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Forum Post: Hiding from Google

Posted 9 years ago on April 30, 2014, 11:38 a.m. EST by shoozTroll (17632)
This content is user submitted and not an official statement

A few years back, after Target told a woman she was pregnant, before she knew she was, another woman decided to find out of she could hide her own pregnancy from all those prying internet, advertising eyes.

This is her story.

"Janet Vertesi, assistant professor of sociology at Princeton University, had an idea: would it be possible to hide her pregnancy from big data? Thinking about technology—the way we use it and the way it uses us—is her professional life’s work. Pregnant women, she knew, are a marketing gold mine; a pregnant woman’s marketing data is worth 15 times as much as the average person’s. Could Vertesi, a self-declared “conscientious objector” of Google ever since 2012, when they announced to users that they’d be able to read every email and chat, navigate all the human and consumer interactions having a baby would require and keep big data from ever finding out?

Here’s what she found: hiding from big data is so inconvenient and expensive that even Vertesi doesn’t recommend it as a lifestyle choice. (She presented her findings at the Theorizing the Web conference in New York last week.) So what does that mean for companies who say users can just “opt out” if they aren’t happy with (so-called) privacy policies? Can you be a person on the internet without sacrificing all your data to the Google Powers That Be? I talked to Vertesi about her experiment, its implications, and why hiding from big data can make you look like a criminal."

http://thinkprogress.org/culture/2014/04/29/3432050/can-you-hide-from-big-data/

17 Comments

17 Comments


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[-] -1 points by shoozTroll (17632) 9 years ago

It's a full on surveillance society. Someone, is always watching.

From you neighbor, to Target, to the NSA.

Did you know you're out of toilet paper?

Here's a coupon for 50 cents off Northern @Kroger.

Compliments of Koch Industries.

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[-] -1 points by shoozTroll (17632) 9 years ago

Plutocratic poster boys.

The only way they could get me to buy Northern, would be to emboss their faces on every roll.

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[-] -1 points by shoozTroll (17632) 9 years ago

Well, it would creep me out, butt I'd have to try it once anyway.

Perhaps I could frame a few pieces after use and sell it as high art to all their ALEC friends?

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[-] -1 points by shoozTroll (17632) 9 years ago

Perhaps we could get one of their competitors to issue a special run of just such an embossed paper?

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[-] -2 points by shoozTroll (17632) 9 years ago

DK posted that a while ago. Too bad he was chased off too.

Odin didn't like him.

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[-] -2 points by shoozTroll (17632) 9 years ago

I have no idea, and I don't want to know, lest I get carried away.

Perhaps you could design a signature with the link in it?

That way it would be in everything you post.

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[-] -3 points by shoozTroll (17632) 9 years ago

I liked it too. I found it brilliant, but folks around here would rather attack other posters and politicians, rather than the root causes, these days.

Those threads fall faster than the guy who sky dove from outer space.

I'm just sayin'.

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[-] -2 points by shoozTroll (17632) 9 years ago

You'll notice of course, that we have been heavily down voted here, yet not one of them has had a comment on what amounts to corporate spying.

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