Big Brother 2.0

It might just be paranoia, but it seems eerily coincidental that facebook is catering its advertisements toward my stated interests and other demographic factors that I have listed on my profile.

I logged onto my account over the weekend to find the advertisements on the right hand of the screen to be of interest to me. This can’t be a coincidence. Ads for vacations, entertainment news and college programs recruiting students in my field of study, among others, seemed to be popping up every time I refreshed my page. I have also been searching for apartments recently, and conveniently, links to rental agencies are showing up all over the place.


What’s even more daunting, is that facebook, along with my mother, seem to want me to meet that ‘perfect someone’. It is likely a factor of my age, which is listed on my profile, but ads for lavalife and the like appear on my profile all the time. I already have my mother nagging me about my dating life, and I would prefer it if facebook would stop doing the same.


While this reeks of a giant facebook conspiracy, it is actually a brilliant marketing strategy on behalf of the organizations utilizing this social media site for advertising purposes. Facebook, addictive my nature, is a perfect place to reach a desired target audience by subliminally placing ads on an individual’s account. It is rare these days to come across a person who does not use this social networking site, presenting the perfect opportunity and venue for advertisements.

With the economy in the state it is in, commercials and billboards are not a priority for most marketing departments. Instead, organizations are seemingly looking towards public relations efforts and cheaper alternatives.

I’m not sure how much a facebook ad costs, but if I had to guess, it is probably significantly less expensive than securing ad space during prime time television.

As ingenious as this opportunity may be for those in the business world, I can’t help but feel that someone is on the other side of my computer screen watching my every online move. It seems weird to me that one day I am searching for cheap vacations and the next day ads of this nature are appearing on my facebook profile and my hotmail account is filled with “AMAZING TRAVEL OPPORTUNITIES!”

Can we cruise the Internet anonymously without being bombarded my last night’s click of the mouse? I’m starting to think not.