Althouse: Google thinks it knows me.

May 13, 2019

Google thinks it knows me.

The ad it serves up:

56 comments:

Ann Althouse said...: Sorry I caught the cursor as if I'm about to click it. I did not click. And now the ad is gone, replaced by an ad for atrociously frumpy women's clothes — Google's usual go-to for me.

Althouse, don't you want super-comfortable clothes and to say "Happy Birthday" to President Trump?; 5/13/19, 9:49 AM
rehajm said...: It thought you were an American and therefore wanted to wish your President a happy birthday because that’s what patriotic Amer....HAHAH no, that’s not what they thought!! HeHe...; 5/13/19, 9:57 AM
MadisonMan said...: Trump was born June 14th. His birthday is a while away yet.; 5/13/19, 10:02 AM
Jaq said...: For a long time after I installed a paid VPN and stopped using Google, it only gave me ads for women’s clothes, but I see that today it gave me an ad for a T-Shirt that was engineer oriented, maybe based on rhharden’s path integral comment, IDK.

I once made a pussy joke based on Coleridge’s “caverns measureless to man” line that working in mensuration for menstruation and got ads for various precision measuring devices for a week.; 5/13/19, 10:05 AM
MadisonMan said...: Hey! I just saw that same ad in my sidebar as well!; 5/13/19, 10:06 AM
BarrySanders20 said...: #me too; 5/13/19, 10:12 AM
BarrySanders20 said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/13/19, 10:13 AM
Big Mike said...: @Nobody, was it this T-shirt?; 5/13/19, 10:15 AM
Yancey Ward said...: Chuck and Ritmo will be along shortly to tell you the Trump ad is well placed.; 5/13/19, 10:20 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: Someone paid Google to feed you that add, based on criteria supplied by the ad-placer.

They got you to pass the add on to all of your readers, at no cost to them.

Maybe they know you better than you think...; 5/13/19, 10:29 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/13/19, 10:29 AM
buwaya said...: Precision measuring devices are very cool.
It seems odd to me that few have taken this up as a hobby.; 5/13/19, 10:29 AM
narciso said...: khashoggi, seems to have been a great fit for the paper:

https://www.breitbart.com/the-media/2019/05/12/washington-post-defends-rashida-tlaib-holocaust-comments-attacks-republicans/; 5/13/19, 10:29 AM
Nonapod said...: The Google ad sense algorithm has concluded that you're an absolutely devoute Trump lover?Seem's like the Google algorithm has the sense of a teenager. "Boy, you sure talk about Trump a lot in neutral, non-negative ways! You must love him! You're a cultist!"; 5/13/19, 10:36 AM
tim maguire said...: Will you wish the president a happy birthday? It seems churlish not to after they've gone and made it so easy.; 5/13/19, 10:42 AM
Leland said...: I got an ad for a 24Hr ER. WTF Google?; 5/13/19, 10:43 AM
Yancey Ward said...: "They got you to pass the add on to all of your readers, at no cost to them. Maybe they know you better than you think..."

Those wily Russians!; 5/13/19, 10:44 AM
Yancey Ward said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/13/19, 10:45 AM
Yancey Ward said...: At least it wasn't a funeral home, Leland.; 5/13/19, 10:46 AM
Michael K said...: Facebook is worse, if possible. I don't use Google for searches. I did a search for an Australian town a few months ago and got ads for B&Bs in that town for weeks.; 5/13/19, 11:04 AM
Paul Mac said...: Ann please get signed up for Brave Rewards so those of us who use Brave as a browser can support you easily just by using your site. https://brave.com/faq/#for-publishers

If I see that you are verified I'll send you a tip.

Using Brave and DuckDuckGo rather than Chrome and Google Search are good ways to avoid Google being accurate about knowing you or having to worry that they do at all. Brave is Chrome with all the privacy invasion removed. And DuckDuckGo is about the same thing for searches. I can't recommend enough making it your default search in all your browsers and using Brave as your primary browser. The Rewards system provides an alternative to sites depending on ads for you to support them.; 5/13/19, 11:24 AM
stevew said...: Did you sign the card?

I still get the occasional A**ley Ma***on ads to which I say, "Google Thinks It Knows Me, but It's Wrong".

I've since been using "Startpage" for searches, seems to have helped quite a bit.; 5/13/19, 11:31 AM
Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...: oh, c'mon, Ann-- sign the birthday card.
if not, You will feel bad when he signs yours.; 5/13/19, 11:31 AM
Martin said...: Not you so much as the visitors to your site. And on the whole based on teh bulk of the comments at least, it is not wrong.; 5/13/19, 11:39 AM
n.n said...: Sign the card, don't sign the card, the IRS will not audit you. Although, the Democrats may infer intent.; 5/13/19, 11:57 AM
Wince said...: I just kept clicking women's swimwear and lingerie ads with the zoom-in models photos until they now routinely populate the margins of my Althouse page.; 5/13/19, 12:07 PM
Wilbur said...: It was that bulk order for Trumpy Bears that did it.; 5/13/19, 12:14 PM
Leland said...: At least it wasn't a funeral home

They say AI can predict death these days, so I suspect Google will start advertising that next.; 5/13/19, 12:20 PM
n.n said...: Alphabet/Google wants to know, to predict you. Click here.; 5/13/19, 12:41 PM
Left Bank of the Charles said...: Google knows Meade.; 5/13/19, 12:51 PM
n.n said...: They say AI can predict death these days

A conservative estimate is 10 years. Liberal estimates range from 20 to 30 years, and longer when the winds shift. We should probably get all of our kittens in a row, or not.; 5/13/19, 12:53 PM
Tom T. said...: After I bought clothes for my 3-year-old daughter online one time, I had big, prominent ads following me around for "toddler girl underwear."

Another time I started getting ads for a specialized dating site encouraging me to "meet bipolar singles."; 5/13/19, 1:29 PM
FullMoon said...: I just kept clicking women's swimwear and lingerie ads with the zoom-in models photos until they now routinely populate the margins of my Althouse page.

Yep, me too. And, it affects ads on other sites, like Drudge.; 5/13/19, 1:30 PM
FullMoon said...: Tom T. said...

After I bought clothes for my 3-year-old daughter online one time, I had big, prominent ads following me around for "toddler girl underwear."

Another time I started getting ads for a specialized dating site encouraging me to "meet bipolar singles."

Careful, Mueller & Comey call that "evidence".; 5/13/19, 1:31 PM
tim maguire said...: Leland said...
At least it wasn't a funeral home

They say AI can predict death these days, so I suspect Google will start advertising that next.

There have been instances of algorithms knowing a woman was pregnant before she did.; 5/13/19, 1:35 PM
FullMoon said...: Now I have an ad for a t shirt with a cat on it.

15 minutes after I commented on the cat mommy thread.

Is it because of my comment, or because of the thread? Only God(and Google) know.

Will be interesting to see how often I see cat related stuff now.

Was getting dog related ads here frequently and do not own a dog, or cat.; 5/13/19, 1:39 PM
Dan said...: I get ads frequently for the software package my company develops. I just think, "Great, there's a waste of our advertising dollars, and it's going to look like I'm not interested because I didn't click on it."; 5/13/19, 2:17 PM
n.n said...: instances of algorithms knowing a woman was pregnant before she did.

Are you sexually liberal? Do you practice the planned parenthood method of pregnancy resolution? Are you feminine female? Did you miss your last period? Then you may be pregnant with a [human] fetus.; 5/13/19, 2:28 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: A few weeks ago Google decided that my husband and I must be Asian, so nearly all of our ads had Asian models in them. In fairness, that's better guessing than they usually do regarding what we might like.

My current sidebar ad is telling me to buy Rosetta Stone for my mother. Ha!; 5/13/19, 2:30 PM
AllenS said...: It's no secret, and if people don't know, it's their fault. Your The Althouse Woman.; 5/13/19, 2:52 PM
bleh said...: instances of algorithms knowing a woman was pregnant before she did

The algorithms didn't know anything. Those women were probably trying to get pregnant and got ads about pregnancy after googling about ovulation and so on.; 5/13/19, 2:58 PM
Big Mike said...: I got ads for party dresses with short skirts. If Althouse thinks my legs look bad in shorts, wait until she sees me in a party dress!

[She won’t.]; 5/13/19, 3:29 PM
Tom T. said...: "Careful, Mueller & Comey call that 'evidence'."

Yes, since then, if I ever need stuff like duct tape or bleach, I buy it somewhere other than Amazon. I get paranoid about the software drawing inadvertent connections and profiling me as a serial killer.; 5/13/19, 3:59 PM
Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...: why do we keep getting ads for philanthropic organizations?
Damn these people!; 5/13/19, 4:06 PM
Nichevo said...: Is this your confession that you voted for Hillary? Well well, you didn't fool us but you fooled the AI. I guess you are smarter than a robot!; 5/13/19, 4:30 PM
Marty said...: No shit: I've got a "sleep apnea machine" ad from the "Lung Association of Nova Scotia." Why can't I get the Trump birthday card instead?; 5/13/19, 4:44 PM
buwaya said...: Airline ads keep trying to send me to Vietnam.; 5/13/19, 5:28 PM
Narr said...: Caribbean resort--in Spanish!

Narr
Algorithmically challenging; 5/13/19, 5:48 PM
madAsHell said...: I'm seeing women advertising slinky lingerie.

I don't know HOW that happened!; 5/13/19, 5:54 PM
madAsHell said...: atrociously frumpy women's clothes

Oversized sweat shirts with kitty cats sequined on the front??

I'm saddened that the girl friends in my cohort are starting to dress like Grandmas.

Please Ma'am!! Step away from the elastic waist band!!; 5/13/19, 6:17 PM
narciso said...: My thoughts about this dumpsterfire are clear:

https://hotair.com/archives/2019/05/13/fox-exec-might-find-way-bring-smollett-back-empires-final-season/; 5/13/19, 6:31 PM
Earnest Prole said...: My Althouse ad reads “Got Ants? Oregon’s #1 Eco-Friendly Pest Control.” And strangely enough I just saw a couple of ants scurry across my desk. Unfortunately I’m not in Oregon.; 5/13/19, 8:28 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: Now I'm getting an ad for jewelry, something I do not buy.

Big data is not impressive. They put out press releases now and then to make it look impressive yo advertisers, but in my experience, it's lame.; 5/13/19, 10:55 PM
Fen said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/14/19, 5:02 AM
Fen said...: They say AI can predict death these days, so I suspect Google will start advertising that next.

Ah, the curse of prescience.

Her horoscope says her beau is cheating on her. She scrutinizes him and discover it's true.

Her horoscope says play the lotto and she'll win a new car. She does and it happens.

Her horoscope tells her she will die tomorrow, and the mind being a powerful thing, she dies.; 5/14/19, 5:03 AM
Jaq said...: Big data is similar to counting cards. You see an ace get played, you don’t know what the next card is going to be, but you know it is now 25% less likely to be an ace. That’s powerful, but it isn’t really intelligent, in any real sense. It never gets down to knowing the next card to be played. I made a joke about ED and started getting ads related to ED. If it were really “intelligent” it would have seen that it was a joke and maybe served up condom ads or something.; 5/14/19, 5:44 AM