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Comment by masswerk | Hacker News Reader

> To sway European public opinion, however, the European Commission went even further. X’s Transparency Report shows that the European Commission also used ‘microtargeting’ to ensure that the ads did not appear to people who care about privacy (…) and eurosceptics

Independently of the broader privacy and surveillance topic, this is highly concerning: if institutions, like the EC, start to run agendas through and by carefully created echo chambers and keep certain segments of the demographic out of the loop, all is lost, as there is no common and public realm of political discourse anymore.

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Holy crap that's pretty much evil scheming right there. Digital gerrymandering?

Let's put it this ways: if policymakers are allowed to think that certain elements should not be represented in the political process and/or should be just overwhelmed by a broad wave welcoming the agenda, we're deep into the root causes of what haunted Europe in the 1930s.

If only for this reason, we must stop targeted advertising and messaging, before it is too late. Because, for a minimal social and political alignment, everybody must be allowed to be informed of what is on the market, that of goods and that of ideas. Modern democracy is built on mass media and communications and not on in-group messaging and arbitrage deals. (At least, in the more idealistic and not-entirely-cynical version of the narrative.)

Targeted advertising isn't the problem.

Governmental organisations buying advertisement is the real culprit. They would find a way to do it even without targeted advertising, so let's cut it out completely.

I think, targeted advertising is the major (and single) incentive for what we have become to call echo chambers. Governmental institutions eventually chiming in into what is looking more and more like the predominant mode of discourse is just a consequence.

There are many more ways of targeting advertisement than just paying for it directly. That's why we just need to ban all governmental advertising.

For example:

- buying space only in some paper/digital magazines and customizing the message for each of them

- placing posters only in some locations, e.g. capital city areas with significant universities, or business parks predominantly used by organizations funded by the EU

- sending letters to selected people

...

if i want to buy slippers and i get shown slipper ads, that’s great.

but we’re not discussing slippers. we’re discussing democracy. the EU should be forbidden from targeted advertising because of their democratic mandate.

And who provided those tools? Twitter? So nothing new to see here, only that is not just right wing populists doing it (which is for some reason completely fine on Twitter nowadays).

>Independently of the broader privacy and surveillance topic, this is highly concerning: if institutions, like the EC, start to run agendas through and by carefully created echo chambers and keep certain segments of the demographic out of the loop, all is lost, as there is no common and public realm of political discourse anymore.

It's especially annoying since many people who vote in the EU are a bit more... extreme? Like when you're marketing to "Beligum" or "NL" whatever... the people who've been there multiple generations are the right wing parties.

The folks obeying the spirit of the laws are like the students in America, oft not registered locally.

It's a feedback loop of the same sort who Brexited being sent other things in their feeds.

I agree with the author:

>If there is insufficient support for a proposed legislation, the only proper democratic response is to withdraw it

I'm tired of this fraternity brother model of public policy -- ask until you hear the "yes" you wanted from those who didn't block you from being heard at all.

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