The comment was about the bad grammar in the plan description, not the substance of the plan itself.

It depends on their relationship with the Party. Ultrasurf, for instance, was developed by Chinese dissidents.

If you assign a foreign-sounding word to it, it sounds more official.

The offer is there. It's freedom, and most people don't want it.

A 'free' computer that doesn't actually run any of the tools you need is worthless.

Makes a good doorstop, I guess.

Indeed. You are free to modify it to run those tools, or create alternate tools that do run (maybe not so much after Oracle v Google). But ain't nobody got time for that.

This is such a bullshit argument.

I don't want to spend my time making a toaster - I just want toast.

Also this is why FOSS software continually reinvents the wheel, badly. Want some BS program? There are a million of them. Want an actual tool that requires deep talent and domain knowledge? Outside of compilers, if it's FOSS, it is almost certainly garbage.

I think you are imagining the argument you want to see. Your comment is not responsive to what I actually wrote.

The headline and article are written as if it's somehow outrageous that a text could do this, but when an old-school verbal shout can trigger a lynching, if anything, it would be a letdown if an electronic message couldn't.

Exactly. This has nothing to do with the form of communication. The digital nature makes it merely public and accessible to a very large audience

Thankfully, you're not the first person to think of this, so there are also many ways to buy fake engagement.

Who benefits from the sun shining? Whoever can figure out how to harness the sunlight. The sun doesn't care either way.

Unlike ML-mediated data, the sun is not subject to human law.

Cars sounded like a terrifying future for stagecoach drivers.

Ads don't solely exist to convince you to buy a product. Some ads are designed to make you feel good about the purchase you already made. or to teach people who will never buy a product to respect people who do.

So, ads are in fact optimizing our experience using these dangerously large amounts of tracking data, they're just working so subtly and ineffably, we just don't know enough about marketing's mysterious ways to appreciate it.

You are thinking narrowly. Lets say your profile is "environmentally conscious family man". If you just bought a Tesla, and for 3 weeks after all you saw were ads around the internet reinforcing that "teslas are good for the environment", "teslas are great for budding families". Those ads are designed to generate brand loyalty.

In a completely different context, ads can be used to reenforce status. That was a separate distinct point gp was making. If you want to buy luxury goods, but can't afford them, a well placed gucci ad can act as a brand anchor & keep you yearning.

Your point stands, that the "mega retarget post amazon ads" are a flaw in the system, but as the system gets more data, they will be tweaked to be more effective.

Amazon has plenty of data already to fix this - they undoubtedly could determine "purchasers of X don't buy another one for Y months on average afterwards" - and I remain baffled that they haven't.

This specific case - "here are some other vacuums you didn't buy" - is one that seems more likely to hurt my brand loyalty and post-purchase feelings than anything else.

So, in the other-branded vacuum case, I can see a reason: buyer's regret.

Chances being that anything that irks you about your new vacuum are going to be most accutely felt in the initial period.

So reminding you heavily that there are other, greener-grass vacuums out there seems productive in inceptioning "I'll never buy X brand again!" resentment.

Yeah but you can turn that argument each way, it's just reasoning backwards. It amounts to just doing whatever with the tracking data, waiting for something positive to happen because of it, and then claiming it.

They can do that with random data and it'll work just as well. It's called divination and you don't need to track me for it.

Amazon doesn't care if your loyal to the vacuum brand. They just want the purchase to be through them. If you are unhappy with the purchase they want the rebound sale.

I can't speak for an individual ad I haven't seen. Even if I did see it, I don't necessarily know marketing enough to analyze it. I just know that the purpose can be broader than your post was originally giving it credit for.

The terms don't apply to the same context. A/B testing is a specific technique (well, not that specific) which can be used to do ethical science or unethical science.