Targeted Ads (2002)
And if you use the internet today, you’re bound to be on the receiving end of targeted advertising. Web browsers, like Chrome, use so-called “cookies,” which track the sites you visit and then curate advertisements you see when you visit other sites. That’s why those shoes you looked at one time on Zappos are cropping up in the ads you see as you read a news story on MSN. Creepy, huh?
But years before this practice was ubiquitous, it was seen as a frightful yet inevitable outcome of the technological age. For example, 2002’s fear-tinged Minority Report features personalized advertisements in droves. And while there aren’t yet holograms involved, as there were for Tom Cruise’s character, it seems we’re not too far off from that reality as well.
