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A comment on Only 17% of consumers believe personalized ads are ethical, survey says (2019). Parent comment

Re:Only 17% of consumers believe personalized ads are ethica... by retSava on Monday November 16, 2020 @04:36AM (#25109842)
Since events like this famous case, where Walmart outed a teenage girl pregnancy, it's well-known they mix in some "weird" or irrelevant things to give a sense of plausible deniability. "oh, pregger testers, haha, how weird they can be <nervous laughter>".

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-targ...

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Re:Only 17% of consumers believe personalized ads are ethica... by bob29 on Monday November 16, 2020 @04:29PM (#25117202)
This was Target not Walmart and I say that not to nitpick but rather highlight that arguably Walmart is somewhat an upper tier tech company.

If this is what Target does in 2012, Amazon in 2020 not only inserts plausible deniability to optimize for lack-of-creepiness factor. They're probably running AI bots on forums and social media injecting seamless product placement in commentary you see in your browser.

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