Sep
OMG! Facebook Has Targeted Ads!
Wandering around the interwebs catching up on my Idol gossip (*gasp* it’s been moved to a later timeslot! Dramaz!) I stumbled across this less than fascinating article on The Daily Telegraph about Facebook advertising.
FACEBOOK users beware: advertisers are watching your page and they know what you need. Relationship status single? Dating agency ads pop up on your Facebook page.
Update your status to engaged and the spruiking is suddenly about wedding gowns, weight loss and planning hens’nights.
Married? Then you must be thinking about babies, credit cards and mortgages.
I totally hope that there was a rush to get this to print, Lisa from the tech writing department was running down the hall yelling “STOP THE PRESS!!” and she eagerly thrust her breaking article into the editors hand.
Want to know something even crazier, during Greys Anatomy they have adverts for chocolate and makeup, when the V8s are on they tend more towards fast foods and autoparts stores. I don’t think that L’Oreal would be throwing up an ad on Channel Seven for their latest foundation in between the supercar laps, it makes just as much sense as advertising dating sites to someone who states that their status is married.
Advertising is targeted, if advertising isn’t targeted it becomes completely useless. Facebook is free to use, if you take away the advertising, you take away Facebook. It really isn’t brain surgery, and despite what the article may try and have you believe, there isn’t some lowly advertising exec sitting in his desk watching millions and millions of profiles to see the status changes, the magical bots scan the pages for changes and update your ads accordingly. Yes, Facebook is making money from your life, but you gave them permission to when you not-so-scandously agreed to their TOS.
Which brings me neatly onto my main issue with FB, if you’re going to bitch at Facebook for anything, then this is probably a good start: Stating in the TOS that once you upload any content, like that picture of Little Cousin Susie from your family reunion, you give them the permission to redistribute, adapat and sell YOUR FAMILY PHOTOS as they see fit…
You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service.
Now, whilst I do think it’s highly unlikely that FB are going to start selling people’s snapshots from their online galleries, but the permission is there for them to do so. To me that’s a far larger issue than a bot knowing that you’ve got hitched recently and serving you appropriate ads, maybe I should be writing for the Sunday Telegraph!