TL;DR: Reddit is removing the option to opt out of ad personalization, targeting ads based on user activity. Some specific ad categories can still be limited, but there’s no more opt-out option.
TL;DR: Reddit is removing the option to opt out of ad personalization, targeting ads based on user activity. Some specific ad categories can still be limited, but there’s no more opt-out option.
For those who are paranoid about this - some of you have a Facebook account, and half of you have a Google-filled smartphone. Privacy is important, but IMO there should be a balance between convenience and privacy - unless you actually do stuff that requires the utmost privacy or you need to stay fully anonymous everywhere as much as possible.
Division of identity - that is, having unique profiles/identities for different types of things you do on the web, using alias emails and anonymous email for certain things etc. - is a more viable strategy than trying to be 100% anonymous on the web.
Commercial social media that is free does and will track your activity on the site, whether for personalized ads or for algorithm purposes. Lemmy and Mastodon don’t because they’re FOSS, and don’t run on ads (99.9% of the time).
I don’t think many people have an issue with this. It’s all the bullshit they pull to track you off the site that is the problem, and they do a lot of that.
Edit: and the selling of that information to third parties that you would never consent to. That’s also a huge issue.
Apple is not considerably better for privacy either by rhe way. They just pay more for marketing that says they’re more private than the rest of big tech.