May 24, 2007
The Thought Police Cometh
By Bernice Hurst, Managing Director, Fine Food Network
Most people know their actions in both real life and cyberspace are (or can be) monitored. There are ways to find out where we are and where we have been – not least so that we can be targeted by the advertisers, in our own interests of course; not badgered with ads for things we are never likely to purchase. The cost of such monitoring to retailers and manufacturers is, presumably, outweighed by sales from customers who want their products. Businesses save both time and money by not pestering people who will never be converted.
But Google is now trying to protect its right to go even further. The internet wonder, according to London’s Guardian, recently applied for patents in both the U.S. and Europe to enable it to “compile psychological profiles of millions of web users by covertly monitoring the way they play online games” for use in advertising.
In its patent application, Google said consumers’ decisions made playing online games probably reflect their behavior in real life, and can offer insights into an individual’s preferences and personality type.
Some of the examples given are selling vacations to people who spend a lot of time exploring new worlds in their online games, or mobile phones to those who like games where they spend more time talking to other characters.
Other ideas rely more on in-your-face marketing than psychological profiles. For instance, “In a car racing game, after a user crashes his Honda Civic, an announcer could be used to advertise by saying, ‘If he had a Hummer, he would have gotten the better of that altercation’, etc.” And: “If the user has been playing for over two hours continuously, the system may display ads for Pizza Hut, Coke, coffee.”
The patent would also enable Google to monitor games such as the Sony PlayStation, Nintendo Wii and Microsoft’s Xbox if they connect with the internet.
The Guardian notes that some web companies already scan online activity such as internet searches and email for keywords in order to display advertising based on basic attributes and behaviors. But the extensive profiles proposed in the patent goes way beyond existing examples. Experts said it would be relatively straightforward to combine information sources to put names and addresses to the anonymous profiles.
Google told the paper it had no plans to roll out the technology in the near future, and it was just one of a large number of patents filed in recent months.
Approvals from games publishers to gain access to customer behavior would also be necessary. Justin Townsend, chief executive of IGA, an in-game advertising company, doesn’t think this is likely to be a problem since publishers are always looking for ways to increase revenues. But Mr. Townsend also believes privacy concerns need to be addressed.
“Both consumers, publishers and the advertising industry are very aware of privacy issues,” Mr. Townsend said. “You cannot afford to be vague in these areas.”
Discussion Questions: Scary or sexy? Should companies be able to profile online game behavior to customize advertising messages? How much potential does this offer in learning about individual preferences and personality types? Or are we going too far?
[Author’s commentary] Is it ever going to end? Or could it backfire as people stop playing games online in order to maintain some semblance of privacy and not open themselves to yet more advertising even if it is “relevant to the user”? The whole analysis aspect adds another, even scarier, dimension to the idea if you stop to wonder who will be doing the analysis.
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Should companies be able to profile online game behavior to customize advertising messages? I think that there are really three separate questions:
1. Is the practice legal?
2. Is the practice ethical?
3. Is the practice useful and effective?
I have no doubt that the legality will be explored, tested, and re-tested, many times in many courts as we move into the future. In terms of what is ethical, every individual is entitled to his or her own opinion, but from my viewpoint, the raid on privacy to this extent is a bit extreme. How much potential does this offer in learning about individual preferences and personality types? As a marketing professional, I must admit that this practice would be a 24-hour buffet of pure gold. But with that said, I hope it doesn’t happen because it has other implications that overall will probably have more negative fall out than the positives it can bring to the act of living in a free society.
Since online games are addictive, I seriously doubt that the privacy factor will overcome the prospects this practice offers to those that will capitalize.
One issue is the idea of doing psychological profiling. VALS research does that. The word that was bothersome in the Google version is “covert.” Those people being profiled psychologically for VALS research know they are participating in an evaluative study. It is not covert. Google’s consumers may be upset and then Google will have a problem.
Another issue is the idea of monitoring behavior and making product suggestions. Amazon does this. I always find the suggestions humorous when based upon holiday purchases for my sons. They are not what I am interested in although they do match what I have purchased.
The third issue is selecting to do this profiling from game players. I don’t know of any research that links purchase behavior with game playing behavior. Unless that link is strong, the assumptions made about what people will purchase will be just as out of line as making predictions based upon purchases for my sons.
Google needs to think through a number of issues before embarking on this project.
This sounds scary but is it any different than sitting in a store and watching how people shop, putting RF tracking devices on shopping carts to track movement or studying purchasing behavior?
I recently gave a presentation at a local high school and while there used BuzzMetrics to show up to date blog traffic related to their school and was able to go right to the blogs of students from the high school. My message to the students was that they need to assume that being online is the least private thing they can do.
However, it is easy to have several personas with different email address’ and behavior patterns. It will be fun to see how people mess with the system if it goes on line.
Trying to tie gaming behavior to real life behavior and preferences is making a dangerous assumption. I’ve found the same thing with Second Life. People don’t go to Second Life to recreate their real life–they go there to do things they might never do in real life, and have no desire to do in their real life. Same thing for video games–people act outrageously in the games because they know they can’t and shouldn’t in real life. So trying to assume some kind of behavioral element that could be tapped into to yield a purchase is silly.
“Selling…mobile phones to those who like games where they spend more time talking to other characters.”
I’m absolutely opposed to anything that encourages more mobiles in the the world!
Seriously, though, this strikes me as more of a nuisance than a privacy issue…at least until some genius at Homeland Security (or its UK equivalent) discovers that Al Quedaans are fond of online bingo, and gets involved….
Oh, so many good topics in this one little thread!
First, I have to point out that in order for there to be an invasion of privacy there should be some expectation of privacy in the first place. Why should anyone assume that playing an online game is private? It’s no more private than playing chess in a crowded park. People are going to watch. There are real issue of privacy protection online and I am definitely in the “draw the line before it’s too late” crowd, but if we lump everything into the privacy bucket it will cloud the issue.
Some specific responses to points above: Race, customer profiling and and targeted marketing are at least relevant to your points #2 and #3 above. Certainly the goal of targeted marketing is to dramatically increase the ROI of marketing dollars and the efficiency of marketing campaigns. To Bill’s query of how long would someone put up with people following them everywhere they go, taking pictures of them shopping, eavesdropping on their conversations, and generally hounding their every footstep? I don’t know, ask Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, or Angelina Jolie….
Profiling psychological profiles of online game-playing addicts in order to covertly customize advertising messages them, fully absorbed as they probably are, strikes me like carrying “coals to Newcastle.” Whatever–would this particular audience be fueled up by profiled advertising messages and then converted to different products?
In this “Googled” situation, to expect the unexpected shows a thoroughly modern intellect–silly, scary, sexy, seductive, and secretive, albeit possibly very profitable for Google. As one wonders who would be doing the analysis of such data, is this just another giant step for mankind by marketing mavens?
There are several aspects to the Google patent application that are provocative. First of all, the fact that they even think there is an opportunity to receive such a “process patent.” The whole idea of patenting software has gotten completely out of hand. The fact that a company can use the government (and a whole team of lawyers) to create artificial barriers to competition is ludicrous.
Second, is the whole idea of monitoring game players. Quite frankly I think if everyone really understood what outfits like DoubleClick and the other third party data collection companies are gathering they would be appalled. I remember in the late 90s when DoubleClick made the mistake of publishing some information publicly. There was such an uproar that you have never seen DoubleClick in the headlines again. It doesn’t mean they and others are not out there, it just means they are not talking.
The analogy I like to make is with stalking. Let’s say there was someone waiting outside your front door and every time you stepped out they followed you wherever you went. They didn’t bother you, they simply watched which stores you visited, the things you bought and looked at but did not buy, they followed your family everywhere and compiled a composite of the household’s habits. Then all of a sudden they started to stop you on the street. As you walked into the store they hand you flyers that promote various products. When you got home, your mail box was full of unsolicited advertising. Your TV starts playing ads that are aimed directly at you.
How long would we put up with this?
Very simple…Google must obtain a users’ permission before it monitors anyone’s online activity. The permission can’t be hidden deep in one of those awful online licenses. If Google is allowed to roll out these new patented features without user permission, it will have a profoundly negative effect on the online world.
Let’s hope they get it right.
My apologies in advance to those in the marketing and advertising industries.
Note this data: from a sample of over 5000, organizations, what are the top four factors that determine an organization’s success (i.e., financial strength)?
1. Have a culture that focuses of serving the needs of core constituents rather than serving the needs of the organization’s management.
2. Meet at least the top three core expectations of your customers to an extent of 70% or better.
3. Operate at an efficiency of 70% or better.
4. Have a Master System that keeps making the organization better and better at these things.
Organizations that do these things outperform their best competitors by a margin of eight to one.
The big question is: where in the list of success factors is the one that says, “Reach your customers better and offer them more of what they want or need.” It does not appear in the list at all. This suggests that the concept being promoted by this patent misses the mark of what makes organizations successful, and cannot be useful.
Scary or Sexy? I say neither…yet. What percentage of people game? Of that percentage, what percent has the means to go out and buy a new Hummer or Accord? I don’t believe monitoring gaming behavior to sell more products will be effective. My concern is that because the technology exists, they will start monitoring other things all for the purpose of selling more product. I don’t mind click through analysis. I believe that type of analysis allows manufacturers to understand what I’m looking for and target the right products to me. I do not like the idea that they could potentially monitor activities, apply a psychological profile and target products to me that I am not looking for. Will they also monitor how I use Yahoo Finance or my online banking? How about online photo albums or personal email? This is not the government monitoring for terrorist activity, this is marketing trying to maximize sales.
The technology exists for a lot of unethical things. The test will be controlling the “mad scientist” concept. Over time, rules need to be applied that will allow companies to analyze things that everyone understands can be monitored (like click through) but still protects our rights to privacy. Giving marketing analysts the right to conduct psychological profiles on people just to sell more product has George Orwell’s 1984 written all over it. I understand marketing people’s desire to do this, but in my opinion it’s over the top. Unfortunately, the idea is there and the technology to support it exists. It’s just a matter of time. And it will have to start happening before our obsolete congress applies any rules to prevent it.
Scary? Sexy? How about “silly”? Many people go on the web and visit game sites or places like Second Life to become the people they want to be–but aren’t. How do we–or Google–know that the cyberjock NASCAR kamikaze driver isn’t really some repressed nerd in New York City that hasn’t had a “real” drivers license in 30 years? Check out those fearless, perfect, sexy folks on MySpace who really are 12 year olds playing at being their version of an adult. And gamers–whoah dude–how do you know they aren’t…well…gaming you? Sure it smells like invasion of privacy, but if every effort at Big Brotherism was so sophomoric and ill founded, George Orwell would have written a children’s book.
These tactics may be scary and/or sexy–but in the end they will prove to be largely ineffective. At the surface, there may seem to be some contextual connection between a simulated car crash and that person’s actual new-car purchasing process, but this is only one of a zillion factors that play a role in the latter decision. Overall, this kind of hyper-targeted messaging will sell no more cars than a plain old billboard next to the highway.
Despite the wonders of new technology, mass marketing is still king, and it’s not likely to be knocked off its throne anytime soon.
Paranoia aside, I believe it is a very bad idea to allow anyone, whether they be commercial, service, government organization or non government organization to monitor “public places” in order to monitor and analyze individuals.
This smacks of invasion of privacy rights and despite the many potential commercial application benefits has the potential to create a precedent that we might all be sorry about in the future.
All marketing and advertising can subsidize pleasure. Commercials on TV and radio subsidize “free” programs. Newspaper and magazine ads subsidize news content. If online game players don’t receive ads, then they’d have to pay for their entertainment another way, such as an hourly subscription fee. And advertisers need to target their audiences, otherwise the ads go to people unlikely to be interested in their products. So is this a case of “thought police” or simply a continuation of economic behavior going back 150 years?
These sorts of stories about the web pop up every now and then and lots of people express concern. I’m no marketing expert but a lot of these future world type scenarios and what they’ll mean to marketing and advertising are no more than a Tomorrow’s World look into the future. Some will happen, some will not and many will be so wide of the mark that they’ll disappear up their proverbial… Anyone remember the panacea for marketers that store loyalty cards were going to bring? Sounds strangely similar to me–they were going to track our spending habits, figure out if we had a new baby or not, tailor advertising and marketing campaigns based on sophisticated data analysis, blah blah blah. Where did all that end up? Data overload and a few discount vouchers once a month. Maybe the web will be different and maybe it won’t. Many of the posters above should ask themselves if they actually represent the views of the next generation who seem to have a different attitude to things like privacy. Many seem to want anything but privacy, if MySpace and the endless round of “make me a star for 15 minutes reality shows” is anything to go by. It all sounds slightly sinister and yes adverts popping up are and will continue to be annoying but just like TV, we can use the off switch.
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Should companies be able to profile online game behavior to customize advertising messages? I think that there are really three separate questions:
1. Is the practice legal?
2. Is the practice ethical?
3. Is the practice useful and effective?
I have no doubt that the legality will be explored, tested, and re-tested, many times in many courts as we move into the future. In terms of what is ethical, every individual is entitled to his or her own opinion, but from my viewpoint, the raid on privacy to this extent is a bit extreme. How much potential does this offer in learning about individual preferences and personality types? As a marketing professional, I must admit that this practice would be a 24-hour buffet of pure gold. But with that said, I hope it doesn’t happen because it has other implications that overall will probably have more negative fall out than the positives it can bring to the act of living in a free society.
Since online games are addictive, I seriously doubt that the privacy factor will overcome the prospects this practice offers to those that will capitalize.
One issue is the idea of doing psychological profiling. VALS research does that. The word that was bothersome in the Google version is “covert.” Those people being profiled psychologically for VALS research know they are participating in an evaluative study. It is not covert. Google’s consumers may be upset and then Google will have a problem.
Another issue is the idea of monitoring behavior and making product suggestions. Amazon does this. I always find the suggestions humorous when based upon holiday purchases for my sons. They are not what I am interested in although they do match what I have purchased.
The third issue is selecting to do this profiling from game players. I don’t know of any research that links purchase behavior with game playing behavior. Unless that link is strong, the assumptions made about what people will purchase will be just as out of line as making predictions based upon purchases for my sons.
Google needs to think through a number of issues before embarking on this project.
This sounds scary but is it any different than sitting in a store and watching how people shop, putting RF tracking devices on shopping carts to track movement or studying purchasing behavior?
I recently gave a presentation at a local high school and while there used BuzzMetrics to show up to date blog traffic related to their school and was able to go right to the blogs of students from the high school. My message to the students was that they need to assume that being online is the least private thing they can do.
However, it is easy to have several personas with different email address’ and behavior patterns. It will be fun to see how people mess with the system if it goes on line.
Trying to tie gaming behavior to real life behavior and preferences is making a dangerous assumption. I’ve found the same thing with Second Life. People don’t go to Second Life to recreate their real life–they go there to do things they might never do in real life, and have no desire to do in their real life. Same thing for video games–people act outrageously in the games because they know they can’t and shouldn’t in real life. So trying to assume some kind of behavioral element that could be tapped into to yield a purchase is silly.
“Selling…mobile phones to those who like games where they spend more time talking to other characters.”
I’m absolutely opposed to anything that encourages more mobiles in the the world!
Seriously, though, this strikes me as more of a nuisance than a privacy issue…at least until some genius at Homeland Security (or its UK equivalent) discovers that Al Quedaans are fond of online bingo, and gets involved….
Oh, so many good topics in this one little thread!
First, I have to point out that in order for there to be an invasion of privacy there should be some expectation of privacy in the first place. Why should anyone assume that playing an online game is private? It’s no more private than playing chess in a crowded park. People are going to watch. There are real issue of privacy protection online and I am definitely in the “draw the line before it’s too late” crowd, but if we lump everything into the privacy bucket it will cloud the issue.
Some specific responses to points above: Race, customer profiling and and targeted marketing are at least relevant to your points #2 and #3 above. Certainly the goal of targeted marketing is to dramatically increase the ROI of marketing dollars and the efficiency of marketing campaigns. To Bill’s query of how long would someone put up with people following them everywhere they go, taking pictures of them shopping, eavesdropping on their conversations, and generally hounding their every footstep? I don’t know, ask Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, or Angelina Jolie….
Profiling psychological profiles of online game-playing addicts in order to covertly customize advertising messages them, fully absorbed as they probably are, strikes me like carrying “coals to Newcastle.” Whatever–would this particular audience be fueled up by profiled advertising messages and then converted to different products?
In this “Googled” situation, to expect the unexpected shows a thoroughly modern intellect–silly, scary, sexy, seductive, and secretive, albeit possibly very profitable for Google. As one wonders who would be doing the analysis of such data, is this just another giant step for mankind by marketing mavens?
There are several aspects to the Google patent application that are provocative. First of all, the fact that they even think there is an opportunity to receive such a “process patent.” The whole idea of patenting software has gotten completely out of hand. The fact that a company can use the government (and a whole team of lawyers) to create artificial barriers to competition is ludicrous.
Second, is the whole idea of monitoring game players. Quite frankly I think if everyone really understood what outfits like DoubleClick and the other third party data collection companies are gathering they would be appalled. I remember in the late 90s when DoubleClick made the mistake of publishing some information publicly. There was such an uproar that you have never seen DoubleClick in the headlines again. It doesn’t mean they and others are not out there, it just means they are not talking.
The analogy I like to make is with stalking. Let’s say there was someone waiting outside your front door and every time you stepped out they followed you wherever you went. They didn’t bother you, they simply watched which stores you visited, the things you bought and looked at but did not buy, they followed your family everywhere and compiled a composite of the household’s habits. Then all of a sudden they started to stop you on the street. As you walked into the store they hand you flyers that promote various products. When you got home, your mail box was full of unsolicited advertising. Your TV starts playing ads that are aimed directly at you.
How long would we put up with this?
Very simple…Google must obtain a users’ permission before it monitors anyone’s online activity. The permission can’t be hidden deep in one of those awful online licenses. If Google is allowed to roll out these new patented features without user permission, it will have a profoundly negative effect on the online world.
Let’s hope they get it right.
My apologies in advance to those in the marketing and advertising industries.
Note this data: from a sample of over 5000, organizations, what are the top four factors that determine an organization’s success (i.e., financial strength)?
1. Have a culture that focuses of serving the needs of core constituents rather than serving the needs of the organization’s management.
2. Meet at least the top three core expectations of your customers to an extent of 70% or better.
3. Operate at an efficiency of 70% or better.
4. Have a Master System that keeps making the organization better and better at these things.
Organizations that do these things outperform their best competitors by a margin of eight to one.
The big question is: where in the list of success factors is the one that says, “Reach your customers better and offer them more of what they want or need.” It does not appear in the list at all. This suggests that the concept being promoted by this patent misses the mark of what makes organizations successful, and cannot be useful.
Scary or Sexy? I say neither…yet. What percentage of people game? Of that percentage, what percent has the means to go out and buy a new Hummer or Accord? I don’t believe monitoring gaming behavior to sell more products will be effective. My concern is that because the technology exists, they will start monitoring other things all for the purpose of selling more product. I don’t mind click through analysis. I believe that type of analysis allows manufacturers to understand what I’m looking for and target the right products to me. I do not like the idea that they could potentially monitor activities, apply a psychological profile and target products to me that I am not looking for. Will they also monitor how I use Yahoo Finance or my online banking? How about online photo albums or personal email? This is not the government monitoring for terrorist activity, this is marketing trying to maximize sales.
The technology exists for a lot of unethical things. The test will be controlling the “mad scientist” concept. Over time, rules need to be applied that will allow companies to analyze things that everyone understands can be monitored (like click through) but still protects our rights to privacy. Giving marketing analysts the right to conduct psychological profiles on people just to sell more product has George Orwell’s 1984 written all over it. I understand marketing people’s desire to do this, but in my opinion it’s over the top. Unfortunately, the idea is there and the technology to support it exists. It’s just a matter of time. And it will have to start happening before our obsolete congress applies any rules to prevent it.
Scary? Sexy? How about “silly”? Many people go on the web and visit game sites or places like Second Life to become the people they want to be–but aren’t. How do we–or Google–know that the cyberjock NASCAR kamikaze driver isn’t really some repressed nerd in New York City that hasn’t had a “real” drivers license in 30 years? Check out those fearless, perfect, sexy folks on MySpace who really are 12 year olds playing at being their version of an adult. And gamers–whoah dude–how do you know they aren’t…well…gaming you? Sure it smells like invasion of privacy, but if every effort at Big Brotherism was so sophomoric and ill founded, George Orwell would have written a children’s book.
These tactics may be scary and/or sexy–but in the end they will prove to be largely ineffective. At the surface, there may seem to be some contextual connection between a simulated car crash and that person’s actual new-car purchasing process, but this is only one of a zillion factors that play a role in the latter decision. Overall, this kind of hyper-targeted messaging will sell no more cars than a plain old billboard next to the highway.
Despite the wonders of new technology, mass marketing is still king, and it’s not likely to be knocked off its throne anytime soon.
Paranoia aside, I believe it is a very bad idea to allow anyone, whether they be commercial, service, government organization or non government organization to monitor “public places” in order to monitor and analyze individuals.
This smacks of invasion of privacy rights and despite the many potential commercial application benefits has the potential to create a precedent that we might all be sorry about in the future.
All marketing and advertising can subsidize pleasure. Commercials on TV and radio subsidize “free” programs. Newspaper and magazine ads subsidize news content. If online game players don’t receive ads, then they’d have to pay for their entertainment another way, such as an hourly subscription fee. And advertisers need to target their audiences, otherwise the ads go to people unlikely to be interested in their products. So is this a case of “thought police” or simply a continuation of economic behavior going back 150 years?
These sorts of stories about the web pop up every now and then and lots of people express concern. I’m no marketing expert but a lot of these future world type scenarios and what they’ll mean to marketing and advertising are no more than a Tomorrow’s World look into the future. Some will happen, some will not and many will be so wide of the mark that they’ll disappear up their proverbial… Anyone remember the panacea for marketers that store loyalty cards were going to bring? Sounds strangely similar to me–they were going to track our spending habits, figure out if we had a new baby or not, tailor advertising and marketing campaigns based on sophisticated data analysis, blah blah blah. Where did all that end up? Data overload and a few discount vouchers once a month. Maybe the web will be different and maybe it won’t. Many of the posters above should ask themselves if they actually represent the views of the next generation who seem to have a different attitude to things like privacy. Many seem to want anything but privacy, if MySpace and the endless round of “make me a star for 15 minutes reality shows” is anything to go by. It all sounds slightly sinister and yes adverts popping up are and will continue to be annoying but just like TV, we can use the off switch.