Meanwhile, over on Yahoo! News… Eric Auchard is writing about Google’s unwillingness to tie together profiles across their massive collection of services for the purpose of serving up targeted ads.

What they are willing to do it use information that can be gleaned from within a given search session.

A user who types “Italy vacation” into a Google search box might see ads about Tuscany or cheap flights to Europe. Were the same user to subsequently search for “weather,” Google will assume there is a link between “Italy vacation” and “weather” and deliver ads tied to local weather conditions in Italy.

Given recent concerns about Google’s ever-growing collection of personal information, this is a pretty wise move. It essentially suggests to users that their unique data will be used to enhance services, while reassuring them that it won’t be given out to advertisers. Auchard comments on the tension between relevance and privacy:

In seeking patterns, Google’s plans involve tracking the various words typed in a given search session, as opposed to building a deeper user profile over time. The latter is known broadly as behavioral targeting, which has long been seen by many as the Holy Grail of the online ad business, but inevitably raises issues about personal privacy.

I support Google’s stance. Many may see behavioral targeting as the Holy Grail of the online ad business, but if people aren’t willing to participate, how useful will it be? Users have infinite choice these days, whether it’s blocking pop-ups or switching search engines. What’s the point of a behavioral system that serves to alienate the audience?

I think the Holy Grail is a system that delivers information uniquely appropriate to the individual without compromising their privacy concerns. What would that look like?

1. It would be transparent.
   Just because people have privacy concerns doesn’t mean they don’t want personalized content. It means people want full knowledge of what data is being stored, how it is being used, and who has access to it. Without transparency, users have no ability to take informed action.

2. It would keep the users in control.
   Hand-in-hand with transparency is control: the ability to turn personalization off, access it more fully, or delete data. Choice is paramount in order for users to feel comfortable providing information. Also along the lines of this item is opting-in: users should be able to decide they want something and get it rather than being forced to turn something off they didn’t want to begin with.

3. It would be useful.
   If a service isn’t useful, why would people want it? If its only use is to the advertiser and not the consumer, why should the consumer care? Combining this with the previous point, if I have to waste time turning off services that aren’t useful because they’re given to me automatically, it won’t really matter that they’re transparent and give me control; I’m still going to be annoyed.

VortexDNA’s relevance services fit those three criteria—was that why I chose them? No… it’s a chicken-and-egg, I think. We developed VortexDNA the way we did because we believe privacy to be paramount.

What have I missed here? What would you add to create the Holy Grail of personalized search?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 1st, 2007 at 4:51 am and is filed under Privacy, Personalized search, Relevance, Search, Google. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.