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[Music]
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[Music]
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Joe thank you so much for joining us
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today pleasure thank you so at the
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beginning of your book you say that the
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advertising industry has launched what
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you call one of history's most massive
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stealth efforts in Social
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profiling how is this happening and what
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are the implications for consumers well
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um a lot of it is happening because
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companies feel that they have to know a
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heck of a lot more about their consumers
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the users of their products than they
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ever had before uh as a consequence
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there are tens and tens of companies
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that are prepared to follow consumers
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wherever they go trying to anyway and
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then to share the data anonymous or not
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anonymously with um uh Publishers and
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marketers and uh and the consequence is
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the kind of new environment that we're
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seeing in the media and among
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advertisers uh historically if we look
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at the rise of the media agencies what
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were some of the under the hood forces
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that uh led to this environment of
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digital
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intrusiveness mainly it has to do with
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the transformation of the media buying
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industry the media buying industry is
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really a subset of the advertising
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industry historically media buying was a
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straightforward activity um the the
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center of advertising was in creating
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the ads and then the idea was where do
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we go to put those ads by Time by space
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and it was pretty straightforward in a
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country like the United States where you
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went to television magazines newspapers
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maybe Billboards um with the rise of
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cable television you had the beginning
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of the multiplication of channels and
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the question of how do we try to reach
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people with different demographics
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across 150 type channels plus other New
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Media coming online and then with the
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rise of the internet that multiplied
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almost infinitely and by then a whole
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new set of companies media planning and
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buyo companies that had been spun off
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from the major advertising agency
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conglomerates as Standalone profit
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centers had emerged and those companies
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are leading the March into this new
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world so what are some examples of of
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the kind of intrusiveness that you're
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talking about well the kind of
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intrusiveness I'm talking about has to
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do with um in the first instance
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following people around the web uh even
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around a site for example what is it
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that you do on a website how does that
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relate to what we knew know about you
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demographically and then beyond that
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what is it that you do across a variety
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of websites and then beyond that what is
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it that you do connecting your uh laptop
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activities with your mobile activities
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with your in store activities and all of
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that begins to create a profile of you
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much of it today is thin though
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increasingly we're talking about
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hundreds of data points a lot of it
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today is rather uh transient so that if
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people get rid of their cookies and a
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lot of people don't but if people get
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rid of their cookies they won't be able
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to be followed as well but increasingly
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we're in a situation where hundreds and
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hundreds of data points about people
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across a whole variety of aspects of
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their being together with lots of ways
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to track them across sites and across
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platforms is emerging and down the line
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that's having imp it's already having
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implications for the ads we see for the
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discounts we get for the World Views
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that we get in terms of marketing and
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advertising but it's also beginning to
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affect uh what we see in U news and
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entertainment and it's having enormous
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ramifications for the so-called Legacy
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Media how so well what's happening is
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that the Legacy Media and by that I mean
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traditional magazines newspapers
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particularly print media are finding
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that as they lose
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audiences uh who are migrating to the
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web and particularly in an economic
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downturn advertisers are following them
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to the digital environment what we see
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however is that advertisers are not
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sticking with those same platforms forms
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they're moving into other platforms and
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the competition is so large that while
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they used to get tens of dollars per
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thousand people in say newspapers and
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magazines now we're talking about a
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couple of dollars and even less and as a
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result um magazines and newspapers that
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used to make a lot of money on those
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individuals in the Legacy world are
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having trouble surviving even with
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double or triple the number of audiences
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in the digital
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World which are the companies you think
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are most responsible for some of these
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intrusive practices um what we see are
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companies that have to do with tracking
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and uh managing data okay some of the
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biggest companies like axium and
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Experian have data about virtually
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everybody at least in the United States
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you could literally if you go to the
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Axiom catalog which you can find online
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you can see that they sell enormous
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amounts of information about us
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sometimes actual with names so you can
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find out what kinds of Health aspects
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people search for you can find out what
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kind of houses people have what kind of
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financial activities they do uh what
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kind of um psychographic profiles they
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have what vacations they take um then
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there are companies like ex exelate 33
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across X+1 that are more Niche companies
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in the digital realm and what they do is
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they track people and create cookies
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about people often anonymously that can
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be merged with marketer cookies about
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those same people and if you put all of
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this together in a pot and sometimes the
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data flow across these sorts of
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companies um many companies now are
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looking at Social relationships for
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example uh so you add social
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relationships to demographics to to
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offline activities to uh shopping
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activities to Lifestyle profiles all of
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these things begun begin to create
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images of who we are essentially
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reputations and what I try to do in the
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book is to show that we're at the
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beginning of this era certainly not even
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the middle and the end but if you follow
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the industrial logic you see how this
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has the implication the possibility of
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really creating a situation where we
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live in these silos these these areas of
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life based on how marketers Define us
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without knowing anything about where
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they get this information and even that
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it's going on
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except this vague notion that is
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happening you use the term in the book
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long click what exactly is that and what
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what what implications does it have the
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long click is sort of the Holy Grail of
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advertisers today um it's the idea that
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we can begin to follow a person from
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that top of the funnel okay the
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marketing funnel which we could discuss
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whether that really exists or not in the
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way it's discussed but at any rate from
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the time a person begins to look for a
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product through the the various online
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and offline platforms that that person
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uses to the point where that person
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swipes a credit card writes a check and
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then we can try to follow attribute that
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person's activities through the entire
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process of searching and eventually
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purchasing knowing that we know a lot
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more about what that person does who
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that person is and we maybe can
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generalize to other people we think are
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like that so that's the kind of Holy
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Grail it also monetizes justifies the
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monetization of certain media much
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better than it ever has been done before
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as I say it's a Holy Grail but um
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Technologies are developing to try to to
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try to do that what were some of the
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technological
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innovations that the advertising and
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media industry had to go through in
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order to you know get the capability of
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doing some of the things you're
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describing the first one that we often
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take for granted um in this ball game is
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the CLI the cookie
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the cookie was created uh as a very
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conscious effort to try to help
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marketers and actually stores online to
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um track people's purchases when they
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were buying more than one thing uh the
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cookie uh people who created the cookie
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really had some philosophical issues how
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do we think about privacy in this and in
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mid and late 90s when all this was going
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on they created a certain kind of
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regimen which was more beneficial some
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would say to marketers than to people
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who care about privacy but the cookie is
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only the beginning uh together with the
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cookie we had to development of
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probabilistic statistical thinkers
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computer scientists who have tried to
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figure out how we can get a hold of what
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it means to follow an individual across
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a whole variety of spaces that's another
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uh deep technological uh sort of
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invention that has taken place another
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of course is
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and with the rise of Google uh really we
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have a new marketing model having to do
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with the notion of the click which is
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controversial The Click itself is a
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fascinating technology it's really the
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extension of a human being's hand uh and
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people say well do we really want that
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to be the model of what it means to sell
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a product because display advertising
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gets hit by that so now there's a push
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back in terms of display an attempt to
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try to figure out ways to model
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engagement as it relates to display so
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all of these ideas are taking place with
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a whole new group of people who are
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thinking about this some of them worked
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on Wall Street and worked on derivatives
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and now they're moving into Madison
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Avenue and they're trying to understand
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how to bring big data and how to bring
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new technologies to the question of how
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do we Define people it's totally
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understandable my concern about it is
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that it's also totally under the hood
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and we as a society really have no idea
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about what's going on what control we
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have and down the line what the
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implications are going to be right so so
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let me just uh explore this a little bit
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further with a with a very specific
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example that I just remembered uh the
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other day I was on amazon.com and I I
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bought a gift for a friend it was a book
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on Buddhist Meditation uh and the next
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time I went to Facebook uh suddenly I
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started seeing ads about the Lama's uh
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uh vide tapes uh now on the one hand
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this could be an example of what you're
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just describing the long click uh where
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where some someone
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somewhere saw my behavior on one website
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Amazon and is now presenting commercial
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messages to me on Facebook yes but could
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it also not be argued that this is
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something that might benefit me if I
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were genuinely interested in this no
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question so how how how do you olve that
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in your book well the way I try to
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resolve it is the following I'm not
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against Target marketing I'm not against
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uh following people online for reasons
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that you suggest what I am against if we
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want to call it against is the issue of
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it happening without people
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understanding it and without their
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giving permission regarding it uh
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because that what happens in the end I
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would argue it hurts marketers and
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advertisers um fundamentally we're
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moving into a society where data about
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us are going to be continually traded in
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ways that have not happened at the scale
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before that's what we started with that
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question of collecting information about
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people there's never been a time in
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history where individual bits of data
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about all of us are circulating the way
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they are now if we um accept the notion
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that we're just at the beginning of this
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and that marketer logic require if you
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read the trade press and go to meetings
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as I do the notion that we're going to
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try to follow people wherever they are
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and serve them what we consider to be
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relevant to them whenever they seem to
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want it the question becomes who gives
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you the right to Define me and to
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surround me with ads and discounts and
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somebody else with very different ones
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some people are going to lose other
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people are going to win some people are
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going to be called waste which is a term
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they use some people going to be targets
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and as a society we have to come to
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grips with that because eventually
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people going to say Hey you showed me a
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different map of the airplane for seats
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then you showed the guy next to me as a
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consequence I ended up having to pay $25
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for an aisle seat and you didn't why is
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this going on and right now people are
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relatively calm about this sort of thing
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but eventually we may have occupy
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Madison Avenue the way people had Occupy
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Wall Street people are going to get
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their hands on the idea that something
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is a miss here because we are being
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defined by forces we have no clue about
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now you also argue in the book that U
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some of these advertising models are
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destroying uh traditional publishing
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ethics yes uh could you give any
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examples of that yeah there magazines
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used to have in newspapers too this idea
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of the church State divide uh the the
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term was coined by a famous American
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publisher Henry loose who owned timeing
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Incorporated and the notion was that the
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business side should not even speak to
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the editorial side um with Hyper
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competition particularly in the uh in
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the print area and with the notion that
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somehow the web is fundamentally
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different and you have to make money
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there in advertising not even
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subscriptions so companies as you know
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are trying to to get money that way um
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that has fallen apart in much of the
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magazine industry the notion now is how
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can we get advertisers to like us and
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we'll bring them in any way we can
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virtually now there are some magazines
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that are more welcoming than others but
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the notion of what a magazine is has
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fundamentally changed that way for
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example a major magazine company
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Meredith really sees itself as a
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marketing services company and uh um
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Hurst owns a digital advertising company
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uh we're moving into a world where media
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are seeing themselves more as extension
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of Market marketers than they ever have
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not that they never did but we had a
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period in American history where
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advertising and media editorial were
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considered separate and even in
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newspapers they're beginning to see
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parts of it particularly soft news as
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areas where they can welcome advertisers
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and not get into trouble with
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journalistic organizations that's very
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interesting so if if we believe that
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Publishers are starting to customize
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news and information based on the
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characteristics that they think the
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advertisers want to see what kind of
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privacy concerns do you think that
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raises well I think it has to do in that
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case with the question of why do I get
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certain agendas of news and you don't so
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let's say hypothetically that uh I do an
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analysis of your clicking behavior and I
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find that when there are optimistic
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headlines that you look at you're much
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more likely to put your mouse over an ad
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or maybe spend more time with an ad in a
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display manner than you would if we have
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pessimistic headlines it's only a little
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leap to for me to decide that from now
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on I'm going to change the headlines
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that you see okay and I could say but
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that's what that person wants see and
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the same with with television which is
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going to move to an internet addressable
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system it's there've been attempts at
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this for the last 10 years or so but
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eventually uh customization of
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Television will exist to the point that
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when when you turn your TV on you won't
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see a channel you'll see an agenda you
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know an intelligent Navigator as it may
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be called and uh I can very easily see
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that the agenda that gets set up is a
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combination of what you say you want and
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what the the algorithm said you're
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likely to like together what some
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advertisers are interested in supporting
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so maybe an Advertiser will be likely to
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say I will pay for this movie if you
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want to watch it this week your next
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door neor won't get that okay or Tiffany
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might say we know that your wife's
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birthday's coming up here's a romantic
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movie that we'll pay for you to watch
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and they'll put product placements in
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there seamlessly specific to your
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demographic and other people see it will
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get very different product placements so
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you will see a very different world RIT
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large than other people will and um you
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know it's not going to be totalistic but
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in general it could have very
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interesting effects on how you look at
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the world or reinforce your sense that
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you're being judged by Society in
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certain ways and not in other ways
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fundamentally it's a discriminatory
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activity some people gain by
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discrimination other people don't um I
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also ought to point out that there are
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companies deeply involved in trending
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topics and this too is affecting the
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media so there's a company for example
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called demand media which looks at
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what's trending and Google and Bing has
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freelance ansers rather cheaply uh churn
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out videos and uh you know written
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stories on that with the idea of
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blanketing the web and their own
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websites so that when you do a search
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their articles will come up that has
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enormous implications for what we mean
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by journalism soft news and even
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eventually entertainment and the kinds
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of things that advertisers want to put
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their stories next their their own
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stories their advertisements next to and
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I think these are all areas of major
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concern especially the content Farms as
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as as these are called and I think
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Google and some other companies have
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actually changed their algorithms to to
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to prevent this they tried ironically
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you know what company that seems to have
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been hurt most about.com that was owned
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by the New York Times that is owned by
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the New York Times the times was making
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a lot of money from that uh they
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probably wouldn't call a Content Farm
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but they were really hit pretty hard as
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a consequence of it right now uh there's
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always been this view that the web
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uh empowers
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consumers uh from from the book that uh
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from what you say in the book it seems
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like that might not be exactly true do
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you do you agree that uh do you think
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the uh web empowers consumers or does it
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make them more subject to manipulation
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by companies and the government both I
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think it's both I think that in the most
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obvious way the web empowers consumers
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we can now walk into a store uh look on
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a on our mobile device if you have a
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smartphone and find out what prices are
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elsewhere stores have gotten to the
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point that they'll even allow people to
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go online in the store with the idea
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that if they don't keep them there uh to
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look at prices they'll go anywhere else
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anyway uh so those kinds of things plus
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the ability to collaborate and to do a
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lot of things that some academics have
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have emphasized certainly show that the
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web is terrific uh that the digital
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world is in liberating in many ways but
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what I was concerned in writing this
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book about is that people seem to stop
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there and what I'm arguing is if you go
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under the hood of the internet and see
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where the Core Power really is it has to
00:20:08
do with trying to take back what
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advertisers marketers were afraid they
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were losing with the Advent of the
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digital world really take back certain
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power and we see developing in into the
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2000s and and nowadays an attempt to use
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what people do that they consider
00:20:28
liberating
00:20:29
and turn it to the advantage of
00:20:30
marketers in ways that people might not
00:20:33
be at all comfortable with uh and what
00:20:36
we have found in a lot of surveys we've
00:20:38
done people have this vague sense of
00:20:40
discomfort a vague sense that they know
00:20:42
what's going on but they really don't
00:20:44
know much for example about data mining
00:20:47
they know stuff like that happens but
00:20:49
even if you go to websites that try to
00:20:52
explain it like Google for example they
00:20:53
use onepoint descriptions so they'll say
00:20:56
things like um how do we do this let's
00:20:59
say we follow you across websites and
00:21:01
find out that you're a football fan well
00:21:03
then we will send you ads about football
00:21:06
you know that sounds so benign as to be
00:21:09
stupid why would Professor Joe turo care
00:21:12
okay but the point is they do a lot more
00:21:14
than that and we're talking hundreds of
00:21:16
data points that are distributed across
00:21:18
everything that you're looking at right
00:21:21
so I wonder if it could end with some of
00:21:22
the public policy implications do you
00:21:25
think the the solution lies in Greater
00:21:28
self
00:21:29
awareness and self-regulation by the
00:21:32
advertising firms or uh more
00:21:35
interventionist action by the government
00:21:37
I think all of the above I think that
00:21:39
advertising companies uh have to realize
00:21:42
that there are there are real
00:21:44
responsibilities in today's world um for
00:21:47
a century the advertising industry has
00:21:50
basically uh Gone on with the idea that
00:21:52
it's a lazy fair environment um now it's
00:21:55
quite clear that advertisers are shaping
00:21:58
being uh the media environment in ways
00:22:02
that Society will have Major Impact
00:22:04
about and also our understanding of
00:22:07
ourselves and for the self- protection
00:22:10
of the industry they have to understand
00:22:12
self-regulation that has to be done
00:22:14
seriously and it depends there should be
00:22:17
a public discussion and an industry
00:22:19
discussion and there is to some extent
00:22:21
not deeply enough i' argue about what
00:22:23
that means at the same time I believe
00:22:26
that regulation has to take place
00:22:27
because there are a lot lot of Bad
00:22:29
actors out there and there are a lot of
00:22:31
competitive forces that companies like
00:22:33
for example Google who said five years
00:22:35
ago they would never do something are
00:22:37
beginning to do it because now they're
00:22:38
competing with Facebook and Twitter and
00:22:41
so uh in some ways they should see
00:22:45
public regulation and public discussion
00:22:47
about these things as beneficial for the
00:22:50
industry because if things are done the
00:22:53
right way they will move forward in ways
00:22:56
that people can feel comfortable with
00:22:58
with and that the public can feel safe
00:23:01
about and right now I think both of
00:23:04
those are highly problematic great Joe
00:23:07
thank you so much for speaking with
00:23:09
thank you
00:23:13
[Music]
