Yahoo debuts Ad Interest Manager. How many people will ever use it?
Yahoo debuts Ad Interest Manager. How many people will ever use it?
This morning, web portal Yahoo unwrapped a new tool that lets users of the site select whether they do or don’t want to see advertisements lumped into each of seven major categories. Yahoo Ad Interest Manager, as its called, seems like a privacy pundit’s delight. But in reality, it seems more of a tool for attracting goodwill to Yahoo than for revolutionizing online advertising.
Ad Interest Manager is simple: By default, all users are opted into the system, with all seven categories set to ON. Those who learn about the tool and venture to its control panel page find this explanation of what it does:
To make our ads more relevant and useful for you, we make educated guesses about your interests based on your activity on Yahoo!’s sites and services. Some of the ads we show you reflect these interests. You can opt out of interest-based advertising altogether using the tools on this page.
Users can click one button to opt out of the system entirely. Or they can click ON or OFF for each of the interest manager’s seven ad categories:
- Entertainment > Games
- Entertainment > Games > Platforms (a platform is, for example, PlayStation 3)
- Finance > Consumer Credit Info
- General Health
- Life Stages > Education > College and University
- Travel
- Travel > Destinations > North America > United States (for example, the state of Arizona’s tourism campaign)
Ideologically, the Ad Interest Manager is a respectable attempt to lower Yahoo customers’ frustrations with ads they don’t even want to see, and to give those who consider the Internet one big invasion of privacy a chance to opt out from being tracked, at least for Yahoo ad categories. I’m also sure it’s being hawked to advertisers as proof that on Yahoo, people have clicked ON to prove they want to see clients’ ads.
But realistically, what fraction of Yahoo users will ever learn about Ad Interest Manager’s existence, let alone find and use it?
Professional pundits are skeptical about Yahoo’s motives. Boomtown editor Kara Swisher thinks the tool’s launch is timed to a Federal Trade Commission meeting on privacy this morning. PC World Columnist and business consultant David Coursey says it’s “more confusing than helpful,” saying the vague, incomplete control it offers makes him “wonder what the value of this new page is really supposed to be, besides placating government regulators.”
Notably, I haven’t been able to find any tweets from non-journalists who’ve actually tried Yahoo Ad Interest Manager and have an opinion on it. That usually means it won’t catch on either now or later. If you’ve got a take, tweet it to me @paulboutin.
