Although I fear ostracism, I also feel obliged to speak up.  I actually work
for a company similar to DoubleClick.

Now, before anyone goes out and destroys my credit rating, I'm a little
curious about where people feel the privacy line should be drawn.  Our
current product tracks nothing more than what banners work best, and where.
We can tell that the blue banner on Yahoo's home page generated more sales
than the red one on Excite, but nothing about individual users.

That having been said, we (like every other company in this field) are
looking at moving into what is described as "one-to-one marketing" (that
can't be bad can it?).  The current idea is that for a single advertiser, we
can track peoples history, and better interact with them.  So if you buy a
AppleG4, and we're serving apple's ad's, we can show you an add for the new
AirPort card you didn't buy.  On the upside, it's like your grandfather
walking into the general store, and having the people there know him, and
what he likes.  On the downside, you loose some anonymity on the Web.

At my company the developers have had many discussions about this, but I'm
very curious to hear how others feel.  Obviously I don't think this thread
needs to stay on the list, but if people want to respond to me personally,
I'd be very interested to read your comments.

Note:  If you think advertising on the web is evil, I personally have no
problem with that, so please try not to send flames.  Thanks.

on 2/16/00 3:39 PM, Lex Spoon at lex at cc.gatech.edu wrote:

> I'd use it!
> 
> This kind of program generalizes very well.  There is a "Muffin" program
> in Java which does some of this already.  You point your web browser at
> Muffin, and Muffin will filter both requests and replies.  Filters are
> Java objects, and you can add new ones as desired.  Some of the existing
> filters:
> 
> 1. Eliminate cookies
> 2. Eliminate ad banners
> 3. Eliminate images from known ad sites
> 4. Remove JavaScript
> 5. Modify your User-Agent: field
> 
> I've really thought that doing this in Squeak would be much nicer.
> Perhaps Comanche would help.
> 
> 
> Lex
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> "Ted K." <Ted.Kaehler at disney.com> wrote:
>> Folks,
>> Here is something I would really love to have in Squeak.  It is a
>> "Cookie Zapper" with control.  I am upset at the amount of info that
>> companies like DoubleClick are collecting on me using cookies (in Netscape
>> or Internet Explorer).  I do want cookies for places I like and trust, but
>> I don't want cookies for others.
>> There are cookies I want to keep.  I want Amazon to recognise me
>> when I log on.
>> How about a Squeak program that does this:
>> 
>> () Keeps a dictionary of companies that have planted cookies in the past.
>> With each company is 'true' if I want to keep their cookie.
>> ()  Silently erases the cookies of the ones I don't want.
>> ()  Asks me when a new kind of cookie appears.
>> 
>> I don't know how to make sense of the data in cookies, but you
>> probably do.  An application that handled them would be a service to
>> Squeak-kind.  And I could see inside it and tailor it to my needs, unlike
>> other cookie control programs.
>> 
>> --Ted.
>> 
>> 
>> Ted Kaehler,   Walt Disney Imagineering, R&D
>> (home) 3415 Cork Oak Way, Palo Alto, CA  94303.  voice (650) 424-1070
>> http://www.webPage.com/~kaehler2/
> 
>