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Looking for free resources on fighting fake news and developing your students' media literacy skills? Here are some highlights from our activities, lessons, case studies and guest blog posts.

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https://www.readwritethink.org/collections/media-literacy

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Lesson Plans

We have hundreds of standards-based lesson plans written and reviewed by educators using current research and the best instructional practices. Find the perfect one for your classroom.

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We have launched the new ReadWriteThink.org and we would love to get your feedback: Give Feedback We have hundreds of standards-based lesson plans written and reviewed by educators using current research and the best instructional practices. Find the perfect one for your classroom.

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Do you find yourself becoming bored or fatigued by your daily intake of social media? Do you feel trapped in a constant cycle of monotony? You may be caught in a filter bubble. Due to the ongoing pandemic, families and children have looked to technology for sources of happiness, news, and leisure. Quarantines have limited social interaction, forcing society to indulge in more screen-time. Not all screen-time is detrimental, but we must acquaint ourselves with the concept of filter bubbles. Today's article covers what filter bubbles are, the harms of filter bubbles, and how you can keep your family safe from the strings attached to algorithms with the help of our sensible GKIS tips.

What is a "filter bubble" and how are they formed?

Coined by Eli Pariser, a filter bubble is a tailored universe of information built through algorithm filters.[1] Social media algorithms process and gather information (data), with the task of predicting what the user would like to see.[2] Despite the use of free products and services (like Facebook), your family's personal information (like browsing and buying behaviors) is collected and sold to advertisers (this is how platforms grow). Filter bubbles form through data gathered during your recurring use of social media, apps, and websites. In fact, as you browse through the internet, you are being followed by trackers you pick up from websites that gather this data. The trackers that invisibly follow you as you visit various virtual neighborhoods is referred to as virtual exhaust.

With your personal information, these algorithms can then retarget you by showing you ads about the things you seemed interested in during previous browsing. An example of these algorithms at work includes a story about a girl who was targeted with baby ads before knowing she was pregnant! The young woman did not outright give herself away by looking at cribs or diapers; however, her subscription and purchase history led to data collection that pointed to the direction of pregnancy.[3]

If algorithms could go as far as attempting to predict sensitive information such as pregnancy, imagine the different directions the algorithms will predict with each of your family members. Although we give our permission for marketers to track us by using certain platforms (because we love that free, delicious content), it's useful to be educated about the ways of marketers. To help you recognize the red flags of marketing so you can teach them to your kids, GKIS offers ways to keep your family internet safe. Take the first step by signing up for our How to Spot Marketing Red Flags Supplement. It's the perfect addition to our free Connected Family Screen Agreement available at GetKidsInternetSafe.com.

Everyday Examples

Everyday examples of tools that form filter bubbles include Facebook news feeds, Twitter timelines, and any kind of "For You" feature. Because these pages are tailored to your liking (based on personal data), a filter bubble is compiled through media similarities, leading to a customized but limited online experience.

Other examples of tools that form filter bubbles are the checkboxes to "get to know you better" or "Suggested Pages." I love to indulge in following online influencers that offer fashion and makeup inspiration, but at the same time, I realize that it's a bubble of advertisements that are trying to get me to swipe my card. These days, almost every influencer post includes a paid promotion. Because we love the convenience of buying off the internet, it reinforces the idea that you can easily shop in the comfort of your own home. You can see where this constant cycle of exposure can be detrimental, not just to the reward system in our brains (instant gratification) but also to our financial stability.

What are the harms of filter bubbles?

Narcissism and Herd Mentality

It has been proposed that filter bubbles may lead to narcissistic tendencies, as the filter bubble ricochets one's preferences. Narcissism in the digital age includes preoccupation with self-image, which is evident in a filter bubble when your beliefs and opinions are reinforced.[4]

In psychology, the herd mentality is the notion that people tend to make decisions to fit in with the majority. This mentality can be especially harmful in a filter bubble, as your family members may blindly follow an idea or group without considering opposing viewpoints or repercussions of their actions. Sometimes a filter bubble gives the impression of a majority preference when it's actually just a small part of the overall picture.

Exposure to Fake News

Searching the internet makes it very easy to fall victim to a confirmation bias, which is the notion that people prefer sources that confirm their beliefs, negating opposing viewpoints. This bias can put you at risk of digital injury by exposing your family to fake news and misinformation, leading you to believe in (and even share) false conclusions about important topics.

Consider the following thought experiment. Imagine disagreeing with someone so much so that you resort to searching the internet for backup. You might feel tempted to click on the first source that confirms your stance, and then a second, and so on... As you search for information, algorithms are tailoring your search results to your search history, filtering out beneficial information that would be useful to know to form an unbiased opinion.

Voting is a prime example of this dilemma, as politics in this digital age are nearly impossible to evade. Filter bubbles have not only intensified our stance on the current presidential election between President Trump and former Vice President Biden, but they have also affected the way we engage in politics with family members, friends, and even strangers.

No matter where you stand, it is clear to see the effects of confirmation bias on political polarization. Polarized opinions and interactions are just a few of many examples of digital injury and toxic online behavior. To learn more about the repercussions and psychology behind misinformation, check out this in-depth GKIS article about fake news.

Isolation and Narrow-Mindedness

Eli Pariser suggests that we can think of the filter bubble as a "party of one."[5] Without exposure to information that will challenge our way of thinking, our outlook on the world around us will inevitably become one-dimensional.[6] Dr. Tracy Bennett, founder of GetKidsInternetSafe, says she sees evidence of this emotional isolation every day in practice. By feeling more and more confident in their belief systems, many of us increasingly feel frustrated and angry. As we seek sources to increase our confidence, we fall into a cycle of fear, confirmation, anger, and isolation. "Worst case scenario," she says, "we give up and sink into depression and apathy."

Hate Groups and Radicalization

Kids can fall into filter bubbles just like adults can. To keep kids from accessing hate group and cult information and potentially becoming radicalized, parents need to access parental controls like those offered in our GKIS Screen Safety Toolkit. To learn more about how these harmful communities could be targeting your family, check out this GKIS article about hate groups and cults.

Thanks to CSUCI intern Kaylen Sanchez for researching filter bubbles for this GKIS article.

I'm the mom psychologist who will help you GetKidsInternetSafe.

Onward to More Awesome Parenting,

Tracy S. Bennett, Ph.D.
Mom, Clinical Psychologist, CSUCI Adjunct Faculty
GetKidsInternetSafe.com

Photos Credits

Image by Pixabay from Pexels

Photo by Tracy Le Blanc from Pexels

Image by Yomare from Pixabay

Works Cited

[1] TEDtalksDirector [TED] (2011, May 2) Beware online "filter bubbles" | Eli Pariser [Video File]. Retrieved from: https://youtu.be/B8ofWFx525s

[2] Orlowski, J. (Director) (2020). The Social Dilemma [Documentary] Netflix. https://www.netflix.com/title/81254224

[3] Hill, K. (2016, March 31). How Target Figured Out A Teen Girl Was Pregnant Before Her Father Did. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-target-figured-out-a-teen-girl-was-pregnant-before-her-father-did/#30b9ac0e6668

[4] MacDonald, P. (2014). Narcissism in the modern world. Psychodynamic Practice: Individuals, Groups and Organisations, 20(2), 144-153. https://doi-org.summit.csuci.edu/10.1080/14753634.2014.894225

[5] TEDtalksDirector [TED] (2011, May 2) Beware online "filter bubbles" | Eli Pariser [Video File]. Retrieved from: https://youtu.be/B8ofWFx525s

[6] GCFLearnFree.org (2018, Nov 29) How Filter Bubbles Isolate You [Video File]. Retrieved from: https://youtu.be/pT-k1kDIRnw

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Sorry to Burst Your [Filter] Bubble - GetKidsInternetSafe

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Sorry to Burst Your [Filter] Bubble Do you find yourself becoming bored or fatigued by your daily intake of social media? Do you feel trapped in a constant cycle of monotony? You may be caught in a filter bubble. Due to the ongoing pandemic, families and children have looked to technology for sources of happiness, news, and leisure.

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"A situation in which an Internet user encounters only information and opinions that conform to and reinforce their own beliefs, caused by algorithms that personalize an individual's online experience."
Source (video)

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News Literacy Resources for Classrooms | Common Sense Education

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A best-of-the-best collection of resources for teaching and learning about news literacy.

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Confirmation bias is the natural human tendency to seek, interpret, and remember new information in accordance with preexisting beliefs.
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“Echo chambers can happen anywhere information is exchanged, but the Internet has made echo chambers far more numerous and easy to fall into,” says Lisa MacLean, M.D.

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“Echo chambers can happen anywhere information is exchanged, but the Internet has made echo chambers far more numerous and easy to fall into,” says Lisa MacLean, M.D.

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Source

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 "Filter bubbles: where you don’t hear the other side. Echo Chambers: where you don’t trust the other side." 

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 "Filter bubbles: where you don’t hear the other side. Echo Chambers: where you don’t trust the other side." 

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(Credit: C. Thi Nguyen).

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74% of people are tired of social media ads—but they’re effective

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74% of people are tired of social media ads—but they’re effective

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74% of people are tired of social media ads—but they’re effective | SurveyMonkey

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SurveyMonkey delivers People Powered Data to organizations around the world. From simple surveys to advanced feedback solutions and enterprise offerings, SurveyMonkey products work for any use case or budget

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The average person was estimated to encounter upwards of 10,000 ads every day in 2021, with the number doubling each year since 2007.
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Information can come from many different sources and perspectives. But when you’re only hearing the same perspectives and opinions over and over again, you may be in something called an echo chamber.
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The Pros and Cons of (Online) Cookies     [Real Cookies are always acceptable!]

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The Pros and Cons of (Online) Cookies     [Real Cookies are always acceptable!]

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Targeted ads, or those personalized ones that follow you around on the internet containing products that you actually might like, have a lot of connotations tied to them: they're creepy, they're not quite accurate, and they're even potentially embarrassing, among other things.

However you feel about targeted ads, it's safe to say that, if you're going to be targeted by brands, it's at least nice to have relevant purchase suggestions instead of the usual mishmash of products that you'd never even consider buying.

That's why it's important to get an understanding of the science of personalized ads from a marketer and consumer perspective-you know what you're in for and why it may be best to let them keep doing their thing.

So how do these work? Let's dig in to the details.

Normal people prefer chocolate chip; marketers prefer text files.

A cookie is a small piece of code called a pixel that is placed on a website.

Every time a new visitor comes to that website, the cookie is dropped by the website's server onto a user's computer-but only on the internet browser level.

Each new cookie that's dropped creates a unique identifier code for every new user, and that becomes the user's "name" (your real name is kept anonymous).

Then, the data on your activity tracked from site to site and then collected and compiled into a profile, which includes your browsing behavior, interests, and demographics.

Once a user is identified, the web pages you're on will recognize your tracking code and display relevant ads to you in whatever places the page designates for personalized ad displays (more on the actual personalized ads later). These cookies can only be placed or retrieved for use when the user accesses the website server directly or by means of a third party tag.

First party cookies are placed by the site you visit, while third party cookies are placed by someone other than the site, such as an advertising network.

It's important to note that only the domain or website that places the cookie can read and use it.

Also, personalized and targeted ads cannot work without cookies, making them extremely important to the customer experience and highly valuable to marketers as a result.

So, how does the cookie collect information?

The cookie itself allows websites to recognize a visitor when that user revisits their site, but only if the user has previously identified himself with personal data that will allow him to be recognized upon his return.

This gives the website access to data stored in cookies on the visitor's hard drive. However, cookies don't gain access to data stored on user's hard disk, which protects the user's privacy.

When cookies are used by ad networks or third party marketing services, they allow marketers to follow users on all websites where third party tags are added-but not beyond that realm.

Pros and cons of cookies for users

Pros

Users can be recognized from visit to visit, and their login information, including their username and password, can be auto-filled so that they don't have to type it out every time, making their login process less tedious.

Users' preferences are saved and used for future visits, helping user experience and ease of browsing.

Shopping cart contents are maintained during and between visits on ecommerce sites, so if an app force quits or you forget to check out, you don't have to start the shopping trip from the beginning.

Cookies help ad effectiveness: users see ads for products that actually appeal to them, improving the overall level of interest and browsing experience.

Personalization has some perks, too, as prices and offers may be tailored to specific users and make them feel like a select and valued customer.

Users can choose which browser they want to use based on privacy preferences, so they're not completely without choice in the whole matter.

Cons

Cookies can be seen as a privacy violation when used for ad purposes, making some users feel rather uneasy about the whole thing.

They can slow down the browsing experience as they accumulate, forcing users to have to go and manually "clean out" their stored cookies to improve performance.

Research shows that the NSA can tap into this data, too, which is not at all what cookies were created for and therefore can be unsettling and unethical.

They're not entirely anonymous and can be linked to actual identities if the time is put into analyzing the data and patterns.

Worse yet, someone can accidentally leak personal information if the data is in the wrong hands.

Pros and cons of cookies for marketers

Pros

Users can be identified by publishers and ad networks for behavioral targeting and website retargeting. In other words, relevant ads have never been easier to whip up.

Cookies help enhance the overall ad effectiveness and user experience, which in turn increases ROI.

Users can be tracked for web analytics purposes, helping brands to best serve their customers on the digital side.

Combining network behaviors, marketers can determine all of your devices and combine all of the browsing behavior to build an even deeper and clearer profile.

Cons

Cookies identify the computer's IP address, not technically the user himself. When a computer is shared, the data gets muddled-unless multiple users have separate profiles in the browser.

They can certainly be blocked by the user, or users can opt out, delete, or otherwise disable the full potential of cookies. Though it makes browsing more manual for the user, oftentimes, it's a question of privacy versus convenience.

Each internet browser has its own cookies, so marketers are left with a lot of decisions based on where their audience browses and the benefits that each offers.

Types of cookies

There are so many types of cookies, but we're going to focus on the three most important ones that everyone should be familiar with.

Session cookie

It's a temporary cookie that's stored in your browsing session memory and then erased when the web browser is closed. It's used for session analytics, not identifying information.

Third party cookie

As you read earlier on, these are cookies that are placed on a website by a third party, such as an advertising network or marketing service.

Persistent cookie

These cookies are stored on the hard drive until they expire or are deleted, hence the name "persistent" as they don't disappear easily. These are used for identifying information, such as user preferences and surfing behavior.

There are also flash, post-click, post-impression, and conversion cookies, but they're not as commonly used as the three above.

Rise of cookie use

As with most technological advances, cookie usage has exploded in just a few years. 75% of the world's 500 most popular websites contain cookies, compared with less than 5% in 1998. That's a huge difference!

Google dominates in terms of cookie usage as much as it does in search engine popularity: Google Analytics cookies appeared on more than 30% of the most popular websites. Furthermore, Google's DoubleClick ad server appeared on another 15% of the sites.

Needless to say, cookies aren't going anywhere anytime soon.

If anything, marketers will just get increasingly better at using and analyzing them to make ads feel less like ads and more like gently suggestions from informed sources.

Perhaps they'll find a simpler way to analyze and utilize multi-device targeting with cookies, too. Speaking of which...

Not all of our online activity happens on desktop computers anymore; in fact, about half of browser searches now happen on mobile devices alone.

Marketers can leverage our multi-device habits in a slightly different way since cookies cannot be tracked from one device to another.

Better yet, companies will take browsing behavior from different devices and match habits across each to the best of their ability. The formal name for this practice of studying millions of web users to match people to their devices is called probabilistic matching.

There's big business in this new industry, too, as companies learn about your devices and interests by tracking tons of ad requests daily from internet ad exchanges selling in real time.

This setup allows potential buyers to see device types, IP addresses, browsers, and more to paint a full picture of the user and be more confident with where they put their money.

The biggest clue for matching devices is when two devices use the same IP address when browsing at home. There are a couple other clues, too, such as search patterns for the same product conducted in the same geographical location.

Why is multi-device targeting so important? It has been determined that consumers tend to search for products on mobile devices, then go complete the purchase on desktop computers instead.

When you factor in consumer buying habits and then optimize to get them while they're willing to buy, your chances of closing the deal can skyrocket.

For example, one company launched a cross-platform ad that yielded three times greater response than traditional internet ads would have.

While this used to be simply called internet-based advertising, the term has matured with the tech itself.

This new method enables advertisers to reach users based on their interests, demographics, behavior, and more. It also allows for more efficient monetization of websites, increased value for advertisers, and better user experience all around.

In fact, a study found that 71% of consumers actually prefer personalized ads.

Even so, they have some work to do: consumers expect the content to be both useful and contextually relevant to their needs, every. Single. Time.

The more marketers can nail presenting the right information at the right time, the better off we'll all be.
There are a lot of benefits to personalized advertising, too:

The relevancy of ads is significantly improved.

It's a great way to discover new products and brands.

It makes shopping online a little more effortless and a lot less stressful.

Personalized ads boost engagement, as people are almost twice as likely to click-through an ad from an unknown brand that it well-tailored and relevant to their preferences. It's a win-win for the smaller brand and the user!

44% of respondents to a survey said they're perfectly willing to give up information such as their name, address, and email to get more personalized ads, which means that their benefits are apparent to consumers as well as marketers.

Overall, personalized ads reduce friction and improve the shopping experience.

How do personalized ads work?

When you browse a brand's website, then go to a different place on the internet, you may have noticed that you'll start seeing ads pop up everywhere for that brand or product you were just checking out.

You'll even go to another page or entirely different website only to find the same: more of those ads. Why does this happen?

Marketers take the clickstream data collected by the cookies we discussed earlier and then use the data from those to tailor ads to you based on your browsing information and preferences.

Then, they analyze the search terms you use and other user habits you inevitably have in order to place the right ads in your search engine results.

You'll notice that some searches yield ads right on the top of the list-that's because those companies are paying a premium price on particular keywords for a higher position in your results list.

Then there's your previous purchase data, including items you once put in your cart and later abandoned, that factors in, too. This information helps brands suggest related items or even replacement items if the ones you purchased are able to be used up.

The goal is to entice users to come back and buy more or reconsider the items they previously abandoned.

Finally, marketers will pull data from your social profile as well, such as brands you follow, ads you've clicked on, your selected interests, and more. This social data is used to provide users with custom advertising within the platform.

Facebook can even collect data on you from any site that contains a Facebook like or share button, too. While it may seem like you merely think about a donut and suddenly an ad for Krispy Kreme pops up, it's likely that you've searched for donuts before or even mentioned somewhere on Facebook that they're your favorite pastry.

All of this information above is then collected into a robust user profile and utilized by marketers for the purpose of making defined audience segments and effectively cater ads to each.

While this tactic evolved from simple demographic targeting, it uses more data and results in significantly more accuracy per user.

There are plenty of types of targeting:

Technical targeting (based on device)

Behavioral (based on activity)

Retargeting (based on previous interaction with the content)

Each of these uses certain types of information, from the device you use to the language your keyboard is set to.

As a non-digital example of language targeting, I once received an internet provider offer in Polish-it's my first language, so it made sense, but it was delivered to my house in Denver, which is a very non-Polish area. Needless to say, I was more impressed than usual with their use of data and accuracy.

Some of the most common information that marketers collect via cookies is demographic, psychographic, and behavioral (including browsing history, purchase history, and overall activity).

There are some pros and cons to the use of personalized ads, as marketers have yet to attain the perfect level of targeting users at the right time, right place, right mindset, and right budget.

Some pros are that the ad may be bothering you, yes, but it's at least bothering you about something that you may actually be interested in rather than something entirely irrelevant to your life.

It also minimizes waste for advertisers, diminishes ad spend, reduces bounce rates, and increases ROI.

On the downside, you can trigger retargeting unintentionally for one-off purchases that aren't actually relevant to you. For instance, if you buy a gift for a loved one, you get targeted for those products long after the purchase and can get irritated.

It can also be very embarrassing for the user if anyone else sees the ads in their browser-when my boyfriend bought me a cardigan from this one brand, he was quite uncomfortable with the resulting sports bra ads that the brand started dishing up on his browser day in and day out.

Some may see it as a slight invasion of privacy as their interests or shopping history are dangled in their faces for anyone near the device to see.

There are bigger problems with personalized ads than irrelevancy, though, so it's important to be aware of why they're still not the perfect solution for marketers.

The problem with personalized ads

First and foremost, people value their privacy.

Many fear that the data collected from cookies can put together a robust image of their true identity, and the fact that the NSA piggybacked off of profiles created for marketing purposes is certainly concerning and unethical.

Nevertheless, marketers create terms of use and many clearly lay them out on the bottom of a website to show users that they mean business, not identity theft, which helps alleviate some skepticism.

The second issue with personalized ads is entirely inevitable and inescapable: some people just hate advertising in general.

In fact, millennials are the most skeptical generation and try to opt out of ads entirely by leveraging ad blocking technology.

95% of users surveyed in one report said that they take actions to avoid seeing or receiving ads altogether, which entails avoiding signing up for email lists, disabling cookies, and using ad blockers as mentioned above.

Why?

Well, it turns out that plenty of people would prefer to discover their own content on their own terms, essentially being in charge of their own personalization.

This is because many users want to retain full control of what they see and browse through, likely because their standards for ads are that they should be fully customizable to their interests and must hold their attention and cause them to spend more time on the content.
If marketers can get to that advanced of a level of personalized advertising, it would lead to:

62% more users seeking out information about the brand in the ad

53% of users becoming more likely to remember the brand from the ad

A gratitude effect, where users form a relationship with a brand because it delivers the right experience and puts in the effort to tailor to their individual preferences

If marketers want to receive less skepticism and convert even more users through personalized ads, they must step it up.

The respondents from the study mentioned above provided resoundingly negative feedback on the current quality of the messaging and ads themselves.

Worse yet, more than half of the respondents stated that they would prefer personalized ads, just not today's standard of such.

Of course, we are limited by our technology, so it's going to take some time to get to the next level of this strategy.

What are your thoughts on personalized ads?

Love 'em, hate 'em, don't mind 'em too much?

Share with us in the comments below!

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Who Took the Cookie? The Science Behind Targeted Ads | Blog | Herosmyth

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Targeted ads, or those personalized ones that follow you around on the internet containing products that you actually might like, have a lot of connotations tied to them: they're creepy, they're not quite accurate, and they're even potentially embarrassing, among other things.

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The Problem of Living Inside Echo Chambers

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The Problem of Living Inside Echo Chambers

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Pick any of the big topics of the day - Brexit, climate change or Trump's immigration policies - and wander online.

What one is likely to find is radical polarization - different groups of people living in different worlds, populated with utterly different facts.

Many people want to blame the "social media bubble" - a belief that everybody sorts themselves into like-minded communities and hears only like-minded views.

From my perspective as a philosopher who thinks about communities and trust, this fails to get at the heart of the issue.

In my mind, the crucial issue right now isn't what people hear, but whom people believe.

Bubble or cult?

My research focuses on "epistemic bubbles" and "echo chambers." These are two distinct ideas, that people often blur together.

An epistemic bubble is what happens when insiders aren't exposed to people from the opposite side.

An echo chamber is what happens when insiders come to distrust everybody on the outside.

An epistemic bubble, for example, might form on one's social media feed. When a person gets all their news and political arguments from Facebook and all their Facebook friends share their political views, they're in an epistemic bubble. They hear arguments and evidence only from their side of the political spectrum. They're never exposed to the other side's views.

An echo chamber leads its members to distrust everybody on the outside of that chamber. And that means that an insider's trust for other insiders can grow unchecked.

Two communications scholars, Kathleen Hall Jamieson and Joseph Cappella, offered a careful analysis of the right-wing media echo chamber in their 2008 book, "The Echo Chamber."

Rush Limbaugh and the Fox News team, they said, systematically manipulated whom their followers trusted. Limbaugh presented the world as a simple binary - as a struggle only between good and evil. People were trustworthy if they were on Limbaugh's side. Anybody on the outside was malicious and untrustworthy.

In that way, an echo chamber is a lot like a cult.

Echo chambers isolate their members, not by cutting off their lines of communication to the world, but by changing whom they trust. And echo chambers aren't just on the right. I've seen echo chambers on the left, but also on parenting forums, nutritional forums and even around exercise methods.

In an epistemic bubble, outside voices aren't heard. In an echo chamber, outside voices are discredited.

Is it all just a bubble?

Many experts believe that the problem of today's polarization can be explained through epistemic bubbles.

According to legal scholar and behavioral economist Cass Sunstein, the main cause of polarization is that internet technologies have made the world such that people don't really run into the other side anymore.

Many people get their news from social media feeds. Their feeds get filled up with people like them - who usually share their political views. Eli Pariser, online activist and chief executive of Upworthy, spotlights how the invisible algorithms behind people's internet experience limit what they see.

For example, says Pariser, Google keeps track of its user's choices and preferences, and changes its search results to suit them. It tries to give individuals what they want - so liberal users, for example, tend to get search results that point them toward liberal news sites.

If the problem is bubbles, then the solution would be exposure. For Sunstein, the solution is to build more public forums, where people will run into the other side more often.

The real problem is trust

In my view, however, echo chambers are the real problem.

New research suggests there probably aren't any real epistemic bubbles. As a matter of fact, most people are regularly exposed to the other side.

Moreover, bubbles should be easy to pop: Just expose insiders to the arguments they've missed.

But this doesn't actually seem to work, in so many real-world cases. Take, for example, climate change deniers. They are fully aware of all the arguments on the other side. Often, they rattle off all the standard arguments for climate change, before dismissing them. Many of the standard climate change denial arguments involve claims that scientific institutions and mainstream media have been corrupted by malicious forces.

What's going on, in my view, isn't just a bubble. It's not that people's social media feeds are arranged so they don't run across any scientific arguments; it's that they've come to systematically distrust the institutions of science.

This is an echo chamber. Echo chambers are far more entrenched and far more resistant to outside voices than epistemic bubbles. Echo chamber members have been prepared to face contrary evidence. Their echo-chambered worldview has been arranged to dismiss that evidence at its source.

They're not totally irrational, either. In the era of scientific specialization, people must trust doctors, statisticians, biologists, chemists, physicists, nuclear engineers and aeronautical engineers, just to go about their day. And they can't always check with perfect accuracy whether they have put their trust in the right place.

An echo chamber member, however, distrusts the standard sources. Their trust has been redirected and concentrated inside the echo chamber.

To break somebody out of an echo chamber, you'd need to repair that broken trust. And that is a much harder task than simply bursting a bubble.

[ Deep knowledge, daily. Sign up for The Conversation's newsletter. ]

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The problem of living inside echo chambers

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Rush Limbaugh is said to have presented the world as a simple binary - as a struggle only between good and evil. That worked, as a philosopher explains, because many people live in echo chambers.

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What is targeted advertising?

Advertising is everywhere online, but we've gotten pretty good at ignoring it. To win back our attention, advertisers have adapted to our digital viewing habits by remembering what we read and buy online, then using this information to sell us things they think we might like. While it may sound strange, this practice, called targeted advertising, has become very common.

Targeted advertising is a form of online advertising that focuses on the specific traits, interests, and preferences of a consumer. Advertisers discover this information by tracking your activity on the Internet.

How does it work?

Here's one of the most common methods: Let's say you go to Amazon to look for a new Paul McCartney CD. In order to keep track of your visit, Amazon creates a file called a cookie on your computer. Later, when you're reading an article on Slate, automated advertisements read this cookie and generate ads for items related to your Amazon visit, like other Paul McCartney albums or a Beatles T-shirt.

The good thing about targeted ads is that you'll see ads for products you actually want. However, this system isn't perfect. Even if you only visit a page once, you may see ads for that particular product for quite some time. For instance, you may keep getting ads for maternity wear long after you've given birth.

Aside from cookies, advertisers also learn about you in other ways, like checking your search engine history and finding your personal information on social media.

Isn't this an invasion of my privacy?

Targeted advertising could be seen as an invasion of privacy. However, remember that all of the information you submit to the Internet can be tracked, whether it be search engine requests, social media updates, or the websites you visit. And if it can be tracked, this information may return to you in the form of a targeted ad.

The more advertisers know about you, the more they assume about your buying habits. Age, gender, income, relationship status: Advertisers will take whatever they can get if it means they could sell you something.

For instance, the Facebook profile below contains biographical information that advertisers would love to know. According to the profile, this user is a young, art school-educated woman who lives in a big city. Based solely on this information, advertisers could send her numerous targeted ads that may appeal to her.

Can these ads follow me across different devices?

Yes. If you're shopping for work boots on your laptop, you can get targeted ads for work boots on your smartphone, even though you never browsed for boots on the device. Advertisers can now guess who you are by analyzing your location, browsing habits, and the types of sites you sign in to, like Facebook or Google. And the crazy part? Their guesses are surprisingly accurate, according to articles from Digital Trends and MIT Technology Review.

The advertisers that collect and use this data claim to not keep sensitive personal information on file, but it's difficult to figure out exactly what these big-data advertisers know. Unfortunately, this type of data collection is becoming the norm and currently there are no regulations against it, meaning it will likely be around for years. Thankfully, there are a few things you can do to fight back against the ads.

How can I stop these ads?

First, a good rule of thumb for browsing online: Assume that nothing you do online is private.

Next, if you simply want to stop seeing ads, download an ad blocker for your web browser, which should get rid of most of them. To prevent advertisers from tracking your information altogether, you have a few options:

Go to the Privacy settings of your web browser, then delete your cookies and ask websites not to track you.

Visit an opt-out site like About Ads and request that participating ad agencies stop tracking your information. While it will not completely eliminate targeted ads, it will significantly reduce them.

Reduce the amount of information you share on social media, giving advertisers less to learn about you.

Also, all web browsers have a private browsing mode that doesn't record your history or cookies. However, this mode will not prevent targeted ads, as advertisers can still track you in other ways, like your search engine history and social media information.

Online ads aren't going away anytime soon, and targeted advertising is proof that advertisements have adapted to the changing tastes and habits of consumers. Now that you understand how advertisers learn about you and your online activity, targeted ads should no longer surprise you.

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Learn more about targeted ads and how advertisers use them to try and sell products to Internet users in this free lesson.

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We've all been there. You're having a conversation with a friend about a product he or she wants you to try. Later that day, you're scrolling Facebook and bam! Eerily, there's an ad on your timeline for that EXACT product. Your flags are raised. You look over each shoulder, crouch in the shadows, and suddenly, you feel vulnerable. Is Facebook listening to us? Seeing digital ads after talking about something may lead you to think so.

There's a reason this is happening, but "listening" is probably not it.

Talking about something and seeing a digital ad for it. Thinking about something and seeing a digital ad for it. Even dreaming about something and seeing a digital ad for it.

Peoples' collective experiences like these have led many to ask the question, "Is technology listening to us?" It's a question that has been blatantly posed to social media leaders like Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook) and Adam Mosseri (Instagram). Time and time again, they have adamantly denied the fact that their apps are "listening" to users via smartphone microphones and the like.

The general consensus among industry experts is that they are telling the truth. For one, doing so would be illegal. Secondly, the logistics of actively listening to, recording and storing conversations just don't make sense when you really think about it.

Tracking, not listening

So if Facebook and Instagram aren't listening, then how do our conversations and thoughts about products magically turn into ads?

In a way, social platforms are "eavesdropping," but just not in the way we think.

We see digital ads after talking about something because social media apps like Facebook and Instagram are extensively tracking our actions, both online and off.

A hypothetical scenario

Let's say you are at a birthday party, and your friend tells you about this new meal service he or she has tried and loved (let's call it "Yummy Time.") You have never texted about Yummy Time. You have never Googled Yummy Time. You and your friend simply have a conversation about it out loud.

Hours later, you're at home scrolling the News Feed and whoa...there's an ad for Yummy Time.

How they track

No, Facebook didn't hear your conversation. They are just so good at tracking you in other ways that it can feel that way.

We know that Facebook surveils our online behaviors: i.e., what websites we visit, what terms we search for, what we purchase online, etc. These tracking methods (which get extremely sophisticated beyond what we're describing here) have a direct influence on the ads that we see.

In the case of the conversation with the friend, we can thank location tracking for that. Even when one is not signed in to the app, Facebook (given permission by the user) can track the location of our mobile phones.

Therefore, Facebook was able to determine that you and the friend were in the same location at the party. If the friend had previously had any online interaction with Yummy Time, then there is your connection. Facebook knows you're friends on Facebook. It knows you were together. If that friend is bringing up Yummy Time, it's likely that he or she has had some kind of recent interaction with it-Googling it, visiting the website, etc. Even if the mentioned product was one your friend purchased in a store, Facebook location tracking can be privy to the fact that your friend was at said store.

Let's take it a step further. Even if your friend (Friend A) had only had a conversation about Yummy Time with another friend (Friend B), then Friend A could have been the one on the receiving end of the ad prior to talking about it with you. That's enough for Facebook to try the ad with you as well.

In other words...

Beyond just being together, Facebook's algorithm compares your interests, demographics, places you've been, groups you're a part of, hashtags you follow (the list goes on) to that of your friend. If you and your friend are similar, and the friend has already left a trail of breadcrumbs to that product, then Facebook will serve you up an ad to see if you feel the same.

Fueling the algorithm

So what about those times when you just think about something, and then you see an ad?

It can be difficult to wrap your head around, but it likely is less of a coincidence than you think. Any piece of information Facebook picked up (even just semi-related to the thought), either before or after your thought, could have led to the ad being served.

Every move you make online fuels Facebook's algorithm. Engaging with a post, liking a person's photo, or even using your Facebook account to sign in to another online service are all examples of this.

Essentially, a complex algorithm is "listening" to us, just not using microphones.

Can I stop being tracked?

There are permissions you can play around with to limit how Facebook tracks and uses your information. However, if you are using the social platform in any capacity, then it has enough information to go off of to "learn" your potential interests for advertising purposes.

The only true way to stop being subject to social media marketing algorithms? Quit altogether.

Summary

Seeing digital ads after talking about something is no coincidence. Though we don't think anyone is sitting in a warehouse with a pair of headphones listening to our conversations, technology is actively monitoring our behaviors to make suppositions about our future buying inclinations.
McNutt & Partners is a full-service advertising and digital marketing agency. Contact us today for your marketing needs! Call 334-521-1010, or visit our contact page.
digital ads, digital ads after talking about something

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Why We See Digital Ads After Talking About Something - McNutt & Partners

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We've all been there. You're having a conversation with a friend about a product he or she wants you to try. Later that day, you're scrolling Facebook and bam! Eerily, there's an ad on your timeline for that EXACT product. Your flags are raised.

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Don't believe everything you read--especially if you are reading news on social meda

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Don't believe everything you read--especially if you are reading news on social meda

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Did you know that technology may be choosing what articles, news items, and posts that you see? Complex algorithms use your online presence to calculate what you want to see based on your searches, comments, and more. Is your computer "listening"? Probably not--but there are active programs generating your next ad or link.