HipType wants to spy on your reading

[jgaiser]

I guess I forgot the smiley

Seriously though, If you're really worried about being tracked you should follow my advise.

The problem is that unless you live completely detached from the world, advertisers are going to be keeping track of you. It's been going on long before the Internet. Realize that and make whatever effort makes you feel comfortable.

Me.. I use adblock, I don't use loyalty cards, I do use debit cards, I'm aware of the things I can't control (search engines, Amazon, Google, everybody else who tries to plant cookies on my machine), and I go on with life.

[JoeD]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

I guess I forgot the smiley

You did

Still, it was worth answering to give those who may not have thought about the issues something to chew on :P

Me.. I use adblock, I don't use loyalty cards, I do use debit cards, I'm aware of the things I can't control (search engines, Amazon, Google, everybody else who tries to plant cookies on my machine), and I go on with life.

Likewise, adblock, ghostery, javascript blocker, no loyalty cards. I do use CC though as I'd rather lose a bit of privacy to the CC company due to the added fraud protection CC's provide over my banks debit card. As for google, they likely know more about me than I know about myself :P

Also, whilst I'd avoid any books that made use of this tracking feature, I'm not actually against them adding it as long as they make it clear it exists, it's dead easy to disable if you don't want it and they provide something in return.

The lack of getting something in return for a loss of privacy is really what I object to the most. If they did offer something though, I wouldn't feel inclined to not buy their books even though I'd still opt-out

[xg4bx]

meh. it really doesn't bother me if commercial interests get my info; ads don't work on me so if advertisers want to waste their money, let them.

[teh603]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

I don't use loyalty cards,.

Loyalty cards work both ways, though. There was a grocery store in town that accidentally let a load of bad meat get out, and they ended up tracking down most of it and replaced what they could using loyalty cards.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by teh603

Loyalty cards work both ways, though. There was a grocery store in town that accidentally let a load of bad meat get out, and they ended up tracking down most of it and replaced what they could using loyalty cards.

People returned bad items long before loyalty cards. People still return items without loyalty cards. The store *does not* need to know what I buy.

[MissKittiness]

I think we all need to take off our tin-foil hats and remember that these are books.

[JD Gumby]

Originally Posted by MissKittiness

I think we all need to take off our tin-foil hats and remember that these are books.

So? What books people read are of interest to many different groups (not just advertisers). Government agencies from around the world'll be crowding in to get at the info, and I highly doubt HipType'll confine themselves to only to publishers and only about books that publisher sells... Bet the US government would LOVE to know what Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, and Michael Moore books, for example, people have been reading, how often they've been reading them, how many of their books they're going through, exactly which pages have been lingered over, etc., etc....

[MissKittiness]

Originally Posted by JD Gumby

So? What books people read are of interest to many different groups (not just advertisers). Government agencies from around the world'll be crowding in to get at the info, and I highly doubt HipType'll confine themselves to only to publishers and only about books that publisher sells... Bet the US government would LOVE to know what Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, and Michael Moore books, for example, people have been reading, how often they've been reading them, how many of their books they're going through, exactly which pages have been lingered over, etc., etc....

Like I said... I think we all need to take off our tin-foil hats. :P

[xg4bx]

Originally Posted by JD Gumby

So? What books people read are of interest to many different groups (not just advertisers). Government agencies from around the world'll be crowding in to get at the info, and I highly doubt HipType'll confine themselves to only to publishers and only about books that publisher sells... Bet the US government would LOVE to know what Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, and Michael Moore books, for example, people have been reading, how often they've been reading them, how many of their books they're going through, exactly which pages have been lingered over, etc., etc....

i'm sure that stuff is already sorted through NSA/DHS computers the second you buy it. sadly, it's not tin foil hat stuff-

"Hundreds of words to avoid using online if you don't want the government spying on you (and they include 'pork', 'cloud' and 'Mexico')

The Department of Homeland Security has been forced to release a list of keywords and phrases it uses to monitor social networking sites and online media for signs of terrorist or other threats against the U.S.
The intriguing the list includes obvious choices such as 'attack', 'Al Qaeda', 'terrorism' and 'dirty bomb' alongside dozens of seemingly innocent words like 'pork', 'cloud', 'team' and 'Mexico'."

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz22NEuD0Lr



personally i like teasing them with vague references to mk ultra and sleeper agents on my facebook, but that's just me.

[MissKittiness]

Originally Posted by xg4bx

i'm sure that stuff is already sorted through NSA/DHS computers the second you buy it. sadly, it's not tin foil hat stuff-

"Hundreds of words to avoid using online if you don't want the government spying on you (and they include 'pork', 'cloud' and 'Mexico')

The Department of Homeland Security has been forced to release a list of keywords and phrases it uses to monitor social networking sites and online media for signs of terrorist or other threats against the U.S.
The intriguing the list includes obvious choices such as 'attack', 'Al Qaeda', 'terrorism' and 'dirty bomb' alongside dozens of seemingly innocent words like 'pork', 'cloud', 'team' and 'Mexico'."

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz22NEuD0Lr



personally i like teasing them with vague references to mk ultra and sleeper agents on my facebook, but that's just me.

Looking through the HAZMAT list of words... They must get mighty scared right after an episode of Breaking Bad airs!

[Graham]

After years of being indignant about this sort of thing, I realised that I have absolutely no problem with advertising being tailored to my needs. It's the 21st century equivalent of the barman putting your favourite brew on the counter as you come in through the door.

Graham

[heySkippy]

I'm confused over how this is going to work.

This start up has developed a new platform which will let publishers know virtually everything about your reading habits as well as personal details like your location, age, and income. Basically it’s going to let publishers know all the juicy details that Amazon, B&N, and Kobo have but don’t share.

Since I can put my own HTML in an ibook file, it would be trivial to include a "phone home" 1 pixel image similar to what spammers used to do (maybe still do, I dunno) with email. What I don't understand is how any script on my iPad could tell anyone my age and income, or even my location since iBooks doesn't use locations services (that I know of). Apple didn't ask my age and income when I signed up with iTunes Connect, how would this service get that data from a script in a book?

Sounds like a Chicken Little scenario to me.

[jbcohen]

If they can figure out what I am going to read next from that data more power to them, I simply can't figure that out myself with that data and more. I seriously doubt that anyone with a computer is going to be able to figure that out.

[JD Gumby]

Originally Posted by heySkippy

Since I can put my own HTML in an ibook file, it would be trivial to include a "phone home" 1 pixel image similar to what spammers used to do (maybe still do, I dunno) with email. What I don't understand is how any script on my iPad could tell anyone my age and income, or even my location since iBooks doesn't use locations services (that I know of). Apple didn't ask my age and income when I signed up with iTunes Connect, how would this service get that data from a script in a book?

Even if iBooks doesn't use any official location services, it will still know the IP address you are contacting the system from - and that narrows you down to a specific city or region. As for the other info, well, it can easily be figured out to a decently-tight demographics range based on your purchasing and reading habits.

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by heySkippy

I'm confused over how this is going to work.



Since I can put my own HTML in an ibook file, it would be trivial to include a "phone home" 1 pixel image similar to what spammers used to do (maybe still do, I dunno) with email. What I don't understand is how any script on my iPad could tell anyone my age and income, or even my location since iBooks doesn't use locations services (that I know of). Apple didn't ask my age and income when I signed up with iTunes Connect, how would this service get that data from a script in a book?

Sounds like a Chicken Little scenario to me.

Not many people use completely different names and email addresses for each site they sign up with. Get one, you've usually got them all.