What's in a Number?

[kmo]

In recent conversations, I've been returning to the idea that Facebook and social media generally are driving us insane. Social media, and Facebook in particular are certainly useful. I went to my 30-year high school reunion last year, and Facebook played a major role in shaping that gathering. The Friends of the C-Realm group on Facebook puts me

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[peristaltor]

Based on their posture, their facial expressions, their gate and even their smell, we can not only determine their mood and disposition, but we have a very good idea of what they're feeling.

Another aspect of social media that I feel is being neglected is (of course) advertising. Ads used to be cooler conversation material, stuff that would be discussed along with "the game," one of the bigger network productions, or any of the other limited phenomena accessible to all.

Now that we have admissions of psychometric ads being used in the last election, ads disseminated to FB users based on an assessment of their personality types, we have ads that, unlike ads of the past, fit with a person's perspective of the world.

Meaning they are not visible to just anyone. We have come to a world where people can simultaneously view a device and access/see content that no one else in their household or workplace can see.

Predictably, I have work conversations around "the cooler" that tend toward the bizarre, observations of (for one example) traffic that lead off toward wildly different conclusions about how that particular accident/snarl/design should be interpreted.

I've gotten pretty good at noticing AM radio memetic interference spitting out from people's mouths. But how am I am going to get ads targeted to such people, just so I can understand what they might be trying to say?