In a word, folks, all this shit is about tracking you as a consumer. Every dodge, every little gimmick that gets you to fork over some piece of personal information, especially a “tracking key” like a phone number or email address, is used to build a profile of not just you, but every group you fit into - the better to control your buying environment and target your wallet ever more accurately.
It isn’t done by individual companies like Eddie Bauer or NewEgg or whoever. The data is passed up the chain and managed by mega-targeters like Acxiom. If the idea of a privately held, nearly secret corporation accountable to absolutely no one (not even the tepid, ineffectual accountability we have from government agencies) accumulating truly massive amounts of data on every individual who can be tracked doesn’t unsettle you… okay. Happy shopping and darn you’re a smart kitty for using a fake-out email address.
I recently searched for car rentals and hotels for my daughter’s upcoming trip to San Fran. Since then, I’ve gotten inundated with both targeted ads on message boards and emails from discounters. I know it’s related to all this profiling and tracking nonsense. I was all set to be I’d be indignant over my loss of privacy, except that I ended up booking a car for over $200 less than I’d been able to find on my own.
I will acknowledge, somewhat, that it’s helpful to know what people buy. I certainly reap the benefits of Amazon’s recommendations for me.
What I really resent, though, is giving up my info if I’m just going to browse. I don’t want to make up another damned login and password just to BROWSE. I’m really not receiving any benefit from providing that information, other than the dubious pleasure of browsing that site…and the thing is, I can almost certainly find some other site to shop.
The only info that an online store really needs is my shipping address, billing address, credit card info, and credit card security code, for most items. In most cases, if I make an account with that store, the store is really the only one who benefits, I don’t get any benefits at all.
I like to enter the email addresses of other companies that want me to give them my email address. I never get the activation message, but the resulting circle of pointless data mining makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside.