Category Archives: privacy

The Encima Group Donates Tag Management Referrals, Maintains Neutrality

The latest from Encima but a long-time in the making….hopefully more digital analysts and marketers will consider Piwik as an open source alternative to sharing their precious customer data with G. And of course, the DAA is doing some great things for the industry and we want to be a part of that. Special thanks to David Clunes for his vision and support on this initiative.

Encima Group LogoNewark, DE – August 18, 2014 – Analytics consultancy The Encima Group, is pleased to announce the donation of several thousand dollars in referral fees earned through the recent recommendation and subsequent implementation of Signal’s technology platform. Signal’s Tag Management system (formerly BrightTag) was chosen by two of Encima’s major pharmaceutical clients as the best-in-class tag management solution. For one Encima client, their prior tag management system took too much time to use and was expensive. It was replaced with Signal and the client is already seeing ongoing tag maintenance now taking less than 10% of the time that it did before. For another client, Signal was deployed together with an enterprise site analytics solution across several high-profile Web sites making ongoing tag maintenance a snap.

David Clunes, CEO and Founder of The Encima Group explains, “With technology vendors often jockeying on new capabilities, we prefer let them do what they do best without getting caught up. We purposefully do not recommend the technology platforms that make us the most money, instead we recommend what is best for our client’s long-term analytics success. Donations like this help us continue to maintain our neutrality – all while doing some good for the industry.”

The Encima Group, known best for its independent analytics and digital operations services often finds itself recommending platforms for clients. Sometimes viewed as another value-added reseller, The Encima Group sees itself as an extension of their clients’ organizations and vigorously maintains its “Switzerland” status. That sensibility extends from the firm’s analytics practice which uniquely eschews agency media buying and creative services to focus on providing clients with both objective performance reporting and unbiased campaign optimization recommendation.

Clunes continues, “When it comes to analytics, more objectivity is always a good thing. We feel that this is a great way of paying it forward and that hopefully other firms get the idea.” By sharing the referral fees that it earned, Encima is simultaneously investing in two worthy causes known to analytics professionals worldwide: The Digital Analytics Association, a global organization for digital analytics professionals and Piwik, the globally popular open source Web analytics platform.

“The Digital Analytics Association is thrilled by the Encima Group’s donation,” said DAA Board Chair, Jim Sterne. “The funds will be added to our general fund to benefit all members of the DAA. We hope that others in the space will follow Encima’s leadership in this area.” For Piwik, the funds will be used to facilitate continued development of this open-source platform. Available as an alternative to sharing with 3rd parties, Piwik allows digital marketers to control their Web site behavioral data. Maciej Zawadziński, of the Piwik Core Development Team says, “This is great and will help us to further develop an alternative free Web analytics platform.”

About The Encima Group

The Encima Group is an independent analytics consultancy that was recently recognized for its successful growth in the Inc. 5000 (ranking in top 25%). The Encima Group’s mission really is about actionable analytics and flawless execution. Offering an integrated suite of services around multi-channel measurement, tag management, dashboards, technology strategy consulting and marketing operational support, The Encima Group pioneered the notion of Data Stewardship. The Encima Group is based in Newark, DE with offices in Princeton, NJ and Chicago, IL. Its client roster includes leading pharmaceutical companies like Bristol-Myers Squibb, Shire Pharmaceuticals, Otsuka, AstraZeneca and Novo Nordisk.

For more information about The Encima Group, visit www.encimagroup.com. For more information about Signal visit www.signal.co, for Piwki visit www.piwik.org and for the Digital Analytics Association visit www.digitalanalyticsassociation.com.

Media Contact(s)

Jason Mo, Director of Business Development (jmo AT encimagroup DOT com); phone (919) 308-5309; Domenico Tassone, VP Digital Capabilities (dtassone AT encimagroup DOT com); Phone.

 

In Support of IAB

While we don’t always agree with IAB when it comes to viewthrough, a recent post on AdExchanger deserved support: IAB Vs Mozilla: Randall Rothenberg Takes The Gloves Off

The Viewthrough Measurement Consortium supports the IAB’s position. The idea of a centralized cookie clearinghouse run by people with anti-business agenda is suspect. When Mozilla forces users out by default, that smacks of paternalism if not Bolshevism. The natural quid pro quo between a publisher and their online audience is being hi-jacked as a result of these maneuvers. Meanwhile, the biggest threat to privacy is likely the Feds who have effectively unlimited resources and can use force to compel behavior. Free people have a choice.
The question for the consumer (as always) is what’s in it for me? Today the choice is free content or free content (no ads/tracking). Some will choose the latter. Right now, consumers of ad-supported content really don’t know what it costs to provide it and there is no penalty for blocking ads or cookies. VMC’s position is to let the consumer decide: their choice should be to either pay for the content or accept ads/tracking…everybody else should get blocked by the publishers – meaning no or very limited content/functionality. Users can always opt-back in.
While it is great that browser companies want to provide consumers with more control, the consumers themselves ought to make their decision in a way that is also truly informed. Publishers have really got to wake-up to actively owning this – that day is coming, albeit slowly. For the Bolsheviks, there really is no free lunch.
Related post from the Tip of the Spear Blog: Solutions to the Privacy Debate: Lemons, Carrots and Potatoes.

Solutions to the Privacy Debate: Lemons, Carrots and Potatoes

After reading the How to Prevent the ‘Do Not Track’ Arms Race  by Peter Swire, the inanity of it all becomes more apparent.The premise of this Wired piece is that users should have a choice…they do. They can visit a site and are implicitly (and sometimes explicitly) agreeing to receive free content and services in exchange for being presented with targeted ads.

Canny Web browsers are in a mad dash to curry favor with the genteel “Information should be free” crowd visible in the user comments. It seems that this end-run was done to pre-empt negotiations through W3C, most likely in an attempt to gain market share. However, it is surprising that for an attorney that Swire missed the opportunity to articulate the above quid pro quo argument missing in the discussion. Then again, so did the IAB. See Digital Media Lesson in Shooting One’s Foot (Part I).

The Dead Weight Web Audience (DWWW) consists of variety of ad/tracking dodgers. The size of this audience and their habits can be measured by most major site analytics tools and ad servers out-of-the-box or with some customization. Common methods include:

  1. Browser DNT
  2. Cookie blockers
  3. Ad blockers
  4. JS rejectors
  5. NAI opt-outs
  6. Likely cookie-deleters
  7. Others…

While the politicians posture and the debate rages on, sometimes it is necessary to turn these lemons into lemonade. The good news is that, solid ad analytics (or adverlytics) can inform the decision-making process about which kinds are most prevalent in your target Web audience.


Advertisers
It all starts with digital marketers and their agencies paying attention to the details of ad delivery. The growing interest in ad viewability is encouraging. For those that really want to reach a tech-savvy entitled audience that wants nothing to do with their ads  they will need to first measure it, in order to monetize it.


  • Carrot. Demographics on this audience may skew higher education and higher income; this  audience spends a lot of time online and believes in getting something for nothing and not afraid to post about it. Measuring the performance of this specific audience for your ad campaigns however, may require a concerted effort by digital media planners and analytics professionals – but that is their job.
  • Stick: Time to get up off the couch and start asking questions of your media suppliers, agencies and analytics team. Advertisers wasting impressions on an audience that doesn’t want any ads and is actively blocking your efforts to show them an ad is kind of masochistic. Ignorance is no longer an excuse as the money being wasted on targeting into the unappreciated abyss, could instead be heavied-up with more receptive audiences. Again, analytics can help refine targeting.

If existing agency analytics can’t measure the Dead Weight Web Audience, then consider adding an independent analytics consultant.

Publishers
For site publishers that really want to attract the free-riding tech-savvy audience that also wants nothing to do with supporting their business model, the same advice applies: measure it and monetize it.

  • Carrot: Allow them to consume content for free, but find a way to sell advertising against this special audience. Free-riders can become its own targetable segment by definition – no off-site tracking or ad network is even needed. Anyone with DNT header activated, rejecting 3rd party cookies, blocking JS, etc…Most larger pubs already have an audience research/analytics and ad ops teams that can help do this and if not, additional consultants can be engaged.
  • Stick: Just say no to the content free-riders. While this has been really difficult for sites that have historically been in search of bulk ad impression delivery, the writing is on the wall considering the drive for ad viewability. When these literally dodgy people visit a site, send them a pop-up that advises them to pay for the session, subscribe, register or add site to the targeting white list. If the users choose not to, show them an empty page, very stripped down content or allow an annoying freebie cap. BTW, the pop-up can carry an ad, too.

Ad Networks
The real question is what to do with the DWWW that expects free content to be there when they arrive at a network Web site. These users can be sized up and once this is done, it is a question of monetization:

  • Carrot. Though anecdotal research suggests a small percentage of users are actually opting-out and that the size of the audience is relatively small, it does represent a valuable tech-savvy segment. Simply enable ad targeting of the DNT, NAI Opt-outs and the 3rd party cookie blocking crowd. Many ad networks have a means to even exclude likely cookie-deleters from their targeting. Folks, that sounds like a new segment to sell.
  • Stick. Develop or implement ad/pay wall technology. This will force the quid pro quo. For users that want to read their favorite bloggers, they will need to pay up with cash or a small slice of their attention. Smaller long-tail publisher partners will need help pulling this off but ad networks could easily deploy this technology.

Conclusion
Whether using the carrot, the stick or both, the solution is that advertisers and publishers need to take action on their own to stop getting ripped-off. Don’t carry this sack of entitled potatoes on your back. Now is the time to measure and monetize this otherwise mass of Dead Weight Web Audience.

Leveraging an incremental approach that leverages solid adverlytics, these strategies can boost the bottom-line and shape the digital media industry for the future. In doing so, many of these regulatory problems will solve themselves.

Learn to Say No to Free-riders.

    Control Your Ad Preferences 2012!

    Updated for 2012 and just in time for the Holidays, its Control Your Ad Preferences 2012!


    Don’t be a cafone and block ads or delete your cookies…forget what the privacy fanatics and content freeloaders say. TOTSB’s handy reference of major ad control settings panels is here to help. In our continuing effort to ease the privacy data paranoia and highlight consumer control, here is where you can adjust most if not all digital advertising preferences. 2




    Overview for 2012
    Overall, controlling your ad preferences has gotten easier. It is much simpler to do than correcting information on your credit report. What is interesting is that not all of the tools out there allow you to opt-in as in some cases you might be opted-out through no direct action on your part.

    LIMITATIONS: As with all cookie-based systems they are susceptible to cookie blockers, changing computers or delete the NAI opt-out cookie.

    Global Cookie Managers
    These services have emerged as a one-stop shop for consumers.
    1. PrivacyChoice – Very easy to use and includes Yahoo, Bizo, BlueKai, Exelate tabs (definitely easier to use since 2011). Individual publishers can skin this with their ad partners.
    2. Network Advertising Initiaive (NAI) – The industry’s solution and one of the earliest efforts to give consumers control. If you really don’t want ANY display advertising tailored to you, set your opt-out centrally and then get lots of irrelevant ads – enjoy. In 2012, they made it easier to see the opt-in list compared to opt-outs. However, it is easier to opt-out than it is to opt back in.
    3. TrustEWas new in 2011 as an opt-out approach and competitive to NAI. It has more participants than NAI. Not a bad approach but seeing tracking technologies like Adobe Omniture included here is interesting.
    4. PreferenceCentral – Rub by email house Unsubcentral – looks interesting but not sure what control this really provides yet (no change form 2011)
    Specific Advertising Provider Preference Managers
    The data providers of the world mostly work behind the scenes but have a variety of services for consumers to control their advertising.
    1. Blue Kai – by far the most interesting with a new interface. Plenty of behavioral ad targeting fodder in here. Also, you can really see the presence of offline credit ratings companies busily creating a whole new revenue stream off of you; interesting that because it is just as creepy yet harder to see. Still, Blue Kai stands out as offering a benefit to charities.
    2. Exelate -They changed the URL in 2012 and improved the interface. Offers many interest categories that can are based on behavior but can be edited.
    3. Lotame – New URL! Fairly innocuous interest and sub-interest categories with observed behavior.
    4. Bizo – Known as the B2B player in the digital advertising data business. Nice approach actually.
    5. Safecount –  from the DynamicLogic (WPP) family comes a totally different approach; with no behavioral segments but plenty of ad creative and sites you’ve been to; no interest preferences here. Actually shows you the creative units.
    6. Amazon – pretty simplistic control over personalization of Amazon ads.
    7. Blue Cava – mobile targeting manager. 
    8. RapLeaf – Opt-out and preference manager; associates to an email address.

    Major Consumer Portals
    Where people get their email 24×7 and store their personal life’s electronic communiques all for free…somebody has to pay for this storage and bandwidth. Thank you advertisers. Note, these email portal systems are more persistent than anonymous cookie-based platforms since they require users to authenticate. At the same time, they tend to be the most advanced.
    1. Google – Comprehensive and interest-based; no observed behavior included (yet). There is also the Google Dashboard. which offers an integrated way to manage all your Google services – including your search history. Must be signed-in.
    2. Microsoft – Another comprehensive list of interests; no observed behavior.
      Must be signed-in.
    3. Yahoo – Offers a fairly deep interest profile; no observed behavior. Their Ad Interest Manager currently only allows 7 category opt-outs – seems like an odd limit on something that makes the advertising more valuable.
    4. AOL – Pretty simplistic; shows what categories you are in but no control here yet.
    5. AT&TNEW! Control panel based on observed interests; a little clunky but editable.
    If anyone has any other suggestions for the above list, please comment or drop TOTSB a line!
    Also, in case you were looking for a Flash cookie control panel to view and/remove such locally stored objects: http://bit.ly/2fZi


    Last, don’t be evil and enjoy your new Google Toilet ™!


    A Fool and Their Data are Soon Parted

    In the post Fear & Loathing in the Ad Technology Stack (3/8/11), TOTSB opined about the latent dangers of having a tag management platform provided by the same vendor as the site analytics solution. Since then, IBM CoreMetrics joined the fray with their Digital Data Exchange solution. Earlier this week, the other and much bigger shoe dropped as Google announced their new and free Tag Manager.

    With this latest development, it seemed like a good time to take a look at digital marketers often foolish handling of their customer’s behavioral data. These days such foolishness is like leaving the safe open with money in plain view. Now, let’s take a closer look at what is being offered by Google.

    How Does It Work?

    The appeal of Google Tag Manager is understandable: “Google Tag Manager is easy, free, and reliable. It gives marketers greater flexibility, and it lets webmasters relax and focus on other important tasks.” Signing-up is easy enough and takes just a few minutes like many other Google tools. Digital marketers can even “opt-out” of anonymously sharing their data for benchmarking purposes. However, this is a faux bone being thrown out by Google that is revealed on a subsequent screen.

    Later, users learn that are actually agreeing to share their data with DoubleClick, Google’s advertising business and signing-up for AdWords, too. It is odd that users must explicitly agree to this to use a Tag Management System. On the final screen you can add then add some 3rd party tags. Conveniently this screen is pre-populated with Google’s Ad Words, DoubleClick Floodlight and Google Analytics tags. Supposedly other tracking tags will be coming soon with such drag-and-drop simplicity. Until then you can add custom code.

    Google Tag Manager is:

    • Asynchronous itself and calls 3rd party tags asynchronously which means that slow-loading tags (including itself) won’t slow down page download time.
    • Not server-server…at least that is not yet clear. Meaning tags are literally firing on all requests which is technically a worse engineered solution when simultaneously using other Google products and services. When GTM does go S2S, certainly it will be positioned as a speed benefit…just ignore the looming centralized consolidated Google master cookie.
    • Using a Data Layer. Handy, as it means that there is a way to manage standardized data elements from user behavior on a page or other integrated systems.
    • No SLA. That is what free means; as a result this makes GTM less appropriate for enterprise-sized clients. Perhaps this will be included in Google Analytics Premium.


    The Trojan Horse
    Now for the rub. Considering the success of Google’s model of free analytics, this move by Google should not be a big surprise. If you weren’t already sharing your data with the Google data-mining machine, now there is one more way for them to get even more breadth of data capture.

     

    Combined with their the search, free email, social and display media business, Google continues to steadily touch more and more of the entire digital stack. That means they also have maximum user depth, i.e. the full end-to-end view of cause and effect. It is this rich, vast global data set that Google’s engineers have trained their sights on analyzing. The reality is that most digital marketer’s already aren’t technically savvy enough to realize the free Google stack is a digital data Trojan Horse much less do anything about it. When you are used to getting the milk for free why would you want to pay for the cow? Let’s face it – it is a brilliant strategy.

    Even if digital marketers decide to forgo Google Analytics and upgrade to a pure-play enterprise analytics solution (not a fake one like Google Analytics Premium), they still have a hole in the data bucket…now thanks to Google Tag Manager. Let’s just call it Google’s little data collection hedge.
     
    At the same time, for most Tag Management System vendors this is going to be a really big problem. Google will now commence to eat many TMS’ lunch by putting tremendous price pressure on the market..kind of like dumping. Many digital marketers have already invested in what we can refer to as TMS 1.0 where its all about putting tags in containers albeit through non-server-to-server solutions. Interestingly, many of them are using their paid TMS to deliver their free Google Analytics. Arguably, these clients are the most at risk to Google’s freebies.

    Think about it: these TMS 1.0 providers cannot compete any time soon with what will soon be a cloud-based (S2S) architecture. It will be difficult, expensive and risky to change their platforms with many clients and very tedious implementations already behind them. Expect to see more consolidation as a result.

    The High Cost of “Free
    Most digital marketers have been blissfully unaware of the actual game that they have been playing with Google for years – all under the auspices of free and easy-to-use. Perpetuated by self-appointed experts, there is a popular notion that espouses that analytics technology should be cheap and that it is more valuable to have a well-funded well-paid analytics people…not an expensive tool. The above meme is so Google. It is self-serving and self-reinforcing; it works especially well for the cottage industry of certified implementers and analysts. Unfortunately, it usually also means weak display media measurement, gaping holes in data security/intellectual property control and potentially deep privacy concerns. More tangibly, it could also mean inadvertently feeding your competition through a de facto data co-op while Google makes a buck.

    The layers of Google’s conflicts of interest are deep and include:

    • Google Remarketing –  conveniently baked into Google Analytics these days; the Google advertising cookie and the Google Analytics site cookie have been one and the same for some time now
    • Google Analytics – known to overstates Paid Search performance
    • Google Search – recently changed how referral data is passed on  landing pages, thus obfuscating search performance
    • Google Analytics Premium – a thrown bone on fractional attribution and now via DoubleClick Analytics, yet their credibility as an independent arbiter of their own performance is rarely considered

    On Being Ethically Challenged About Others’ Intellectual Property
    Google’s history is riddled with questionable attitudes towards ownership of other’s data. If your IP attorneys are not paying attention to this – you might need new ones:

    Digital Marketer’s Fasutian Bargain
    The fact of the matter is that Google is really an advertising company not a technology company. The big question for today’s digital marketers that are considering Tag Manager has not changed. It is the same as the Google Analytics question, i.e. is your company’s most valuable asset (customer’s behavioral data) worth more than the cost of not sharing it with the best data-mining conglomerate in the world? For many smaller companies the answer could be no, but for many largeradvertisers the answer should be – thanks, but no thanks.

    Google’s latest self-serving, 3-for-me and 1-for-you offering should really motivate digital marketers to start to think differently about their value of their data, how much they trust others with it and what they need to do next to securely and exclusively control their data. Smart advertisers need to really start paying attention to how much data they are really sharing with a company that Sir Martin Sorrel best referred to as a “frenemy“…and that was way back in 2007. So much for do no evil.

    The good news is that it doesn’t have to be this way.

    How to Remove Google from your Ad Stack
    Others are also noticing Google’s move and that digital marketers do have other alternatives…they are just not free. Back to using common-sense and ROI/TCO analysis to justify technology investments…or risk sharing your data with Google and the competition.

    Here are some thought-starters:

    • Tag Management. Best choice at this point: BrightTag. Yes, I am an advisor. However, the reason I am is because only BrightTag has looked beyond tags on pages to the underlying problem of the data transport layer. Unlike the other TMS 1.0 platforms, BT has already a few years into developing a powerful TMS 2.0 tool; it is based on a highly scalable cloud-based infrastructure that offers digital marketer’s a real alternative to Google’s encroaching data glom. The good news is that most everyone that matters is already server-server integrated with BT…except of course (wait for it…)…Google’s products (Google Analytics, Floodlights, AdWords).
    • Analytics: Adobe, ComScore’s Digital Analytix and if you must IBM CoreMetrics
    • Ad Server: MediaMind, Pointroll, MediaPlex and if you must Atlas……not Google Analytics
    • Search Management: Kenshoo, Adobe, Marin…anything but DART Search
    • Attribution: Adometry, Visual IQ have better methodologies…C3, Convertro, Clearsaling…not Google Analytics or DFA.
    • Demand Side Platform: MediaMath, Turn, DataXu…not Bid Manager (formerly Invite Media).

    The truth of the matter should be getting clearer to savvy digital marketers. If not, bring in independent viewpoints that are not invested in this madness. Good luck!

    For publishers this is a much more complex proposition and the subject of a future post.

    Control your Ad Preferences (and Cookies) 2011!

    What a difference a year makes! New posts are brewing but in a continuing effort to help ease the privacy data paranoia and highlight progress, this popular Tip of the Spear Blog post has been updated for 2011. Can’t wait for the 2012 election fueled update…


    With all the hub-ub from the New York Times, WSJ, gubment (including former Black Panther and Chicago’s very own Bobby Rush) and consumer privacy fanatics you must be growing VERY concerned. For your handy reference below is a list of major consumer settings panels where you can adjust your advertising preferences that is actually much easier than correcting information on your credit report.

    Global Opt-in Cookie Managers
    These services have emerged as a one-stop shop for consumers.
    1. PrivacyChoice – Very easy to use and includes Yahoo, Bizo, BlueKai & Exelate. Individual publishers can skin this with their ad partners.
    2. PreferenceCentral – Not sure what control this really provides just yet but it looks interesting.
    3. TrustE – a recent effort and competitive to NAI; it has more non-participatns provided seemingly to get them off the fence. Not a bad approach.
    4. NAI opt-out – The industry choice. If you really don’t want ANY advertising tailored to you, set your opt-out centrally and then get lots of irelavant ads – enjoy…also, don’t change computers or delete the cookie! 
    The Consumer Portals
    You get your email 24×7 and store your personal life’s electronic communiques in there for free – somebody has to pay for this!
    1. Google – comprehensive and interest-based; no observed behavior included (yet). There is also the Google Dashboard for general privacy.
    2. Microsoft – another comprehensive list of interests; no observed behavior.
    3. Yahoo – fairly deep interest profile; no observed behavior. Their Ad Interest Manager currently only allows 7 catagory opt-outs – seems like an odd limit on something that makes the advertising more valuable.
    4. AOL – not much control here yet.
    Specific Advertising Provider Preference Managers
    The data providers of the world mostly work behind the scenes but have a variety of services for consumers to control their advertising.
    1. Blue Kai – by far the most interesting with a new interface. Plenty of behavioral ad targeting fodder in here. Also, you can really see the presence of offline credit ratings companies busily creating a whole new revenue stream off of you; interesting that because it is just as creepy yet harder to see. Still, Blue Kai stands out as offering a benefit to charities.
    2. Exelate – they changed the URL! No worries, we found the new one for you. Exelate is not as behavior dominated but has many interest categories. Also, it doesn’t seem to update in real-time.
    3. Lotame – fairly innocuous interest and sub-interest categories with observed behavior.
    4. Bizo – known as the B2B player in the digital advertising data business. Nice approach actually.
    5. Safecount –  from the DynamicLogic (WPP) family comes a totally different approach; with no behavioral segments but plenty of ad creative and sites you’ve been to; no interest preferences here. Actually shows you the creative units.
    6. Amazon – pretty simplistic control over personalization of Amazon ads.
    7. Blue Cava – mobile targeting manager. 
    8. RapLeaf – Opt-out and preference manager; associates to an email address.

    If anyone has any other suggestions for the above list, please drop me a line!

    Also, in case you were looking for a Flash cookie control panel to view and/remove such locally stored objects: http://bit.ly/2fZi


    Last, don’t be evil and enjoy your new Google Toilet ™!





    Recent Privacy & Targeting Coverage

    New posts are brewing, in the meantime here is a repost of the OPA’s roundup.

  • Consumers Are Getting Savvier About Behavioral Targeting  (paidContent)
  • Behavioral Targeting On Rise Regardless Of Pushback (MediaPost)
  • Consumers to Behavioral Advertisers: We Know You’re There (eMarketer)
  • Trends in Behavioral and Contextual-based Advertising shows consumers accepting of targeted advertising (Parks Associates release)
  • Round up of Do Not Track News

    Snowed in?

    I am…so feed your paranoia or revel in the latest regulatory threats from DC bureaucrats and the Bobby Rush’s of the world.

        Ad Groups Granted Extension To Comment On Do-Not-Track (Online Media Daily | MediaPost)
        Firefox Web Tool to Deter Tracking (Wall Street Journal)
        Mozilla offers do-not-track tool to thwart ads (Deep Tech | CNET News)
        Google Offers Privacy Plug-In for Chrome (ClickZ)
        Google and Mozilla Announce New Privacy Features (Media Decoder | NYTimes)
        Firefox and Chrome Add ‘Do Not Track’ Tools To Their Browsers (ReadWriteWeb)
        Mozilla, Google Take Different Paths Toward Privacy Protection (paidContent)
        Mozilla, Google Take Small Steps Toward Browser Privacy (GigaOm)
        Will Do-Not-Track Become Law This Year? (Daily Online Examiner | MediaPost)
        Privacy Insiders Weigh In on FTC and Commerce Reports (Future of Privacy Forum)
        Rockefeller Eyes Online Privacy, Consumer Protection Issues (Adweek)
        Senate to Hold Hearings on Online Privacy (Adweek)

    From the nice people at the Online Publishers Association:

    Control Your Ad Preferences!

    With all the hub-ub from the New York Times, WSJ, gubment (including former Black Panther and Chicago’s very own Bobby Rush) and consumer fanatics you must be growing VERY concerned. For your handy reference below is a list of major consumer settings panels where you can adjust your advertising preferences that is actually much easier than correcting information on your credit report.
    • Blue Kai – by far the most interesting. Plenty of behavioral ad targeting fodder in here. Also, you can really see the presence of offline credit ratings companies busily creating a whole new revenue stream off you; interesting that because it is just as creepy yet harder to see.
    • Exelate -not as behavior dominated but many interest categories.
    • Lotame – fairly innocuous interest and sub-interest categories with observed behavior.
    • Google – comprehensive interest-based; no observed behavior.
    • Microsoft – another comprehensive list of interests; no observed behavior
    • Yahoo – fairly deep interest profile; no observed behavior.
    • Safecount –  totlly different with no behavioral segments but plenty of ad creative and sites you’ve been to; no interest preferences here.
    If anyone has any other suggestions for the above list, please drop me a line!

    If you really don’t want advertising tailored to you and you can set your NAI opt-out cookie and then get lots of irelavant ads – enjoy!


    Also, in case you were looking for a Flash cookie control panel to view and/remove such locally stored objects: http://bit.ly/2fZi


    Last, don’t be evil and enjoy your new Google Toilet ™!