Ced0540: Week Four Reflection

This week's tasks had us researching Bill Tancer and his Hitwise company of collecting and analyzing data from Internet users. I am always amazed at the inventors of the world, and I would easily put Tancer in that category. I wish I had that thing in my brain that enabled me to think creatively and use my talents to create a niche for others. I have always considered myself more mechanical and so generating new ideas is difficult for me. I'm great at "borrowing" the ideas of others and then tweaking them to my needs. Perhaps that's one reason of many why I'll never make my millions in the world.

Bill Tancer's company provides an excellent service for those industries who rely heavily on the Internet to generate revenue. What a great population to monitor, and as I've mentioned in our Week Four assignments, the data is already there. It just needs to be organized. I never before thought about how the search habits of consumers tell so much about them and how predictable they are based on their search habits. It's also a bit scary that our search habits are being that closely followed and monitored. Perhaps we all have to just get used to this notion. For example, whenever I run to Pick n Save and purchase something, I'm automatically given coupons based upon my purchases. On the one hand it's convenient, but on the other, it makes me wonder what kind of data is being collected on my Pick n Save card. I have those same feelings when it comes to my Internet usage. If enough data on me is collected, how will that effect me down the road? It sounds rather paranoid, but if the government someday started watching as well, what decisions might it make based upon this data? I hate to even think about that without drawing obvious comparisons to Huxley's 1932 novel, Brave New World .