<
https://doctorow.medium.com/everything-advertised-on-social-media-is-overpriced-junk-7cb46e3b03e4>
"In “Behavioral Advertising and Consumer Welfare: An Empirical Investigation,”
a trio of business researchers from Carnegie Mellon and Pamplin College
investigate the difference between the goods purchased through highly targeted
online ads and just plain web-searches, and conclude social media ads push
overpriced junk:
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4398428
Specifically, stuff that’s pushed to you via targeted ads costs an average of
10 percent more, and it significantly more likely to come from a vendor with a
poor rating from the Better Business Bureau. This may seem trivial and obvious,
but it’s got profound implications for media, commercial surveillance, and the
future of the internet.
Writing in the
New York Times, Julia Angwin — a legendary, muckraking data
journalist — breaks down those implications. Angwin builds a case study around
Jeremy’s Razors, a business that advertises itself as a “woke-free” shaving
solution for manly men:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/06/opinion/online-advertising-privacy-data-surveillance-consumer-quality.html
Jeremy’s Razors spends a fucking
fortune on ads. According to Facebook’s Ad
Library, the company spent $800,000 on FB ads in March, targeting fathers of
school-age kids who like Hershey’s, ultimate fighting, hunting or Johnny Cash:
https://pluralistic.net/jeremys-targeting
Anti-woke razors are an objectively, hilariously stupid idea, but that’s not
the point here. The point is that Jeremy’s has to spend $800K/month to reach
its customers, which means that it either has to accept $800K less in profits,
or make it up by charging more and/or skimping on quality."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
