RJM62
Touchdown! Greaser!
- Joined
- Jun 15, 2007
- Messages
- 13,157
- Location
- Upstate New York
- Display Name
Display name:
Geek on the Hill
No, I don't want (or need) to do it. I'm just curious about how such a thing could be done.
Long story short, I was on another site that uses Amazon ads, and it was a format I haven't seen before. I think it's one of the beta ads they're letting publishers try out. (I'm a long-time Amazon Associate, so I'm aware of the beta ads, but haven't tried them yet.)
Anyway, this ad was for toner cartridges and a replacement fuser for my default printer, an old HP CLJ. The cartridges are in fact getting low, and I've been debating whether to replace them or replace the printer; but I haven't searched on it.
I wasn't logged into either my Amazon customer or Associate accounts, but I don't delete their cookies, so they could have known who I was. I've also printed numerous purchase pages from Amazon to use as receipts, always on the HP printer. So in theory, I suppose it's possible for Amazon to know what kind of printer I have. (I didn't buy the printer from Amazon, by the way.)
The only time I think I've ever made reference to the printer online was in a POA thread about printer recommendations. But POA doesn't have Amazon ads, so they would have no reason or mechanism to scrape the content as they do with their own contextual ads.
So I'm curious. I'm not especially creeped out by it, just curious. I'm not aware of any script that could determine what a person's default printer is and whether it needs toner; and certainly I don't know how I'd write one that would work quickly enough to render an ad based on that information.
Rich
Long story short, I was on another site that uses Amazon ads, and it was a format I haven't seen before. I think it's one of the beta ads they're letting publishers try out. (I'm a long-time Amazon Associate, so I'm aware of the beta ads, but haven't tried them yet.)
Anyway, this ad was for toner cartridges and a replacement fuser for my default printer, an old HP CLJ. The cartridges are in fact getting low, and I've been debating whether to replace them or replace the printer; but I haven't searched on it.
I wasn't logged into either my Amazon customer or Associate accounts, but I don't delete their cookies, so they could have known who I was. I've also printed numerous purchase pages from Amazon to use as receipts, always on the HP printer. So in theory, I suppose it's possible for Amazon to know what kind of printer I have. (I didn't buy the printer from Amazon, by the way.)
The only time I think I've ever made reference to the printer online was in a POA thread about printer recommendations. But POA doesn't have Amazon ads, so they would have no reason or mechanism to scrape the content as they do with their own contextual ads.
So I'm curious. I'm not especially creeped out by it, just curious. I'm not aware of any script that could determine what a person's default printer is and whether it needs toner; and certainly I don't know how I'd write one that would work quickly enough to render an ad based on that information.
Rich
