Google Patents Detecting, Tracking, Targeting Kids 115
theodp writes "A newly-issued Google patent for Rendering Advertisements With Documents Having One or More Topics Using User Topic Interest describes how to detect the presence of children by 'using evidence of sophistication determined using user actions' and tracking their behavior using the Google Toolbar and other methods to deliver targeted ads. Which is interesting, since the Google Terms of Service supposedly prohibit the use of Services by anyone 'not of legal age.' The inventor is Google Principal Scientist Krishna Bharat, who is a co-inventor of another pending Google patent for inferring searchers' ethnicity, reading level, age, sex and income (and storing it all)." Ok I'll be the first to admit that this is greek to me. Someone smart figure this out and post a comment translating patentese into english.
Ads by Google... (Score:4, Insightful)
Reading a website doesn't form a contract anyway (Score:4, Insightful)
Very odd text from the ToS:
Uh, visiting a website DEFINITELY doesn't constitute forming a binding contract. My (completely unprofessional) understanding is that if I can use the services without having to verify my identity, then I probably haven't formed any contract, and if I'm not forced to even be aware that there IS a "contract" then I certainly haven't agreed to anything.
Am I right? Or have we entered some parallel dimension in which simply looking at a piece of content makes you bound by a contract? I'm going to sneak into museums and install my own paintings with arduous terms of viewing.
this seems like an easy thing to do: (Score:3, Insightful)
#2 gather enough of these searches and you'll have a composite of the searcher's general interests
#3 cross references their general interest with the average gender, socieconomic, racial, and/or
#4.. Patent!!!
#5... Profit???
So if you want to screw up that system, a person should just search and click thru something completely random, like businessman searching pokeman websites, a musician searching physics research, or a slashdotter searching for ED pills
Holier-than-thou ignorant nonsense (Score:4, Insightful)
So fucking what? Is it better to be a part of a modern mega-Car-making Machine?.. or a modern mega-Paper-pushing Machine?
At its utmost core, advertising is doing a very important job - connecting people who would like to buy something, with the sellers who are offering something for sale. Like it or not, but advertising, in whatever form, is an integral part of a market economy. The fact that advertising is obtrusive and annoying, is not any more an inherent property of advertising, than killing innocent people is an inherent property of a sword (I was going to say "gun", but realized where I was).
If anything, you should be PRAISING Google for furthering the idea that advertising can be profitable WITHOUT being intrusive, and disruptive. As opposed to spamming you with images or sounds hawking products you're not interested in, Google politely shows you products that their software thinks you might be interested in (to the best of their ability to determine this).
Only communist-pipe-dream hippie would think something wrong of such an approach, or would think it shameful to work at such a company. Ultimately, everything is relative, and I'd rather have Google than many of its competitors.
Re:Ads by Google... (Score:1, Insightful)
If its greek to you... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Holier-than-thou ignorant nonsense (Score:1, Insightful)
You are correct in the sense of conveying important information about products and services.
But modern marketing and advertising have gone WAY beyond that by CREATING demand for their products. Modern advertising is much more about convincing you that you have needs that can only be met by consumption, particularly of their product. That's the insidious part of our free commercial speak - it's gone way beyond providing information to let us make more intelligent choices (and perfect information on the part of suppliers and demanders is a requirement for a free market system to produce an optimal outcome). And then there are the outright lies.
Unfortunately, absent rigoruous censorship, there's no way to separate responsible advertising from irresponsible advertising.
Re:Holier-than-thou ignorant nonsense (Score:3, Insightful)
So, considering that a large portion of advertising is intended to deceive people, yes, I would say it is better to be part of a modern mega-car-making or paper-pushing machine.
Re:If its greek to you... (Score:1, Insightful)
I think it's quite likely this was the only submission on this patent, and I think it was a good move to post it. What's more, because the patent does involve age it inherently targets children as a group - just as it targets senior citizens as a group. It's a misleading headline but not entirely inaccurate.
No that isn't marketing, that is capitalism. (Score:1, Insightful)
There is a difference from free as in beer and ... (Score:1, Insightful)
Since anyone can distribute and modify FOSS, it actually prevents monopolies and lowers the market entry barriers for related software and services.
A monopoly is a monopoly, and the only monopoly that should be tolerated is a limited government. Or if this is truly a free market, you can vote with your dollars... oh wait.