Big Brother Knows You Need Milk!

Wake up to find almost no milk left in the fridge.  Now you’ve got to decide whether to eat your cereal dry or try pouring Pepsi on it again.  Days like this have made us all wish the fridge just automatically knew when to replace the milk jugs.  We longed for the days when the world threw what we wanted at our feet.  And then it happened, without expecting it, and suddenly it feels more like a scene out of terminator than paradise.   In his book, Niche Envy, Joseph Turow explains that marketing and consumer-focused businesses have become centered around data-driven relationships from a cornucopia of virtual sources.

 
With the introduction of new surveillance technologies that only continue to increase their hold over the personal information of our lives, companies are creating customer profiles to predict and customize their relationship into seemingly perfect matches.  As an advertising student, this seems like an amazing step in advancement to me.  A world where individuals are no longer forced to stare at ads that would never interest them, but instead to be presented every time with something one would actually consider buying.  And yet, Joseph Turow makes a compelling argument that it will lead to the unequal discrimination of market segments.  People will be virtually descriminated without realizing that others are not recieving the same treatment.  Pricing would become based on your profile, changing from person to person.  In truth, Joseph Turow’s nightmare has already come true.  Clout uses technology to give individuals scores based on their online influence.  Companies use these scores to give special deals to those with the highest Clout score.  In conclusion, This book does a chilling job of revealing the other side of customer profiling rarely brought to light.