this post was submitted on 11 Apr 2025
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Privacy
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... then see if it appears in your ads. Saved you a click.
Absolutely. I’ve tested this with friends, and we pick random topics or products we would never need or look up. Sure enough, we both start getting ads within 24 hours.
Got into a rare mild argument with my wife last week, and we started getting marriage counseling and dating app ads. Fucking infuriating.
Notice the plausible deniability that’s always put into ‘we are not spying on you statements.’ Zuckerberg will tell Congress, ‘Facebook is not listening on your phone,’ but that leaves it open for a third party partner to be doing the spying for them.
How can you be sure that the "random" products aren't something that you've seen ads on (but not remembered seeing), which stuck in your subconscious, and then you regurgitated as the random item? Then later when you saw more of the same ads, you noticed them and they seemed like new, targeted ads.
You would need to use a random topic generator, not just come up with them via brain.