#NotHumidiferAdvice

Seriously, though, is this bullshit actually effective enough to justify all the money and effort they put into it?

I really doubt it. I think targeted ads are just window dressing to hide the real reason they want to spy on us everywhere all the time.

After reading an article about ad metrics I realized this is ad fraud.

What is going on is a business buys ads and pays one rate for ads shown but pays a higher rate if the ads resulted in a conversion (a sale). But the ad contracts are monthly or longer. So a business buys ads for their product and the ad company after noticing you bought it, stuffs your feeds with ads for what you just bought so they can bill those ads at the higher conversion rate.

YouTube fed me a sponsored ad from Scientology today. Like, Google, you know everything about me, you should know this was stupid.

I've been recently rewatching all the X-men movies in order on Disney+.

After each one it's like "why not watch the first one again?" like it doesn't know full well I watched it a few days ago.

All this data collection, and for what?

I’m also amusedly infuriated when “smart” advertising takes the exact wrong pattern …..

“ I see you recently bought a part for a Toyota. You must have a Toyota. Let me sell you the same part for a Volkswagen. “

You would really think the algorithm would be smarter by now.

Y'all need to go on the dark web, people are gambling millions on humidifier vs. dehumidifier battles, the videos are disturbing and end dry or moist.

Almost as good as when I went to Home Depot and the next day I got an email asking me to rate my experience during my recent visit. That creeped me out so much I removed the app from my phone and forced logout on all devices. I have not been back since. And no, I did not pay using a Home Depot card and I am not part of any rewards program with them. Just eeew. If you advertise to me, I will ignore your product and buy something else. If there is not an alternative, then I will either plug my nose and buy it assuming that it is a need, otherwise I go without.

I bought a specific airfilter from home depot once (prob 15 years ago). 6 months later I went back because I needed a filter. I couldn't remember which one I bought so I popped on their website, from my phone. I found the unit I bought and got the filter that it needed from the store.

For the next 3 weeks straight, every other add on every page, on facebook, on amazon, on everywhere was the air cleaner I purchased. They must have spent at least $5 on me alone it was the only static ad I saw the entire time.

Friendly reminder that part of the deal of showing you adverts for what you just bought is to increase your satisfaction with the purchase. It reminds you of what you bought and (tries to) make you feel proud of your decision.

Oh I dunno, maybe stop using Amazon.

Yup, I just bought a tank jet printer, so clearly I'm turning my apartment into the world's most inefficient print shop.

I recently purchased a small apartment. According to calculations, it was cheaper to pay the mortgage than rent a similar size apartment. Now meta thinks I am into collecting apartments in the same postcode. On the other hand, I do find it somewhat useful to see what is happening to the apartment prices around.

I see you’ve just bought a HDMI cable, but what about second HDMI cable?

We think you’ll love it

Show me ads for cocaine and I will click it, brother. I was told capitalism solved all my problems by providing the material possessions I wanted in exchange for currency.

What happened with that.

Better make it a recurring purchase! Buy more, get more humidifiers!

I was a part of Amazon vine for a while. It's Amazon's program where they offer you shit for free that other companies want to give away in order to get reviews rolling in for new products.

Amazon offers around two to eight "just for you" items most days from these people, based on your order history and ad info crap they have on you.

Well I made the mistake of getting a black toner cartridge for my laser printer through vine once. That will last me like a decade.

Apparently, Amazon now thinks that I own 5000 printers of all different kinds and I'm never good on ink. Most days I would have at least 5 of my recommendations be printer ink or toner. Every single damned day it wanted me to get more ink. For months and months and months.

I always say that when advertisers think that I'm a Spanish speaking pregnant woman that I have won.

more like "how shitty of a humidifier did they sell me that they think i already need another"

My partner found the wedding bands they wanted to buy. They're metal bands in the design of para cord as I was in the military at the time and their father is a retired Lieutenant-colonel. The two of them together was like $150 and we got them off Etsy.

For nearly a month after I bought them for us, my phone was giving me ads for wedding rings. Like... Bro, we got them already. We don't need more.

On a very related note, a dehumidifier makes such a huge difference in indoor comfort.

I read a post where someone mentioned they wanted to buy a Royal Enfield Meteor motorcycle.

Ads for that bike have been appearing ever since. I don't own a bike, never had a license, and don't make a lot of comments about them.

Take that for what it's worth.

Similarly:

We've been tracking you for decades now. We know your location at all times. We know about the humidifier you bought. We know you do everything in English, but we also know you're trying to learn Spanish. We know who your family members are based on your interactions with them, and we have vast databases on them too. We know about the plane ticket to Turkey. We know about the new bathing suit you bought. We know about the English language guidebook you bought for Turkey.

We know you're now in Turkey on your vacation.

Here's an ad in Turkish for a humidifier sold in a Turkish store.

You go to a different country, and despite the massive privacy invasions, and the terabytes of data they have about every aspect of your lives, they think you speak the local language and show you ads you can't even understand for products you'd never buy while there on a vacation.

"You know what? I'll treat myself. Just one more dozen of toilet seats."

In the case of something weird like a humidifier, the average person is so unlikely to buy a humidifier that it's actually more likely that someone who buys one is going to return it and get a different one. Or they bought the first one to evaluate it and have some reason to need more than one because they have multiple houses or something.