Give Me Privacy Or Give Me Death

In the article “The Next Revolution in Advertising” I outlined how we can build a healthier and more equitable world with a revolution in advertising that fundamentally changes the relationship between people and business. The heart of this revolution lies in reconciling the conflict between personal privacy and relevancy.

The Nature Of Privacy

For advertising to be valuable, two components must be in place. First, the ads must have the opportunity to be seen or heard by people. Second, the ads must be relevant. The driving force behind collecting people’s personal data is to improve ad relevancy. However, personal data is only one aspect of how advertising affects a person’s privacy.

In advertising, any use of the term personal privacy must include two elements if it is to be accurate. First, there is the information or data associated with an individual that reveals their identity, needs or wants. The second element to privacy is the recognition that people are independent, sovereign conscious beings. It is this second part that illuminates the latent power of privacy to shield a person from being dominated by the views of others. When discussing the value or sacred nature of personal privacy, this component of the definition is often inexcusably overlooked.

What good is a right to privacy that doesn’t include some control over who can inject their speech into your life? Imagine that any ex-boyfriend or girlfriend had unlimited access to talk at you. Any time you were watching TV, listening to music, talking on the phone, reading an article, riding a bus, riding a train, riding a plane, taking a drive, going to school or visiting a public restroom. Is your only choice of privacy to avoid engaging with the world? Or imagine that instead of your ex, it was a political party. Imagine that every hour of the day, every day of the week, every ad you see during all activities in your life was from a political party, telling you what you must do to be a good party member.  What is the impact on those who are forced to listen? Yet this is exactly the access corporations have, and it grows more intrusive every day.

How Can You Build A Relationship Without Respecting Privacy?

 If advertising is to become a more effective tool for building the relationship between business and people, then it must address personal privacy in the context of both data collection and message delivery. There is a time and place to speak to a person, and there should be limits to that, no matter how good your intentions.  Very little relationship-building can take place when the people on the receiving end feel overwhelmed and taken advantage of due to the surreptitious collection of their personal information by middlemen.  

The current advertising system must be replaced by one that gives businesses unlimited opportunity to speak and that gives people the power to turn ads on and off in their life via the click of a button. What if, with one click, people could choose to launch an app containing ads that are only relevant to them? With another click a person could leave that conversation and be done with it. What if ads ceased to be necessary outside of this app?

What if we had a system in which each person has the power to choose what information they want to share with businesses to get more relevant ads? For providing their attention and data, ad recipients are compensated for every ad they receive. No longer would money for advertising flow to middlemen, but would directly benefit the individuals who participate in this more effective way of advertising.  Each month, people who participate receive a check for participating in a system of advertising that supports business and respects privacy.

We need more businesses to do well, so we can create more jobs.  We need a more cost-effective advertising system that helps more businesses grow and gives people greater choice.  If more businesses are competing for consumers’ attention, the number of ads will grow. The only way advertising can be more cost-effective while the number of ads rise is by dramatically improving relevancy. The current method of advertising can only achieve this at the expense of people and their privacy. This does not have to be the only choice. 

Competing Visions Of Privacy

There are two visions of the future. One vision is held by large, highly profitable companies who generate their wealth by “serving up” ads. These are the middlemen. They seek to persuade the public to give up their personal privacy for the benefit of more relevant ads. Their vision is supported by increasingly more powerful technology to capture our personal information and track our whereabouts so ads can be injected into every moment of our life. Theirs is a world of non-stop advertising where to get refuge we must hide under our bed, in a closet or run to the woods.

Today there exists a different option, one that puts people in control of their personal privacy so they can create the highest relevancy while fostering a respectful and sustainable relationship with business. This approach creates the economic incentive for people and businesses to talk directly, while strengthening individual privacy.

Until recently, only that first vision for advertising was possible. Today, you have the choice because of technology.  The only question is: do we have the courage and strength to modernize our thinking?

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Christopher Dailey is Founder & CEO of Cotonomy.com.