Many years ago. I think it was like 2016-17 ish. I interviewed at a university for a grad program that’s basically “psychology -engineering”.
Designing things to work with human psychology.
Aka human factors psychology
(I ended up doing a different degree).
During this interview thing. I was there 2 days. It’s like an event. You meet professors and tour labs. See what other grads are working on and you have lunch and dinner with current grads and professors.
So a professor was talking about developing tech to do eye tracking on phones. So they could see what you were looking at on the screen and for how long.
Now at this time I knew a little bit about eye tracking methods. Firstly I pointed out that it would be impossible for it to be very accurate without stabilizing the head (as is done in research), usually with a chin mount that holds the head still.
But the guy said it didn’t need to be that accurate as the intent was marketing. See what items people look at when scrolling on shopping apps/sites. And see how long they look at it.
I also pointed out that this was highly unethical because it’s using physiological data to manipulate someone into spending money. Indiscriminately.
I said
What about people with a shopping addiction.? Or kids using their parents credit cards. And you would be using this data to psychologically manipulate people for purchases but the data could be used in all sorts of other ways that really even more unethical.
The idea was that if someone showed interest by looking at an item longer then that item would be presented again by the app. Multiple times even. To encourage purchase.
Or to show items that were similar to try to seal the deal with what the person was finding appealing.
Possibly with price alterations to encourage purchase.
When I said again that this was obviously unethical. As a scientist our goal should not be to manipulate the public I was told “someone’s going to do it, it might as well be us so we get paid for it”.
I was very surprised that this came with chuckles and agreement from other students.
Another professor I talked to about her work was investigating devices that could help people drive who were hearing impaired. So it was quite the contrast.
I did not get offered a PhD position but they did offer me admission to their masters program that was 50k a year. Near D.C. 2 year program. (Combo positiond are typically “free” in a manner of speaking. Highly competitive but that’s how it’s done). I wasn’t interested in paying them 200k for a master’s (after taking loans for living expenses too).
I also learned later they don’t even have masters/PhD program combos. Which is what it said on their website and I specifically applied to that. They also gave me a 2 week notice for the interview.
You ever buy a plane ticket 2 weeks ahead? $$$$$
They didn’t reimburse me for that either. Which is customary for these interview invites.
Typically travel and lodging is covered by the university. They had me stay in some graduates house. They had like 6 roommates.
I also pointed out that this was highly unethical because it’s using physiological data to manipulate someone into spending money. Indiscriminately.
I said What about people with a shopping addiction.? Or kids using their parents credit cards. And you would be using this data to psychologically manipulate people for purchases but the data could be used in all sorts of other ways that really even more unethical.
marketing is highly unethical in general. however, your points are kinda invalid. sure, children can use their parents’ credit cards, but they can also burn the money with a lighter. children can do stupid things, and ideally such a purchase would be illegal and the parents eligible for a refund. or you would need a password to authenticate etc.
however what is a real problem is that advertisement poisons our environment. when you step out on the street, there’s ads everywhere. you can’t go anywhere where there’s no ads. the consequence is that your head is trapped in an eternal cobweb of “consume, consume, consume”. you must consume, there is nothing else to do. that is the true horror that modern marketing has brought to us. psychologically hacking the brain to make us think about buying stuff all the time.
What you describe is being used by now. The permanent eye-tracking got low-level support on Snapdragon SoCs by 2023 (Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, “Sensing Hub”), the Honor Magic 6 phone advertised itself as able to “open apps by looking at them”; those desperate fucks really tried to sell this as a good thing to users. Though even this article eventually spilled the beans:
“Content Personalization: Adapt news feeds based on the focus and duration of your gaze.”
They want you to think this is a good thing, but it’s clearly dystopian. And already 3 years old, so by now they certainly found even more ways to make everyone miserable & manipulated.
The Google Assistant famously still listened to the microphone and uploaded data even if you tried to stop it, so I genuinely always recommend everyone to either flash your phone with GrapheneOS, CalyxOS, /e/OS or iodéOS immediately or throw it away. Modern mainline phones are a health hazard.
actually, what i’ve learned is that some people (probably the majority?) actually like being shown ads. that is, i believe, because many people have no inherent purpose of life. so they need to be told why they exist by someone else (“you must consume” is the message of ads. it gives people a purpose in life).
Yeah I keep a piece of tape over my front camera on my phone.
A strip. Because there are usually other cameras you can’t see. Idk which they use but yeah. This tech was already in development 10 years ago. It definitely is common on most phones and apps by now.
Greed. Lack of ethics.
Many years ago. I think it was like 2016-17 ish. I interviewed at a university for a grad program that’s basically “psychology -engineering”. Designing things to work with human psychology. Aka human factors psychology
(I ended up doing a different degree).
During this interview thing. I was there 2 days. It’s like an event. You meet professors and tour labs. See what other grads are working on and you have lunch and dinner with current grads and professors.
So a professor was talking about developing tech to do eye tracking on phones. So they could see what you were looking at on the screen and for how long.
Now at this time I knew a little bit about eye tracking methods. Firstly I pointed out that it would be impossible for it to be very accurate without stabilizing the head (as is done in research), usually with a chin mount that holds the head still. But the guy said it didn’t need to be that accurate as the intent was marketing. See what items people look at when scrolling on shopping apps/sites. And see how long they look at it.
I also pointed out that this was highly unethical because it’s using physiological data to manipulate someone into spending money. Indiscriminately.
I said What about people with a shopping addiction.? Or kids using their parents credit cards. And you would be using this data to psychologically manipulate people for purchases but the data could be used in all sorts of other ways that really even more unethical.
The idea was that if someone showed interest by looking at an item longer then that item would be presented again by the app. Multiple times even. To encourage purchase.
Or to show items that were similar to try to seal the deal with what the person was finding appealing.
Possibly with price alterations to encourage purchase.
When I said again that this was obviously unethical. As a scientist our goal should not be to manipulate the public I was told “someone’s going to do it, it might as well be us so we get paid for it”.
I was very surprised that this came with chuckles and agreement from other students.
Another professor I talked to about her work was investigating devices that could help people drive who were hearing impaired. So it was quite the contrast.
I did not get offered a PhD position but they did offer me admission to their masters program that was 50k a year. Near D.C. 2 year program. (Combo positiond are typically “free” in a manner of speaking. Highly competitive but that’s how it’s done). I wasn’t interested in paying them 200k for a master’s (after taking loans for living expenses too).
I also learned later they don’t even have masters/PhD program combos. Which is what it said on their website and I specifically applied to that. They also gave me a 2 week notice for the interview.
You ever buy a plane ticket 2 weeks ahead? $$$$$
They didn’t reimburse me for that either. Which is customary for these interview invites. Typically travel and lodging is covered by the university. They had me stay in some graduates house. They had like 6 roommates.
Cheap-ass, greedy, no ethics, bastards.
GMU
marketing is highly unethical in general. however, your points are kinda invalid. sure, children can use their parents’ credit cards, but they can also burn the money with a lighter. children can do stupid things, and ideally such a purchase would be illegal and the parents eligible for a refund. or you would need a password to authenticate etc.
however what is a real problem is that advertisement poisons our environment. when you step out on the street, there’s ads everywhere. you can’t go anywhere where there’s no ads. the consequence is that your head is trapped in an eternal cobweb of “consume, consume, consume”. you must consume, there is nothing else to do. that is the true horror that modern marketing has brought to us. psychologically hacking the brain to make us think about buying stuff all the time.
Well at least I am pretty sure corruption in academia never had any long-term consequences for the population! /s
What you describe is being used by now. The permanent eye-tracking got low-level support on Snapdragon SoCs by 2023 (Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, “Sensing Hub”), the Honor Magic 6 phone advertised itself as able to “open apps by looking at them”; those desperate fucks really tried to sell this as a good thing to users. Though even this article eventually spilled the beans:
“Content Personalization: Adapt news feeds based on the focus and duration of your gaze.”
They want you to think this is a good thing, but it’s clearly dystopian. And already 3 years old, so by now they certainly found even more ways to make everyone miserable & manipulated.
The Google Assistant famously still listened to the microphone and uploaded data even if you tried to stop it, so I genuinely always recommend everyone to either flash your phone with GrapheneOS, CalyxOS, /e/OS or iodéOS immediately or throw it away. Modern mainline phones are a health hazard.
actually, what i’ve learned is that some people (probably the majority?) actually like being shown ads. that is, i believe, because many people have no inherent purpose of life. so they need to be told why they exist by someone else (“you must consume” is the message of ads. it gives people a purpose in life).
Yeah I keep a piece of tape over my front camera on my phone.
A strip. Because there are usually other cameras you can’t see. Idk which they use but yeah. This tech was already in development 10 years ago. It definitely is common on most phones and apps by now.