You’re shopping for something on Amazon until you realize that you’ve been mindlessly staring at your phone when you should be doing your homework. Naturally, you open your laptop, open Chrome, and browse to Chegg in order to finish your homework assignment. On the sidebar sits the exact same product that you were just browsing for on your phone just minutes earlier.
We’ve all been in this place and felt the weirdness of being immersed in virtual connectivity. A lot of people are scared that their shopping habits and preferences are being exploited as a result of companies that have access to their data either using it themselves to market particular goods/services or selling it to a third party who would do the same. While it’s a bit strange, I want to pose a contrarian question with respect to this topic: Are businesses using your data to create data-driven ads being invasive or proactive?
In Mateo Turelli and Luciano Floridi’s The Ethics of Information Transparency, a paper written about the ethics of data in the 21st century, information itself is seen to be largely neutral; the ways in which information is used becomes the decider for its classification as good or bad. Medical records, for example, are kept safe by hospitals and insurance companies. While this is great for protecting people's privacy, would that information be better off in the hands of medical researchers? If researchers had access to the conditions that people were facing, could they more quickly develop treatments to combat humanity's illnesses?
In a parallel fashion, could marketers, by advertising things that you like, be simply expediting the inevitable process of you purchasing something? To see how this same idea is applicable in sports marketing, take a look at the short video below!
On the one hand, I don’t think that anyone should have their privacy invaded by sites that want to capture data. If someone wants their information to be private, they should have every right to prohibit sites from collecting their personal information.
On the other hand, I think that data can be an incredibly strong driver in economic efficiency. For example, Adidas wants to provide the best experience for their customers that they possibly can. When their customers are watching a soccer match, they would like to be able to provide advertisements for the customer’s preferred team and player in order to create an individualized, relevant experience.
If I were watching a sports game, I would much rather see ads for apparel that associate with my sports teams! Without data, the advertising companies are simply taking a shot in the dark about what you might like.
If a company notices that a particular group of people is using a product, why would you not try to advertise that same product to other individuals of similar demographics? I think that a market economy naturally finds its way towards equilibrium at one point or another, and data simply allows for this equilibrium to be reached much faster.
This is a really nice blog post. I liked the introduction, it accomplished the purpose of making the reader want to continue with your blog. You essentially checked off all my check marks for a good blog. The only thing that I guess could be fixed is expanding on who is Mateo Turelli and Luciano Floridi since there are people outside this class that also read these blogs. Other than that you did an excellent job. I liked the "flow" hat you had and used both images and videos that better illustrate the ideas you want to convey. Very well done!
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