Pay-For-Visit Advertising

theodp writes "US patent office documents released Thursday show that a startup named Pelago is seeking a patent covering Pay-For-Visit Advertising, which uses GPS, Bluetooth, or RFID on your mobile devices to track your travels to see if you wander into a place of business that appeared in an ad shown earlier on your cellphone, PDA, or laptop. To maximize ad revenue, phone calls are also tracked to see if you dial a number associated with an ad, and financial transactions are examined to see if you make a purchase from an advertiser. The application goes on to note that the system may be of interest to government agencies. Pelago just raised $7.4M from the likes of KPCB and Jeff Bezos."

Minority Report

[Anonymous Coward]

Next they'll be tracking me by retinal scans to see if its REALLY ME and I didn't just loan my device to a sibling, friend or child. Then it'll be cross-referenced with my credit report and my bank account to see if I can even afford it, but they won't care - they'll just offer me a new card with a limit that is just enough to cover whatever asinine product they're trying to force at me.

and first post.

Re:no thanks

[jellomizer]

Oh and you shouldn't use a credit, debit card or checks for any of your transactions, forget about Buying stuff online or mail order.

Back in them olden days when we went to the corner store Bob behind the counter knew what your spending habbits were and gave you options on what was new and good, and if Bob was a bit chatty half the town would know your spending habbits. We acuatlly have far more privacy per day. You are being tacked as a number and that number is rairly connected to you personally. So the whole town doesn't know your spending habbits just some guys from xyz knows that 9384123223 likes to buy keyboards, or is in a market for keyboards. Don't expect the governement to get it right if they cant realize when you put in a change of address for a new license and they will not send you notices that your registration is out of date to the new address I doubt they can figure anything else about you.

What does the customer get out of this?

[immcintosh]

Well, I guess that question wouldn't matter for a less invasive advertising platform, but what this seems to be proposing is currently impossible without the customer's explicit agreement and cooperation. So I'm wondering what they plan on giving the customer to make this ever remotely appealing?

How do they get the location data?

[klingens]

What allows them to access my cellphone remotely and access its GPS receiver? Why would my cellphone tell them the GPS location in the first place?
Are there really phones on the market which allow this? If so, what prevents evil terrorist(tm) to do the same as this company then? Are phonemakers terrorism supporters?!one!?eleven!

Re:So basically...

[ArcadeX]

Not saying i'm for this in any way, but if the phone were provided free, and the add company paid for the phone / service via the adds, I could see older people on budgets, or broke teens not having a problem trading freedoms for services.

That will be the day ...

[Anonymous Coward]

when I stop using mobile phones ... As soon as ads are on my phone, I'm done.

And for the record, I NEVER buy/go anywhere/do anything based on an ad but only on what my needs and wants really are.
Obviously I'm not the typical consumer nor will I ever be. I actually peel all the stickers and badges off of everything
I have, laptops/computers, cars, equipment, tools, etc. I just don't like the look of all that crap.

Re:Can you say "Minority Report"

[starglider29a]

They said the same thing about the "mark of the beast". "That no man may buy or sell without..."

It is and has been a great idea for nearly 2000 years... if you can ignore the downside.

Stalking for fun and Profit

[Anonymous Coward]

Has anyone else noticed the disturbing [to me, anyway] trend towards actions being illegal if performed by a private individual, but legally acceptable if performed by a corporation, for profit?