&gt;<i>Yes, your intuition derived from a single anomalous data point (yourself) is definitely more accurate than the companies which have seen demonstrable success from targeted advertising.</i><p>&quot;Single anomalous data point&quot;? His description is exactly how targeted advertising works for pretty much everybody. He&#x27;s not some weirdo outlier -- we&#x27;re all show the same things we&#x27;ve bought and tangential things to our searches with the stupidest ad AI.<p>He might be wrong that &quot;it doesn&#x27;t work&quot; (e.g. doesn&#x27;t pay since it&#x27;s crude), and probably he is, since so many businesses follow it, but he&#x27;s totally right in that it&#x27;s crude and far less effective than its potential effectiveness.