a bit late

I got this email from my broadband provider. Helpful, you might think - except that I have already activated the protection offered. Surely BT's various software talks to each other?

yes, it shows ...

 

be honest ...

If you was a business owner ... would you like your ads to appear on a platform that boasts that it lets users make AI images from public Instagram profile pics? Read the story on the BBC.

 

Postscript:

Shortly after this story broke came the news from the BBC …

"Meta has abruptly taken down a new feature that allowed people to use its artificial intelligence (AI) tool to make fake images from user content on Instagram."

To me, this says Meta spent an awful lot of money on a product they thought was OK without doing any consumer research. Good business practice?

ad spend well spent? [on a dubious product]

This one goes beyond the question of me being served and ad [on twitter/x] for a product I've no interest in - it seems to me that the product is a bit iffy. OK, so it is available on Amazon as some kind of health product - but numerous reliable sources say [something like] 

A doctor explains that using peptides without medical supervision is unsafe and discusses the associated risks. He outlines specific questions to ask a specialty provider who is offering peptides to reduce your risk of side effects or poor outcomes.

But let's get back to the advertising issue. On the ad it says in very small print 'for laboratory use only'. So, if it is really* for laboratory use only then the ad is targeted at folk who are using this stuff for laboratory research, wouldn't it be easy to get a list of those labs - there can't be that many - and contact them directly? 

Having said that, if the sellers are trying to find individuals who are willing to jeopardise their health by listening to influencers and take this stuff ... well maybe scattergun advertising makes sense?

* Or are those 4 words a legal get-out clause? Would labs really be interested in a retail price with discount for using crypto?

a few years overdue?

In days gone by I did many website 'audits' ... this is the sort of thing I would find.

excellent, well done

Bought some shoes. Didn't fit. Completed online form. No quibble. Produced label for return postage [which I had to print, the only negative]. No charge for return shipping. Email confirming receipt. Then this email. 

👏👏👏

why? you're wasting your ad money

I wanted some laces for my Adidas Samba Supers. I've worn these for around 45 years so I knew exactly what I wanted. I put into eBay search my specific requirements: "Black Laces Waxed - Round,140cm 2mm".

And this was the first sponsored [advert] return.

My guess is that the seller bid on [ie 'bought'] the key words "laces" and "round". True, I wanted round laces, but I wanted black, not brown; 2mm, not 2.5; 140cm not 75.

Furthermore, the next three sponsored listings were similar in their generic listings for laces. 

Ho hum.   

excellent email list cleansing practice

 

remember this?

It was reported that Meta spent over $70B on this total  failure. Maybe if they had asked some normal human beings if they thought it was a good idea and whether they would be happy to use it [no and no].

nice touch

I do like it when websites ask for your email address and then present an 'email friendly' keyboard 👏

Just an example of some useless data …

Yes, this is just some personal information from my iPad - which I ignored - but just consider how much data storage is used up with similarly useless stats about all aspects of business and marketing 🤔

Ad spend well spent?

Rather than show an ad that is irrelevant to the vast majority of folk who might see it, I would have thought the advertiser [I've included its description below the ad] could have contacted directly those organisations that might be interested in their offering 🤔 

I can write my own words, sentences and paragraphs thank you.

 

Nothing. Ever. 

And this is why ...

Who has ever used 'clothe' as a singular noun for clothes?

And there is no way that putting a comma after 'morning' makes any sense whatsoever. I despair. 

Back to basics?

As with the early Internet, it looks as though pornography is to be the primary source of income for the ai companies? 🤔

This makes sense to me

I would like a definition of 'discovering a new product' eg does it mean a product that I've never heard of before, or a new version or brand of something I was previously aware of, but nevertheless this data seems sensible.