@wraith808: Very interesting. Thanks for the info. A bit disappointing too, though I am none too surprised, being skeptical of the motivation of anyone involved in any aspect of advertising after having spent some years working on computational analysis of market research problems, population surveillance problems, and modelling of "target audience participation demographics" down to the ultimate level of granularity - i.e., a single identifiable person. This has the potential to reach into every corner of our lives. The Nazi fascists arguably set the standard by example - tattooing a number onto the forearm of every Jew in the death camps was a brilliant bureaucratic idea for indelible audience identification - one that supposedly "freedom-loving" Western democracies seem Hell-bent on trying to imitate nowadays, through the implementation of the medium of a National ID card, or subcutaneous RFID tag, DNA registering, or facial recognition, or something.
"Ah, but that's justified in the
"War Against Terror™" one might hear someone say. Well, yes, so it might seem, but then what about all those other "wars" that are often used as arguments to substantiate the loss of freedoms, liberty, or franchise in some way - "The War Against Drugs", "The War Against Poverty", "The War Against Malaria", "The War Against Climate Change™" - to name but a few?
If one feels that we
seem to have been encouraged to forget/overlook these post-modern lessons of fascism from Nazi Socialism and Russian Communism from the Second World War, then it's probably because we
have - it's all going "down the memory hole" as George Orwell put it (in the book "1984"). For example, the EU's so-called "right to be forgotten" is a relatively modern innovation of Orwell's "memory hole" (erasing/rewriting history in the Ministry of Truth), but now actually manifested as a legally enforceable
law. You can see where that's heading. So much for freedom/liberty.
With the possible exception of
JunkBuster, I suspect that most of the efforts - e.g.,
Ghostery - to make browsing more private have the potential to be used in a similar sort of "reverse-engineering" manner to
improve the advertising delivery protocols/methods, and that's exactly how they
will be used, even if they
weren't designed for that in the first place. It's a kinda evolutionary process that is happening to market advertising targetting
and delivery methods, and there's arguably nothing you can do about it. It is remorseless, driven by a cancer in the currently supreme form of tacitly acceptable fascism called corporate/capitalist fascism, the most virulent form of which seems to have been homegrown and husbanded in America. It's American-made, like Bud Light.
For example: SOPA? TPP anyone? "G8 Free-market negotiations"? Ah, the taste of freedom! Yeah, right. Look at all those people ROFL.
So, you've "...started trying Disconnect. They seem more upfront... so I'm going to trial it for a while....".
Well, good for you. Let us know how that works out for you.
Arguably it won't make a blind bit of difference what you do, but one never knows...
...and where you say you're "...feeling pretty good about it after this (Ghostery) sensational uninstall page..." I have to agree. It's a moronic but classically fascist way to intimidate people through the use of propaganda. I reckon they should've also worked in the classic "It's for the greater good of our children and their children" too. I mean, it's not like it would've made it any
more stupid than it already was, so why not go the whole hog?
