This digital world we live in has its benefits and its downsides.
That notion struck us again the other night watching TV, as five people, teens and adults, bounced between television and a digital gadget.
The teens were busy texting friends and checking various social networks while the adults looked at recipes or antique tractor sites. With all this multi-tasking going on at one time, the wi-fi at home must surely have been humming in overdrive.
This is the world we live in, but with the good, there are reasons to be wary.
Bell Canada has announced that in November it will begin tracking user activity on television and the internet in earnest. Most sites already have something called cookies which aids in knowing who visited their site and makes the next visit by a viewer more readily available.
The Bell Canada activity has some people sounding the alarm that privacy of citizens is at stake. Perhaps Bell is just upping the ante in a game that has been on the go for some time.
Our introduction to the concept of digital marketing was at a print show, years back. One of the great benefits to marketers using digital tools is the ability to target markets very specifically.
People good at it can easily determine the shopping habits of site visitors and begin flooding the potential customer with information about a product or service of interest.
Print, whether Newspapers, flyers or direct mail, offers a subtle option to consider a product or service. Digital efforts take it a step further, bombarding the device user with information and ads in such a way as to increase the level of compulsion for a particular product or service.
While best values for vehicles, homes or running shoes might be a benefit, the downside of which we write has to do with playing on vices of many forms.
Some like to gamble, some have a penchant for collecting things and others may well have some very unsavory preferences. In a digital world, marketers are able to target their message to an audience that has demonstrated a desire for a particular service or product, making it irresistible to some consumers.
Taking that concept a step further, the possibilities of exacerbating social ills is not far off either. Extremist political or religious views, illicit drug use and a host of other undesirable societal problems could very easily gain traction once a person’s interests or curiosities are established.
All of this seems to happen so innocently, and we remain unsure that the science of profiling people is for the betterment of all.
Predatory marketing will no doubt show up as a real concern at some point.
For us right now, the serendipity aspect of a quality Newspaper each week, or a Google search on the couch for old tractors and world News is quite enough excitement.
