Content-type: text/html Downes.ca ~ Stephen's Web ~ Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica problems are nothing compared to what’s coming for all of online publishing

Stephen Downes

Knowledge, Learning, Community

Two things are true. First: " Facebook makes money, in other words, by profiling us and then selling our attention to advertisers, political actors and others. These are Facebook's true customers, whom it works hard to please." And second, "the same is true for the Times, along with every other publication that lives off adtech: tracking-based advertising." He then backs up this assertion with a detailed description of the tracking tools employed by news websites. Don't think for a minute that education is immune from this. You can't see the tracking tools in an LMS because the LMS is the tracking tool. Nothing prevents your educational institution (or the LMS vendor, if it's in the cloud) from packaging and selling detailed student data with the intent of, ultimately, influencing future behaviour. Which means, most likely, that this is exactly what's happening. As Ben Williamson writes, "the science of personality testing is slowly entering into education as a form of behavioural governance." 

Today: 0 Total: 23 [Direct link] [Share]


Stephen Downes Stephen Downes, Casselman, Canada
stephen@downes.ca

Copyright 2024
Last Updated: Dec 25, 2024 08:20 a.m.

Canadian Flag Creative Commons License.

Force:yes