Stop Tracking Me!

In this day and age, the media often portrays Internet advertising in a very negative light. One of the leading online advertisers is Google with their Adwords and Adense programs. I recently had the opportunity to ask a Google employee how they felt about concerns with online privacy loudly voiced by media. More specifically, I brought up an article in the Wall Street Journal I had recently read that described the “No Tracking Button”.

Here’s the article at a glance:

• Online companies agreeing to adopt the button.
• Some companies who’ve had past privacy slip ups, including Facebook.
• A few web browsers have already installed a No Tracking Button on their browser. Mozilla Firefox was the first adopter of the button.
• Currently, some advertisers and tracking companies have not yet agreed to honor the system
• The rest of the article pretty much details an alliance that universalizes the tracking button, so it will be affective.

I pretty much asked the employee if he believes the No Tracking Button will change Google’s online advertising, which accounts for 99% of their profits. First, he suggested that the media, like it often does, blows the whole Internet privacy thing out of the water. In fact, he stated that very few people would actually use the button. He compared it to people in Switzerland and how they reacted to a questionnaire asking them if they’d want to stop phonebooks from being sent to them. And even though they are one of the most ecofriendly countries in the world, the response rate was less than 7%. He believes that the No Tracking Button will have a similar story. However, the article included a poll asking whether you would use a No Tracking Button or not. Overwhelmingly, the votes were about 90% in favor of using the button.

Additionally, he compared it to taxes. Virtually all of Google’s products are free; they make their money via online advertising. Likewise, many of the government’s “free” services, such as education and roads need to be paid for by taxes. If people did adapt the No Track Button, then Google may be forced to start charging for their products. I believe this will completely change Google. And as we’ve recently seen in our case studies, when companies totally change, they can fall apart.

What do you guys think? Do you think most people will use the No Tracking Button? I personally don’t get freaked out when I see advertisements that are obviously targeted towards me. However, I know a lot of people who do, including my younger brother.

So if people do begin to use the No Track Button, how do you think this will affect Google? Do you think they’ll continue to innovate and be the leader in their field? If they do change, will they pivot completely and fall apart such as Snapple did in our recent case study?