Ban Targeted Advertising Essay

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Ban Targeted Advertising
Author: David Dayen
Date: 2018
From: Gale Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection
Publisher: Gale, a Cengage Company
Document Type: Viewpoint essay
Length: 1,691 words
Content Level: (Level 4)
Lexile Measure: 1150L
Full Text:
Article Commentary
“It’s obvious the surveillance economy’s biggest practitioners won’t police themselves.”
David Dayen is a journalist, editor, and the author of Chain of Title: How Three Ordinary Americans Uncovered Wall Street’s Great
Foreclosure Fraud. In the following viewpoint, he argues that targeted online advertising should be banned because such advertising
is the primary reason that social media sites and other apps collect vast amounts of user data, contributing to widespread invasions
of user privacy. Outlining a series of public revelations about data collection in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica and Facebook
scandals, Dayen illustrates the wide range of user privacy issues implicated in the practice. While the author acknowledges that
many other strategies could potentially address privacy violations and invasions, he concludes that banning the practice of targeted
advertising is the most effective and efficient approach.
As you read, consider the following questions:
1. According to the author, what are the drawbacks of a government policy that requires websites to offer users the choice to
opt-out of data collection?
2. What evidence does the author provide to support his argument that targeted advertising does not appear beneficial for
consumers or advertisers? Do you find it convincing?
3. Do you agree or disagree with Dayen’s argument that targeted advertising encourages monopolies and other kinds of
corrupt or unethical business practices? Explain your answer.
For the first 35 years of my life, like most Americans, I was exposed to lots of advertising. I absorbed billboards and print ads and
direct mailers and television commercials and radio jingles. I learned about available products and services, and chose which ones I
wanted. Some businesses I patronized survived and others didn’t. The economy mostly proceeded apace.
Then, over the last decade, this form of marketing became seen as insufficient?or rather, the rise of digital media made a more
invasive form of marketing too irresistible. Instead of having to cast a wide net in searching for potential customers, advertisers now
could know every intimate detail about those customers beforehand. They began targeting people geographically and behaviorally,
based on common interests or things they liked in social media or what they wrote in emails to friends. The surveillance economy
was born.
The surveillance economy should die. This manner of advertising doesn’t serve the public and it’s not even clear it serves advertisers.
It facilitates monopoly, as those with the biggest data troves receive all the ad dollars. That centralizes the potential for and
magnitude of abuse, with Big Data used to discriminate against groups, steer vulnerable people to financial scams, and meddle in
U.S. elections. Cambridge Analytica’s scraping of 87 million user profiles through a simple personality quiz, and then weaponizing
that information on behalf of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, revealed how information on social media is inherently insecure
(https://www.wired.com/story/facebook-exposed-87-million-users-to-cambridge-analytica/). Now Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is
appearing before Congress on Tuesday to explain how this won’t happen again.
But instead of leaving regulation to Facebook, or devising one Rube Goldberg scenario after another to try to protect consumer data,
the U.S. can take one simple, legal step to roll back this dystopian nightmare: ban targeted advertising.
Here’s what we’ve learned about personalized ads in just the past few weeks: Advertisers armed with Big Data can ensure housing or
employment advertisements don’t reach African-Americans or Hispanics, discriminating on the basis of race
(https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/27/nyregion/facebook-housing-ads-discrimination-lawsuit.html). Scam companies and grifters can
use targeted ads to find an environment of “suckers” prone to believing their pitches
(https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-03-27/ad-scammers-need-suckers-and-facebook-helps-find-them). The capture and
storage of personal information itself creates a target, prone to data harvesting and breaches
(https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/opinion/facebook-cambridge-analytica.html). Companies luring advertisers want to expand this
data trove; Facebook recently sent a doctor to talk with top hospitals about acquiring patient data, which could violate medical
confidentiality rules (https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/05/facebook-building-8-explored-data-sharing-agreement-with-hospitals.html).
Facebook and Google, the surveillance economy’s leading lights, collect this data primarily as a resource for advertisers. Digital ad
spending surpassed television ad spending globally for the first time; targeted data is prized. A stated goal of the proposed merger
between AT&T and Time Warner is to collect a broader range of viewer data to conduct stronger ad targeting.
Do the benefits of targeted ads for consumers outweigh the risks and downsides of mass data collection? That’s unclear. Back when
targeted ads didn’t follow me around the internet, I still somehow found what I wanted to buy. The social value is dubious, if they even
work. (We’ve all had the experience of buying something online and then getting ads for the same product for weeks, as if we needed
two pair of the same shoes.) Most surveys of targeted ads are conducted by advertisers and are completely unreliable.
Is targeting good for media companies that get top dollar for access to their audience? No. Facebook and Google have decimated
brand value by tracking people across the web, not only when they visit the Wall Street Journal or Seventeen magazine
(https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/data-lords-the-real-story-of-big-data-facebook-and-the-future-of-news). Do advertisers get
more value from personalization? This is not proven. Tech platforms have repeatedly been caught lying to advertisers about the
reach and effectiveness of their ads. Procter & Gamble, the world’s largest advertiser, cut its budget for targeted digital ads last year
because they found it to be a waste of money (https://www.wsj.com/articles/p-g-slashed-digital-ad-spending-by-another-100million-1519915621).
There’s nothing wrong with media companies sampling their audiences to determine average income or age or voting preferences;
market research has been a staple of advertising for decades. But when you build specific profiles of individuals, copy the
information, and distribute it for use by advertisers, problems emerge. And the government cannot enforce what it cannot see, so the
abuses occur far under the radar.
It’s obvious the surveillance economy’s biggest practitioners won’t police themselves. Mark Zuckerberg has been apologizing for
Facebook’s extraction of user data for 14 years. He has alternately said Facebook would globally apply European data privacy
requirements, and then that it wouldn’t. He has said that Facebook’s systems prevented hate speech and genocide in Burma, and
human rights groups called him a liar. Facebook now says it will demand authentication for political advertisers and inform users
whose data was improperly shared. But we should not expect a for-profit company to perform the activities of a government regulator.
There’s no question the U.S. government has the right to regulate advertising, and even limit it (https://www.truthinadvertising.org/fe).
The Federal Trade Commission monitors advertising and marketing to prohibit unfair or deceptive practices and enforce truth-inadvertising laws (https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement/statutes/federal-trade-commission-act). The U.S. evens regulates the volume of
television ads.
And there’s already precedent for banning ads in the U.S. The Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act banned cigarette ads on TV and
radio in 1971. Smokeless tobacco ads were banned in 1986 (http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/15/ch70.html). The Family Smoking
Prevention and Tobacco Control Act of 2010 extended the ban to event sponsorships and promotional material like T-shirts or hats
(https://www.fda.gov/TobaccoProducts/GuidanceComplianceRegulatoryInformation/ucm246129.htm). The Telephone Disclosure and
Dispute Resolution Act banned marketing of 900-number ads to children under the age of 12, one of several measures restricting
advertising to kids (https://www.ftc.gov/sites/default/files/documents/public_statements/advertising-kids-and-ftc-regulatoryretrospective-advises-present/040802adstokids.pdf). The Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act bars data collection, the raw
materials of targeted ads, from children under 13 (https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/chapter-91).
The ban I propose would be rather straightforward: The U.S. would disallow all individually targeted ads, with large fines or even
removal from the public airwaves for repeated violations. Nothing tied to a user’s identity should be used to serve them a particular
message. Companies would have to make all ads on its networks publicly viewable and searchable, so regulators can oversee them.
The ban would remove the financial incentive to collect data and spy on users. Companies still might do it, to understand what keeps
users on their sites. But competitors can overcome that by delivering compelling and useful content, which may actually become
important again.
As Harvard professor Jonathan Zittrain explains in The New York Times, consent is too much of a burden on users. The U.S. could
require an opt-out of data collection, as they’re about to do in Europe, but Facebook says that would be a “paid product,” creating a
two-tiered divide on a service fundamental to modern life. The U.S. could change nothing and try to use fines after the fact to affect
corporate behavior, but we know from the banking industry that this doesn’t work. There are options like making tech platforms legally
responsible to act in the best interests of users, or creating nonprofit web 2.0 alternatives. But the easiest way to eliminate the
darkest forces of the internet is to ban targeted ads.
My wife is in advertising, and her first reaction to this proposal was that lots of people at ad companies and tech firms would be fired,
which is true. But when globalization destroyed hundreds of thousands of U.S. manufacturing jobs, few elite policymakers batted an
eyelash. When longstanding professions like taxi drivers and truckers get “disrupted,” it’s seen as the march of progress. That
thousands of well-educated, well-trained innovators might have to find another line of work is worth the price of ridding the country of
the surveillance economy. I have far more confidence that a Bay Area coder will land on their feet than a textile worker in the South in
the 1980s.
The tech-platform giants have been the main beneficiaries of the surveillance economy, their earnings skyrocketing the moment they
unleashed the power of mass spying. Facebook, without personalized ads, would still have an audience of two billion users. Google,
without personalized ads, would still host billions of searches daily on their site. Surely their executives can figure out how to translate
that into profit. In fact, Facebook would be likely to survive without taking one advertising dollar from Western countries
(https://qz.com/1246099/can-facebook-survive-without-advertising/).
Anyway, ensuring the profitability of tech companies is not the government’s concern; protecting the public is.
When Zuckerberg appears before a joint Senate committee on Tuesday, someone ought to ask him why Facebook users should be
forced to accept targeted advertising. He should be asked to make the case for its existence?not only why targeted advertising is
more beneficial than traditional advertising, but why he thinks the associated dangers are worth the risk. If the question leaves him
speechless, that would be perhaps the most honest answer of all.
Full Text: COPYRIGHT 2022 Gale, a Cengage Company
Source Citation (MLA 9th Edition)
Dayen, David. “Ban Targeted Advertising.” Gale Opposing Viewpoints Online Collection, Gale, 2022. Gale In Context: Opposing
Viewpoints, link.gale.com/apps/doc/HTIEWE899739626/OVIC?u=txshracd2489&sid=bookmark-OVIC&xid=1122588e. Accessed
20 Jan. 2022. Originally published as “Ban Targeted Advertising,” The New Republic, 10 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|HTIEWE899739626
Rhetorical Analysis Writing Process
Informal Outline Template
Heading:
Your Name
Prof.
ENGL 13013 February 2020
Title of Your Essay
Current Thesis:
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Question for first analysis paragraph:
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Topic sentence for first analysis paragraph:________________________________________
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Question for second analysis paragraph:
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Topic sentence for third analysis paragraph:________________________________________
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Question for fourth analysis paragraph:
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Works Cited
Sample Rhetorical Analysis Outline
Harriet Clark
Ms. Rebecca Winter
CWC 101
13 Feb. 2015
Rhetorical Strategies in Grose?s ?Cleaning: The Final Feminist Frontier?
Current Thesis:
Although a few poorly chosen emotional appeals at the end of the
article threaten to weaken her argument, overall, Grose?s argument
effectively persuades
her reader through the use of personal
experiences, statistics from reputable sources, and successful
emotional appeals.
Question for first analysis paragraph:
How does the author show that he or she is credible and trustworthy
to the intended audience? (ethos)
Topic sentence for first analysis paragraph:
Throughout her piece,Grose uses many sources that strengthen her
credibility and appeal to ethos, as well as build her argument.
Question for second analysis paragraph:
Is the author?s evidence relevant, sufficient, and up-to-date?
(logos)
Topic sentence for third analysis paragraph: Grose uses strong appeals to
logos, with many facts and statistics and logical progressions of
ideas.
Question for third analysis paragraph:
What emotions does the argument hope to evoke? How effective is the
argument at evoking the desired emotion? (pathos)
Topic sentence for third analysis paragraph: Grose effectively makes
appeals to the reader?s emotions in the beginning and middle
sections of her article.
Question for fourth analysis paragraph:
How effective is the author?s word choice?
Topic sentence for fourth analysis paragraph:
However, due to poor word choice, the end of the article lacks the
same level of effectiveness in developing the author?s ethos.
Work Cited
Grose, Jessica. ?Cleaning: The Final Feminist Frontier.? New Republic, 19
Mar. 2013. https://newrepublic.com/article/112693/112693.
RHETORICAL ANALYSIS
SAMPLE ESSAY
Harriet Clark
Ms. Rebecca Winter
CWC 101
13 Feb. 2015
Not Quite a Clean Sweep: Rhetorical Strategies in
Grose?s ?Cleaning: The Final Feminist Frontier?
A woman?s work is never done: many American women grow up with this
saying and feel it to be true. One such woman, author Jessica Grose, wrote ?Cleaning:
The Final Feminist Frontier,? published in 2013 in the New Republic, and she argues that
while the men in our lives recently started taking on more of the childcare and cooking,
Hook
Context
Article author?s
claim or purpose
cleaning still falls unfairly on women. Grose begins building her credibility with
personal facts and reputable sources, citing convincing facts and statistics, and
Thesis
successfully employing emotional appeals; however, toward the end of the article, her
attempts to appeal to readers? emotions weaken her credibility and ultimately, her
argument.
In her article, Grose first sets the stage by describing a specific scenario of housecleaning with her husband after being shut in during Hurricane Sandy, and then she
outlines the uneven distribution of cleaning work in her marriage and draws a comparison
to the larger feminist issue of who does the cleaning in a relationship. Grose continues
Summary of the
article?s main
points in the
second paragraph
(could also be in
the introduction)
by discussing some of the reasons that men do not contribute to cleaning: the praise for a
clean house goes to the woman; advertising and media praise men?s cooking and
childcare, but not cleaning; and lastly, it is just not fun. Possible solutions to the problem,
Grose suggests, include making a chart of who does which chores, dividing up tasks
based on skill and ability, accepting a dirtier home, and making cleaning more fun with
gadgets.
Throughout her piece, Grose uses many strong sources that strengthen her
credibility and appeal to ethos, as well as build her argument. These sources include,
Third paragraph
begins with a
transition and
topic sentence that
reflects the first
topic in the thesis
?sociologists Judith Treas and Tsui-o Tai,? ?a 2008 study from the University of New
Hampshire,? and ?P&G North America Fabric Care Brand Manager, Matthew Krehbiel?
(qtd. in Grose). Citing these sources boosts Grose?s credibility by showing that she has
Quotes illustrate
how the author
uses appeals to
ethos
done her homework and has provided facts and statistics, as well as expert opinions to
support her claim. She also uses personal examples from her own home life to introduce
and support the issue, which shows that she has a personal stake in and first-hand
experience with the problem.
Adding to her ethos appeals, Grose uses strong appeals to logos, with many facts
and statistics and logical progressions of ideas. She points out facts about her marriage
and the distribution of household chores: ?My husband and I both work. We split
midnight baby feedings …but … he will admit that he?s never cleaned the bathroom, that I
Analysis explains
how the quotes
show the effective
use of ethos, as
noted in the thesis
Transition and
topic sentence
about the second
point from the
thesis
Quote that
illustrates appeals
to logos
do the dishes nine times out of ten, and that he barely knows how the washer and dryer
work in the apartment we?ve lived in for over eight months.? These facts introduce and
support the idea that Grose does more household chores than her husband. Grose
continues with many statistics:
[A]bout 55 percent of American mothers employed full time do some housework
on an average day, while only 18 percent of employed fathers do. … [W]orking
women with children are still doing a week and a half more of ?second shift?
Quote that
illustrates appeals
to logos
work each year than their male partners. … Even in the famously gender-neutral
Sweden, women do 45 minutes more housework a day than their male partners.
These statistics are a few of many that logically support her claim that it is a substantial
and real problem that men do not do their fair share of the chores. The details and
numbers build an appeal to logos and impress upon the reader that this is a problem worth
discussing.
Along with strong logos appeals, Grose effectively makes appeals to pathos in
the beginning and middle sections. Her introduction is full of emotionally-charged words
and phrases that create a sympathetic image; Grose notes that she ?was eight months
pregnant? and her husband found it difficult to ?fight with a massively pregnant person.?
The image she evokes of the challenges and vulnerabilities of being so pregnant, as well
Analysis explains
how the quotes
show the effective
use of logos, as
noted in the thesis
Transition and
topic sentence
about the third
point from the
thesis
Quotes that
illustrate appeals
to pathos
as the high emotions a woman feels at that time effectively introduce the argument and its
seriousness. Her goal is to make the reader feel sympathy for her. Adding to this idea
are words and phrases such as, ?insisted,? ?argued,? ?not fun,? ?sucks? ?headachey,? ?be
judged,? ?be shunned? (Grose). All of these words evoke negative emotions about
cleaning, which makes the reader sympathize with women who feel ?judged? and
shunned??very negative feelings. Another feeling Grose reinforces with her word
choice is the concept of fairness: ?fair share,? ?a week and a half more of ?second shift?
work,? ?more housework,? ?more gendered and less frequent.? These words help
Analysis explains
how the quotes
show the effective
use of pathos, as
noted in the thesis
establish the unfairness that exists when women do all of the cleaning, and they are an
appeal to pathos, or the readers? feelings of frustration and anger with injustice.
However, the end of the article lacks the same level of effectiveness in the
appeals to ethos. For example, Grose notes that when men do housework, they are
considered to be ??enacting ?small instances of gender heroism,? or ?SIGH?s??which,
barf.? The usage of the word ?barf? is jarring to the reader; unprofessional and immature,
it is a shift from the researched, intelligent voice she has established and the reader is less
likely to take the author seriously. This damages the strength of her credibility and her
argument.
Additionally, her last statement in the article refers to her husband in a way that
weakens the argument. While returning to the introduction?s hook in the conclusion is a
frequently-used strategy, Grose chooses to return to her discussion of her husband in a
humorous way: Grose discusses solutions, and says there is ?a huge, untapped market …
for toilet-scrubbing iPods. I bet my husband would buy one.? Returning to her own
Transition and
topic sentence
about fourth point
from thesis
Quote illustrates
how the author
uses appeal to
ethos
Analysis explains
how quote
supports thesis
Transition and
topic sentence
about fourth point
from thesis
Quote illustrates
how the author
uses appeal to
ethos
marriage and husband is an appeal to ethos or personal credibility, and while that works
well in the introduction, in the conclusion, it lacks the strength and seriousness that the
topic deserves and was given earlier in the article.
Analysis explains
how quote
supports thesis
Though Grose begins the essay by effectively persuading her readers of the
unfair distribution of home-maintenance cleaning labor, she loses her power in the end,
where she most needs to drive home her argument. Readers can see the problem exists in
Conclusion returns
to ideas in the
thesis and further
develops them
both her marriage and throughout the world; however, her shift to humor and sarcasm
makes the reader not take the problem as seriously in the end. Grose could have more
seriously driven home the point that a woman?s work could be done: by a man.
Works Cited
Grose, Jessica. ?Cleaning: The Final Feminist Frontier.? New Republic. The New
Republic, 19 Mar. 2013. Web. 28 Mar. 2014.
This document was developed by the
College Writing Center
STLCC-Meramec
Created 2/2015 by HSC
Last sentence
returns to the hook
in the introduction

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