that, for targeted ads to work, you need to be in a receptive mood to click on the ad.
Looking at social media, if you see a bunch of posts about how poorly the economy is going, you are most likely not going to click on the ad for that $150 steak from Crowd Cow.
To combat this, social media sites manipulate what information you see to keep you scrolling. This includes filtering what posts your friends/contacts post, in addition to showing you “recommended for you” content. Facebook is notorious for this.
The result is that these companies figure out what makes you receptive to purchasing, show you that content, and then put ads in front of you. In real life, this means you might be concerned about the coronavirus. You click on an article your friend posted about it being fake. Facebook knows this, so it starts showing you more articles about covid being fake. Now you keep reading articles and believe that covid isn’t real, all so that Facebook can show you an ad and charge a vendor $3 for your click.
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