The funniest of this was when I worked in S Fort Worth, but the home office was in Nebraska. So they thought I was 600+ miles north of where I really was
Wrong!
Show me all the ads for baby products or women’s clothes / cosmetics & I’ll never spend a penny; show me something that I like & there’s a chance I’ll waste my money on something I don’t need
This is a good question. It’s not as if I’m upset about being tracked to the point that I take measures to avoid it, or stay away from being online altogether. I’ve largely resigned myself to it.
As for why I don’t embrace the convenience of having ads targeted to me, I suppose it’s the invasive feeling. Googling info on a thing and then having ads for it served to me across all my web devices and mediums feels Big Brotherish. And there’s no guarantee that the companies that are gathering information on me are going to restrict themselves to relatively benign or even helpful activities such as serving me targeted ads.
Maybe it’s just the cosmic unconsciousness.
Ah yes! The lattice of coincidence that lays on top of everything. And you know those little pine tree air fresheners? There’s one in every car.
Most of the weird advertising coincidences can be explained logically. This morning FB is hitting me with ads for some type of vaccine. Given that I recently got one from the pharmacists, this makes sense. Also sending me ads for some type of truck suspension upgrades. Closer look shows that I’ve visited that same company’s website looking for a different product. Still makes sense.
But… Yesterday I spent a hour on a phonecall with my Dad, who talked at length about visiting Maui, and how much I would enjoy it. He was 400 miles away, and the last time he went there was before cellphones.
And FB is front and center with multiple ads for vacations in Maui this morning. How in the hell did they do that, unless they’re actually listening? I can’t figure out any other way.
I would guess your dad was googling Maui, and you were linked to your dad through the phone call. That can be matched without listening to the conversation.
Interesting. Assuming that some tracking entity wasn’t listening to the call, maybe your dad had been googling trips to Maui, and the call between you and your father was logged, so it was assumed that you might be interested in going with him? It would be a similar example to the moms and strollers example in my OP, except that a connection was assumed from a phone call rather than from proximity.
ETA: or, what the fish ninja said more succinctly 
He is very non-digital. I’ll ask him later, but it’s very unlikely he’s been “googling” anything. I don’t think he actually knows how. Since his housekeeper quit several weeks ago, no one else has been in the house either. (he does have a PC but uses it only for email with a few old friends).
Maybe it’s just a really weird coincidence, or mizPullin’s been hankering to go to Hawaii and looking at ideas on her phone. I’ll ask her too, once she’s up and caffeinated.
I’ve been thinking of choosing some topic, something that I know I’ve never read about or searched online, and which is not something I’ve up to now showed any interest in, which is very likely to be ad-friendly. Then just talk about it with my wife or whoever on multiple occasions, and see if I start noticing ads and videos for that thing. Talk of a vacation trip to a certain specific location would be a good one.
[quote=“solost, post:50, topic:1001969”]
choosing some topic, something that I know I’ve never read about…
Then just talk about it [/quote]
I tried this when a friend told me about the same kind of coincidence as the example of the father and Maui. The friend swore that his phone was eavesdropping on him, how else could it have know to send him adds about (whatever).
So I said, “okay, let’s try it, right now.” And I started talking about motorcycles, how much I loved them, especially Suzuki and Harley, riding, racing, etc etc etc. And he answered me talking about Honda and Kawasaki, etc, etc…
Neither of us knew anything about motorcycles.
And neither of us got any ads about motorcycles.
Here’s a tracking thing I see pretty often-- it’s not surprising, since I’m sure my streaming habits are being carefully tracked, but I’ll often watch something on streaming and then be served videos in my YT feed that are about the exact person, thing or topic I just watched.
For example, the other day my wife and I watched an episode of a show called “Minx” streaming on Hulu that takes place in the 70s, and it had a party scene where an actor playing a young Linda Ronstadt sang. Today I see a video in my feed about Linda Ronstadt.
That’s the least offensive recommendation that could come from viewing Minx. 
Have watched Minx. It’s great.
Ha, no doubt. Well, we’ve been watching it under the Hulu account in my wife’s name (a lot more eye candy on the show for her than me). Who knows what types of ads and / or videos she’s been getting served as a result of watching 
Two hours ago my co-worker told me about how her daughter has been sleepwalking and she needs to get door sensor chimes for the outside doors. I just got an Amazon Shopping text recommendation for a door sensor chime. My co-worker swears she hasn’t looked one up.
Whoa! Now that one is uncomfortably specific!
what permissions did you give Amazon Shopping? You are getting notifications from them, so you basically invite them to spam you!!! - revoke all that!
You best do your (amazon et al) shopping on a website … then there are no apps to bog down your cel, autostart and use memory and also apps have way more “rights” than any website ever will have …
get rid of that cr@p … (yeah, none of my business, I know) …
Yes, that is a creepy example!
I haven’t figured out how to shut them off yet. I get notifications when packages are delivered so that I can grab them before the porch pirates get there, and somehow that grew into receiving notifications for shopping recommendations. I’ll figure it out later today.
Amazon:
You consent to receive automated text messages (including marketing messages) from or on behalf of Amazon about your orders at your mobile number below.
So if I consent to get delivery updates by text, I also agree to marketing texts. That sucks. I guess I’ll just rely on email notifications, but I don’t check it very often.