I've gotten some emails from someone recently whose gmail adverts aren't noticeably related to the content we're discussing or the sorts of ads I've seen in the past. They are, however, linked to the sorts of work the sender has done while programming in the past.

Does the sender (and what some algorithm says about the sender) help determine ads? Do we project ye olde digital proverbial ethos with our emails linked to our online presence/brand as defined by some compilation corp?

I mean, it's not a bad idea from the pov of profit if Google is doing this, but it seems close to an invasion of privacy. No reason everyone should be able to glean from ads connected to my emails that I, um, have read pretty much every codexically amalgamated word written by Frank Herbert [and much too many by his son, which, Dreamer of Dune excepted (barely), probably means any number above 1000].

EDIT: Now that I've replied, the adverts are gone. How the heck does Gmail decide when to show ads? Sometimes you just get offers to connect to Google Calendar or Maps, and sometimes there's nothing, though when it was just one email in the thread, I had probably twelve ads down the right hand side. Weird.

Wow, busy day. Was going to upload the picture and the upload form for Blogger now has a pretty complicated "terms of service" which, though it's dated 2006, wasn't there last time I uploaded something. So we'll link offsite. Here's the text:

In addition, by submitting, posting or displaying Content which is intended to be available to the general public, you grant Google a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to reproduce, adapt, distribute and publish such Content for the purpose of displaying, distributing and promoting Google services.


You mean services like Google Press' book on someone famous who just happened to be in a picture I uploaded? Wow. And so all your family snapshots are belong to multinational corporation. Make your time.

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