Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for September 11, 2024

Hey, maybe they just happened to go into style today. Check GQ.

Oh yeah, I just looked up the value of my car online and suddenly I’m bombarded with car ads.

I will now get out my phone and say, “Naked women.”

Even Alexa© won’t endorse Trump (ha ha ha!)

And I always listen to Alexa© . . .

And Taylor Swift.

Siri is more logical, he/she has ties to reality!!

We do not have Alexa for that very reason, they say it does not spy on you, but best be careful!

It’s marketing algorithms, not the government. Blame Google or Edge or whatever browser you use. They upgraded so that they can read your search history and present ads to help you find/buy stuff you want. Too bad it only stokes the conspiracy theorists out there… (and that the algorithm is useless most of the time)

I remember having Bolo ties when I was young.

My phone, and computer have the speech recognition turned firmly OFF. But it’s true that I don’t actually turn off the mic on the phone since it’s integral to the use of the phone part of the device.

A few months ago I was at a bar, talking to a friend with my phone just sitting on the table in front of me. A song by Paul Simon played on the jukebox, so I told my friend a fun fact about Paul Simon, then said I was getting up to order an Old Fashioned cocktail. When I got back, I picked up my phone, and its Google news scroll began with an article about Paul Simon, followed by one about how to make a top Old Fashioned. I don’t even have the “listen in case I ask a question” feature turned on.

Just last Friday I was talking to a friend about trying a restaurant I’d heard mentioned a month prior, and decided to use my phone to Google search it to see where it was. Its name was three words starting with “One”. I typed “One” and Google’s autocomplete suggestions started with the name of that restaurant, which wasn’t new, was an obscure place, was fifteen miles away from where I was, nowhere near any other destination I’d been at, and wasn’t anything I’d ever Googled before. There was absolutely no way for Google to predict that “One” was going to be a search for that hole-in-the-wall restaurant other than if it had been listening in to our conversation.

if i browse with my phone while p**ping, does the phone know which restaurant i ate at ?

I have a “comprehensive theory” about how it works. The responsiveness of the ads is actually a metric of how much or little personal information they have on me. If I am “starving the beast” and reserving my personal information, then my ads should be focused rather narrowly. If I am seeing a wide spectrum of ads all the time, then “they” know too much about me.

But I may be deluding myself. I think it’s good that my ads from all sources seem to be narrowly focused all the time, and almost always focused on things I have no intention of buying. But it might just be bugs in the AI or some kind of subliminal priming for other stuff that I actually wind up buying without knowing why.

Feel like Rat could pull off that look, tho…

Privacy is old fashioned.So are respect, civility, responsibility, and accountability.

My friend was having trouble with his Amazon account and had called twice to no avail and he asked me to help him. I went to his house and called Amazon on his land line and acted as if I was him. When they asked for confirmation on who I was I gave them my friend’s name, address, email, etc. They asked why I was calling and after I explained I was told to wait a minute or two while they looked into the problem. When the rep returned to the phone he said, “Thanks Mr. S#$^#Y” calling me by my name which of course I hadn’t given to them. The only way he could have known my name was by voice recognition. Be careful because you have no privacy.

Help help.

We actually do need the Government to put some laws in place that protect privacy and deal with new technology. Unfortunately, we also have a country where it’s legal for companies that violate our privacy to give limitless money to legislators.

My phone lives in my back pocket, so all I get is ads for gas-x.

I have some Bolivian bolo ties; they ate quite nice.

Blame Al…Al G. Rhythm

Our search engines are listening to us. Stop it, Chrome!

THEY hear everything. (But who are THEY?)

It’s all a conspiracy, man.

LOL!

What’s really creepy is when you just think of something and an ad for that shows up. Coincidence? Maybe…

Yep, trackers!

I look up something on Google, and suddenly there are videos in my YouTube feed on that very subject

The quote, “Privacy is dead. Get over it,” is often attributed to Scott McNealy, the co-founder and former CEO of Sun Microsystems. The company is long gone, but the prescience of the words remains.

I never watch sports. I have no real interest in sports. I have no browsing history involving sports. But once a year I check the Cleveland Indians’ standing just before playoff season. And then for weeks I get pop-up ads for sporting gear, Vegas odds-makers, sports streaming services, men’s “health aids”, wings and pizza.

But its even worse when you know what you want, you don’t have to search anything, you go directly to amazon and purchase the item, and you’re still bombarded with ads for the exact item you already purchased.

It’s not the government… it’s the corporations that are listening to you

By commenting here will I soon be getting ads for Pastis’s books?

I remember the scene Mr Scott picks up and talks into a mouse and learns the computer isn’t voice activated. Found the concept quite “Quaint” but now I find it more annoying and invasive as mosquitos (that at least go away in the winter)

This is so true. I was in a store and mentioned something I never looked up, then it was in my search suggestions list.

Nah, Sundar Pichai just likes to listen in

My wife and I do this all the time just to prove to are friends that nothing is private any more.

It’s 2024, and y’all are just NOW figuring this out? Really?

Well, at least somebody is listening to me. My husband and kids certainly don’t.

This DOES NOT happen to me.

Wanna know why not?I don’t use Google Chrome, except in VERY rare instances where I have to check how a website looks on other browsers (haven’t had to for about 2 years now). I don’t use Microsoft Edge. I hit the Internet on my smartphone maybe once every two weeks at best, and my online phone screentime can be measured in minutes per week. I use Amazon with extreme reluctance. I use “QuackQuackForward” (figure it out) as a search engine. I have to plug in a microphone for my desktop and laptop to use Zoom, Skype, etc. and then unplug them. I use Firefox as my browser on my devices. About the only contact I have with Google is Google Maps/Earth now and then, and I long ago learned to navigate without GPS. If there’s voice recognition on my phone, I don’t know (or care) how to turn it on. My wife uses yet another privacy-enhanced browser, same name as the Scottish-themed “princess” movie of years ago.

AND YET, Google Maps will still prominently bring up and call attention to businesses in the industry/field where I did writing and review work long ago………….. which, I’ll be honest, is not THAT bad a thing to have happen…….

I remember when gmail first started. I noticed that I would get advertisements that seemed to be related to the subject line. So, I created a fake gmail account, then sent myself emails with subject lines such as, “Stop fracking (edited) my husband you cheap blankity blank” just to see what ads I would get.

Look up ‘Cox Media Group (CMG)’ and ‘Active Listening’ and you’ll see reality is meeting fiction, it is nuts to me that there isn’t people with pitch forks in the streets.

Sent my friend pic of “robot dogs” being used in Ukraine. All of a sudden, I’m getting ads for them on my tablet. One in Ohio comes with a flamethrower.

I was joking with my (adult) kids about trying to trick my smartphone by mentioning “Platypus (mating)”… Facebook starting spamming me with platypus nature documentaries.

don;t do this at home!!!!

Must have Google searched bowling.

Researchers have proven that corporations have been illegally spying on everyone for years. Not much has come of it, as long as our privacy protections are up for sale to anyone with a valid bank account.

That’s not actually fiction. Ford motor company just sending a patent to put a listening device in your car so they can put ads on your screen that reflect your conversations. Do you think big brother isn’t here yet?

I blame Fox News.

And climate change…

therecord dot media slash ford-patent-application-in-vehicle-listening-advertising

Ford seeks patent for tech that listens to driver conversations to serve ads

Ford Motor Company is seeking a patent for technology that would allow it to tailor in-car advertising by listening to conversations among vehicle occupants, as well as by analyzing a car’s historical location and other data, according to a patent application published late last month.

“In one example, the controller may monitor user dialogue to detect when individuals are in a conversation,” the patent application says. “The conversations can be parsed for keywords or phrases that may indicate where the occupants are traveling to.”

The tech — labeled as “in-vehicle advertisement presentation” — will determine where a car is located, how fast it is traveling, what type of road it is driving on and whether it is in traffic. It also will predict routes, speeds and destinations to customize ads to drivers, the application said. …

Stop sending me adds! We already bought a new mattress!

I’ll settle for getting popup ads off the GO COMICS site….

I am still wondering what I was discussing, or looking for, when I get ads for adult diapers and sombreros. Not making this up.

Happens to me all the time too. I search it on my phone, I get it on my computer.

Who doesn’t love a nice Bolivian Bolo Tie?

Rat, you gotta be the oldest character on pearls!

The way to fix that is to change society’s paradigm. I’m not holding my breath.

The snooping problem has kept me from getting a smart tv.

This is news??? What universe have you been living in?

You may get a reply in question form like: Do you mean Bolivian Bolo Hats ?

why the heck do they keep removing my fricking comments????

And in some parts of the world they are bombarded with depends ads and e.d. cures. Marketing is the real devil.

Duh. We sold our souls long ago.

I don’t own a cell phone.

EVERY DAY, I get more and more reinforcement that my decision is unquestionably impeccable.

……… Never,……. not ever.

I have some Western style shirts. I hope to get me one of those ties someday.

Pig’s got the right idea. I do one better. I’ve never been comfortable carrying a live phone everywhere. When I do travel with it, I keep it in a backpack.

Every now and then I get an email from company I never heard of. It may have been a result of some other online activity. If I know I’ll never do business with them, I unsubscribe since I never subscribed anyway.

I, for one, welcome our new AI overlords! Don’t fight it! Be polite to Alexa, Siri, and automated assistants because they know and they remember.

I’ve gotten ads for things I’ve merely thought about.

Just do a search on Google. Your inquiry returns a URL with hundreds of bytes of tracking data included, along with injected text ads at the head of the results.