Thrid Party Sharing, Cookies and Internet Martketing, Oh My!

Hello readers, in this post we are going to talk about the internet marketing, cookies and having your information shared with another party. Most of us would know that the internet has become a useful tool that most of us take advantage of every day. In the mid nineties to present we saw the dot com boom and the exponential growth of the internet. Now more than ever e-commerce has really began to shape the way we buy products, sites such amazon sell us goods at a much lower price by eliminating much of the retail infrastructure. We all really enjoy this, but at the same time it is not a perfect model. Much of your buying habits and information is tracked to: up-sell, cross-sell, and market new products towards you. With your information being shared is it very fair?  A thought I would like to add is the possibility of having an option to share information voluntarily. And if shared possibly receive a compensation (i.e. discounts, percentage of information shared, etc...) Feel free to share if you would do so.

How about cookies? Ah yes, we all love cookies, especially chocolate chip! No, not those cookies. Cookies are small file added onto your computer to monitor your spending habits, sites you visit, and other pertinent information relevant to the businesses. They tend to sometimes have a negative connotation, but they are not solely bad. Like anything thing else they can be abused and misused, on the other hand they can be very helpful. One helpful use is that they, help make the website personal to your own tastes and preferences. So how does it pertain to privacy? When a cookie is place on your computer your are free to delete them, but there is never any permission asked when they are place on your computer, once again is that crossing boundaries?

Last I want to talk about Internet marketing. With most the world switching to computers, it is important for businesses to reach the people in way that is beneficial, because most traditional forms are fading. Is Internet marketing turning into to too much spam? I read an article that deals with the ethics of spam and cookies. The article goes into the discussion about what are some ethical issues being crossed via spam and cookies. The writers doesn't so argue one side or the other, but mearly raises deeper questions. How do the readers feel about spam, or pop-ups that will not go away unless the computer is shut down feel free to share.

Works Cited

Palmer, Daniel E. "Pop-Ups, Cookies, And Spam: Toward A Deeper Analysis Of The Ethical Significance Of Internet Marketing Practices." Journal Of Business Ethics 58.1 (2005): 271-280. JSTOR Arts & Sciences VI. Web. 6 Nov. 2011.