correlate Rotating Header Image

There’s Contextual, And There’s Exact

Jun 15th, 2007
by Lou Paglia.

I had an interesting experience with Google Gmail usage today. For those who do not know me, I am not one to jump on the privacy issues surrounding Google right now. This isn’t the first time I noticed the contextual nature of their sponsored links but for some reason, this evening it really caught me by surprise. My brother, a recent home owner, had an appliance break in his house. I emailed him this evening about a company I’ve had good experience (ALERT, as of August 1, 2008, I AM NO LONGER HAVING A GOOD EXPERIENCE WITH THEM!, SEE UPDATE BELOW) with, American Home Shield, that has good coverage for those times you incur expensive fixes or replacement on things such as appliances.

Gmail Contextual Ad

As I went to go check my next email, there I see a contextual ad right there in Gmail. See the image above. That is not contextual, that is exact! For the most part, I applaud Google’s algorithm and the manner in which they monetize their service. I guess it is just the fact that I get hit with an exact advertisement SECONDS after I hit the send button on an email that makes me feel a little intruded upon. Is this a violation of privacy? Or is this an added-value service? The line certainly is getting blurry. But I must say, I don’t have to use Google Gmail if I don’t want to. As long as my information isn’t leaving the context of my experience, perhaps I do not have a problem with it. Lots of privacy talk surrounding Google right now as the worry is where could your information go if (as they prove here) they clearly have it at their disposal. Additional Reading: For anyone interested in the topic of privacy and Google, Steven Bradley has a very comprehensive post, Is Google Soft on Privacy, which is full of links to additional reading on the topic. Another great read is by Danny Sullivan which intelligently questions some of the criticism. And it is always interesting to get the perspective of Google’s own, Matt Cutts, who has a post on the topic.

UPDATE, August 6, 2008: American Home Shield just lost huge points in my book. Had my first major appliance problem and they are giving me the classic run-around before paying the claim. Basically giving me every excuse in the book to avoid or delay a payment to get my air conditioner serviced. And as luck would have it, with some further research on message boards, there are many of my AHS brethren having similar problems. Guess I needed to do more research before going with them.

Sphere: Related Content

Posted in: Uncorrelated.
Tagged: · · · · ·

← Knowledge is the important word in KM
Demise of Books? Not for a while. →

  • Lou,


    I agree with you. "Exact and immediate" is a little too close to the bone. The user experience and spam-resistance of gmail makes it seductive, though one would have to think twice before sending anything remotely confidential or of commercial value through it.


    Relying on a commercial enterprise like Google to guarantee any protection of privacy is a major folly. Their only true responsibility is to their shareholders. And their actions (e.g. censorship in China) have proven that winning comes first, doing no evil, somewhere thereafter.


    Google is in the midst of a very high-stakes game. With so many employees, there is no practical way to ensure that elements, rogue or not, cannot exploit your personal correspondence.


    In the end, it is up to consumers to choose. For those who don't want their email data mined, broadband access usually comes with a free email account. For the completely paranoid--yet technically savvy and insistent on the cool gmail.com address--there is always FireGPG, which recently got Slashdotted. No telling if it stops drafts from getting auto-saved, though.

  • Pete: Agree that is user beware. Extending this beyond Google, however, is there really anything stopping any email provider (aside from patents) from copying the Google model. Right now Google is the focal point because they are the ones most successfully executing their strategy by leveraging the power of Ad Words everywhere.


    The thing to think about is everyone is going to catch up at some point. Nothing to stop other web mail providers. Nothing to really even stop this type of technology and revenue drivers from being deployed in POP3 solutions as well.


    Simply move back the email analysis layer back in the architecture, tail a contextual ad to the bottom of your email and then send along to the recipient. Furthermore, is there anything really stopping a *paid* broadband service from saying they are going to do it as well? Truth is, unless you are running your own mail service, this is something that is a possibility.

  • Lou, if that immediacy of placement of the AHS is supposed to be a value-added service, I have to say that it is a pretty dumb one! After all, it seems to have been cued by your writing a "fan" letter for the company; so you are the last person in cyberspace that needs to be told about them! The ad should have appeared along with the message your BROTHER RECEIVED, but do you know how your brother reads his mail? (Mine only uses his Gmail account when he cannot get to his Comcast account.) From my point of view, your experience is right up there with the Amazon.com recommendations I get for books I already own (some of which I have written about in very derogatory language)!


    I've given similar thought to how Google handles ad placement on my blog:


    http://therehearsalstudio.blogspot.com/2007/04/on-logic-of-system.html


    At the end of the day, however, I do not think it does me much good to worry about it. When privacy is necessary, I either get behind a firewall (for my business life) or refrain from writing (for my personal life).


    I generally agree with Peter that, when it comes to who sets the priorities, the shareholders tend to trump all other factors. Nevertheless, it was interesting to see that, in Google's case, China may have trumped at least one faction of shareholders:


    http://therehearsalstudio.blogspot.com/2007/05/things-are-still-black-and-white-at.html


    As users we have to look out for ourselves and, as you put it, "beware!"

  • Steve, I take your point that it isn't very valuable to advertise something I already know about...for me and arguably not for the advertiser (good thing it is billed by CPM). As for my brother, I will check with him to see what ad he received when he opens the mail...I'm sure he got the same one.


    And as you say, as far as privacy goes, there are certainly ways to manage it. And your business behind the firewall is one...that is until Google releases Enterprise Gmail Server where businesses are running the same solution behind the firewall.

blog comments powered by Disqus