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I'm about to give up.
On the one hand, I see countless people get loyalty cards and enjoy discounts on their purchases. They connect with friends on Facebook and Twitter. They use apps on android or apple smartphones to give them turn-by-turn directions, find out where their friends are, or find places of interest. Their e-mail is "in the cloud" where they can get to it from multiple places. They use services like dropbox to share files. They get their news on-line and read e-books. I could go on and on.
On the other hand, I see opportunities for tracking and profiling in every one of those activities. So much so that it seems like one would be under constant observation and surveillance. We are just data points to be sliced and diced and marketed to — a society of consumers rather than customers.
So, I've got a major "ick factor" knowing about these practices and yet I'm hard-pressed to explain any negative consequences to otherwise intelligent people. "I don't do anything that's THAT interesting." "I've done nothing wrong, so I don't worry about it." "I like getting the bonuses and discounts."
Yet, I see companies expend great amounts of money implementing tracking mechanisms such as cookies, super-cookies, clear gifs, as well as huge databases of purchases, travels, and interests. I don't believe they are doing this for purely philanthropic reasons.
In no particular order, I include these for consideration:
- "If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him." - Cardinal Richelieu
- "If you are not paying for it, you are the product."
- Joel on Software - Strategy Letter V: Commoditize your Complement
- Using Metadata to find Paul Revere
I use a variety of Addons while browsing the web using Pale Moon: a custom HOSTS file, Self-Destructing Cookies, Ad-Block Plus, Ghostery, NoScript, Better Privacy, Flashblock, and Ref Control. I have a firewall and use anti-virus products. "In real life" I prefer to use cash over charge cards for my purchases. I have no loyalty cards.
What say you Soylentils? Am I being unreasonably paranoid? Or not paranoid enough? What dangers, really, are there? Why not sign up for all those loyalty cards and social apps? What privacy protections do YOU use?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:24PM
> The only way to really opt out of tracking is to use cash only, and almost no one carries huge wads of cash around to make basic purchases.
It really isn't that hard. The times you need an actual "huge wad of cash" are pretty rare. Most of the time a couple of hundred bucks is more than enough. And yes, I speak from experience over the last 4 years or so.
> I figure most purchase data is really, really, really boring and wouldn't tell you much.
Which totally explains why so many spend so much money trying to acquire that information. It's just useless. [wsj.com]
> So the short answer is these loyalty cards and promos aren't really that great of a deal,
The best thing you can do is to simply refuse to shop at stores with loyalty cards. You will probably save money in the process. [wsj.com]
> What's really funny is how utterly awful companies are at using the data they have.
That's because profiling information is not useful for making recommendations. That is a hard AI problem that has yet to be solved because figuring out what you are likely to want requires running a simulation of your personality. Marketing analytics isn't about selling you stuff you need, it is about figuring out how to manipulate you into buying whatever the client has hired them to sell. Like Target figuring out that women are pregnant [forbes.com] in order to push them into switching to shopping at Target for more stuff. It is all about figuring out how to press your buttons.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:51PM
It works well as a short-term weight loss plan, but I can't recommend "simply don't buy groceries" as a lifestyle.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:56PM
> It works well as a short-term weight loss plan, but I can't recommend "simply don't buy groceries" as a lifestyle.
Here is a short list of places in the USA that sell groceries and do not have loyalty cards, they cover the entire spectrum of pricing:
Wal-mart
Market Basket
Aldi
Trader Joes
Whole Foods
Sprouts
Save-a-Lot
Target
Various produce stands & farmers' markets
(Score: 2) by tadas on Wednesday May 13 2015, @01:31PM
....Shopper's Food Warehouse......
(Score: 2) by Kromagv0 on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:08PM
Not quite correct. Target while not having a card has something probably more egregious, a smartphone app called cartwheel [target.com] that gives you discounts on a rotating subset of things. I tried it and there are very few things that I get a discount on as I don't buy much of any premade food. While I do buy premade stuff (bread, pasta/noodles, salsa) they are low margin items and don't get a special discount very often if at all.
T-Shirts and bumper stickers [zazzle.com] to offend someone
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @11:58PM
Do they only have megacorporations where you are?
Have all the locally-owned shops folded?
I guess I'm lucky where I live.
There are places here [google.com] that are large enough to have decent prices but small enough to not have the abusive practices of the multinationals.
...and I can't imagine applying for a loyalty card that requires verified data.
Heh. Just for fun, I can imagine constantly exchanging cards with someone else to further mess with the data collection.
-- gewg_
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:02PM
Some ways to get the discount without being a _good_ loyalty card customer.
#1: Jenny's got you covered. Enter Jenny's phone number in the form of: [your_area_code] 867-5309
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WTdTwcmxyo [youtube.com]
The hard part is not saying it as 8675-309.
The worst part is that some stores have added this number to an invalid list.
#2: Ask the person in line in front of you to swipe their card for you.
#3: Get a new card every time.
#4: Somebody write up Android/IOS app that allows card swapping. Poisoning the loyalty card data would be the ultimate "Fuck You" -- way better than opting out. This is the idea: http://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=7296&cid=178524 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:24PM
> Some ways to get the discount without being a _good_ loyalty card customer.
Read the 2nd linked WSJ article.
It is generally against your interest to even walk into a place that uses loyalty card schemes because the pricing on all the stuff that is not discounted today is way too high. So unless you are only buying stuff that is discounted on the day you are shopping you are going to get screwed.
The only winning move is not to play.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Wednesday May 13 2015, @04:50PM
There isn't a single drug store in my area where I can opt out. So I have to play.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @05:45PM
If you are buying prescription drugs, then check out: http://www.goodrx.com/ [goodrx.com]
At least you can get the cheapest price with or without a card.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by kaszz on Wednesday May 13 2015, @07:11PM
Online buying is certainly tracked real good..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 14 2015, @12:35AM
Goodrx has nothing to do with online buying.
If you buy prescription drugs and didn't bother to click that link, you are being stupid.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday May 13 2015, @07:17PM
If you can generate a loyalty card on the fly, you can also screw the system.