Nope-- Thats all I get both on Trains and Classic-- Kalmbach Ads, nothing else. So don't feel like the Lone Ranger.
Me, too. I guess I shouldn't even post on this topic, because I get no ads at all on this site other than for Kalmbach products.
York1 John
Perhaps the weirdest thing is that the ads I see depend on the computer browser I'm using. Mostly rail-related, now with the Kalmbach pop-up and e-mail blasts to keep the presumed 'fan connection' alive, but ... nothing extraneous on the Mac systems at home, lots of women's suggestive wear on the old Mac at the office (and all of it not showing the faces, something I don't care for), and the oddest combination of things on the 'loaner' systems up here: I just saw one for Kinder Joy candy, of all things! So it's without a doubt that they're using a quirky and clever algorithm to serve these ads ... perhaps more quirky and clever than they realize.
Quirky and clever is tolerable. As long as it doesn't get kinky.
Well, I'm glad others are not bothered by ads that have no relation to railroading. I was wondering, especially since fairly recently someone who had not done much posting accused me of being privileged, and I could not imagine why I was so accused.
Johnny
Flintlock76As long as the political comment is railroad-related, and everyone stays respectful of others opinions, that is, you can challenge someone's opinion
I think you may be overlooking the personal biases of the people most prone to (ab)use the "report" feature. Granted, it was much worse back when we had member-moderators. But it still goes on.
No ads whatsoever here, except for the invitations to subscribe to the magazine, or order special issues"
Not overlooking anything C-O. All I can do is offer advice, advice that I personally follow. If some here want to get glandular there's not much you or I can do about it.
"There's nought so queer as folk!" as the old British saying goes.
There is one thing on the various Kalmbach Forums I look into that annoys me a bit. That's the guy who asks a question, gets numerous answers, but doesn't have the courtesy to say "Thank you" to all the respondants. Although honestly I don't lose any sleep over it.
Deggesty Well, I'm glad others are not bothered by aads that have no relation to railroading. I was wondering, especially since fairly recently someone who had not done much posting accused me of being privileged, and I could not imagine why I was so accused.
Well, I'm glad others are not bothered by aads that have no relation to railroading. I was wondering, especially since fairly recently someone who had not done much posting accused me of being privileged, and I could not imagine why I was so accused.
It's that very distinguished looking beard you've got Johnny! It makes you look like a Scottish lord!
Wayne
Flintlock76There is one thing on the various Kalmbach Forums I look into that annoys me a bit. That's the guy who asks a question, gets numerous answers, but doesn't have the courtesy to say "Thank you" to all the respondants. Although honestly I don't lose any sleep over it.
It's not unique to these fora. As you say, somebody comes in with a question and that's the last you ever hear from them. Many times their post count is in the single digits. Makes one wonder if they just wandered in, asked their question, then forgot where they asked it...
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
Larry, we just have to acknowledge that some people are ungracious. Did they have no instruction in courtesy towards other people--especially when they receive help? To me, when you receive an answer, especially when it corrects something you said, it is right and proper to thank the one who answered.
Flintlock76 Deggesty Well, I'm glad others are not bothered by aads that have no relation to railroading. I was wondering, especially since fairly recently someone who had not done much posting accused me of being privileged, and I could not imagine why I was so accused. It's that very distinguished looking beard you've got Johnny! It makes you look like a Scottish lord! Wayne
Here's a fascinating, and perhaps sobering, observation:
I just spent a few minutes discussing the Foxconn water diversion, which came up in a thread referencing 'pipeline replacement' trains and coal-slurry pipelines. I made and then edited a post with reference to using a pipeline to restore water to the lake from one or more of the water utility's treatment plants to balance the draw. At which point I look over and see pipeline-specific ads being served to me.
Now, while I do have some interest in pipelines and their technology, I am not, shall we say, someone who'll agitate Kalmbach into articles on modern pipelining in Trains. So it stands to reason that some part of the ad-serving engine is either reading posts or referencing what is being typed into posts, and perhaps even retaining this (probably relatively short-term) in order to serve more 'contextually-relevant content' (I'll be happy to unwind buzzwords for those with actual interest). That's clever, but it'd be pretty spooky too.
We might watch a little more carefully to see what the 'causal connections' for some of the apparently-strange things that show up might be.
OvermodHere's a fascinating, and perhaps sobering, observation: I just spent a few minutes discussing the Foxconn water diversion, which came up in a thread referencing 'pipeline replacement' trains and coal-slurry pipelines. I made and then edited a post with reference to using a pipeline to restore water to the lake from one or more of the water utility's treatment plants to balance the draw. At which point I look over and see pipeline-specific ads being served to me. Now, while I do have some interest in pipelines and their technology, I am not, shall we say, someone who'll agitate Kalmbach into articles on modern pipelining in Trains. So it stands to reason that some part of the ad-serving engine is either reading posts or referencing what is being typed into posts, and perhaps even retaining this (probably relatively short-term) in order to serve more 'contextually-relevant content' (I'll be happy to unwind buzzwords for those with actual interest). That's clever, but it'd be pretty spooky too. We might watch a little more carefully to see what the 'causal connections' for some of the apparently-strange things that show up might be.
Also be careful of what searches for products you do on the net - you will get ads targeting the kinds of items you did your searches on - even after you have actually purchased one of those items.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
BaltACDAlso be careful of what searches for products you do on the net - you will get ads targeting the kinds of items you did your searches on - even after you have actually purchased one of those items.
Especially after you have actually purchased one of those items -- the 'connected environment' now knowing that you actually spent money based on a particular constellation of associated advertising.
Part of the reason the EFF and similar organizations so dislike the idea of 'Big Data' for advertising and promotion is that it involves the retention of so much about your implicit search and purchasing practices. It was bad enough when reasonably accurate -- the emerging problem now is that every click to every site, whether or not a casual surf or a mistake, may be logged and shared from 'profile' to 'profile'. One of the sequels to 'doxxing' and e-mail fragging in the Internet-annoyance world, in fact, is to use browser or credentials hijacking to access various kinds of sites that will hopelessly confound 'personal identity' beyond the ability of any tools, and likely any applicable legislation, to unwind.
I have all my tracking carefully monitored, and all the options to disable new tracking activated. That doesn't necessarily affect either unwitting 'opt-ins' (and we may be talking about extremely sophistic 'Philadelphia lawyer' wording in those user agreements, sometimes in surprising places) or shared clickstreams on advertisements.
Moral of the story: if you want to avoid problems with 'searches from the Web' for commercial things ... do them from a 'burner' account on some sort of public machine, don't use your real name, and don't actually order anything online from an advertisement unless you approve of the company's entire policy regarding customer data and lists ... including what happens in bankruptcy.
DeggestyWayne, if you misbehaved, you might be in a firestorm worse than those in California?
Isn't he married to one?
Yes, I knew Wayne is married to a Firestorm--and he replied that the result would be worse than all the infernos produced in Worl;d War II put together.
.
Well, I'm glad that you shared that with me (us).
One of the things that I find irritating is when someone starts a thread about X, and other posters start a round robin complaining that they don't think that posts about X are allowed here. Sometimes a half dozen times or so.
If "X" bothers them, then why do they keep opening the thread time and again? Don't they have the freedom to NOT open that thread? Of course they do, but avoiding a topic they find distasteful is not their true motive. Controlling what others are allowed to discuss is their true motive, which is why they find abusing the "report" feature so intoxicating.
Not pointing fingers at you C-O, I like your posts, you're one of the good guys as far as I'm concerned.
As far as other threads are concerned, if they don't interest me I just don't look at 'em. If they turn into whizzin' contests I definately don't get involved. Life's too short to get wrapped up in peoples "Derangement Syndromes" of any kind on any subject. I'm here for fun and to maybe, just maybe, learn a little something.
Thanks a lot, Wayne. You had to mention Forever 21 in one of your posts, didn't you? And I participated in that thread ... and am seeing Forever 21 ads now.
I've never had a thing to do with them; my wife or my daughter wouldn't be caught dead in Forever 21 (either the store or the fashion); now that the chain is going under, perhaps they'll never be. But here come the ads...
I also mentioned White Castle; can that be why I'm getting 'slider' Hefty bag ads? This is as bad as the context engine that assigns background images to those time-wasting subreddit agony videos on YouTube...
Talk about scary:
A few months ago, it was reported that home cameras are able to distinguish T-Shirt logos and offer ads based on them.
This came up after a person reported they had worn a rock band t-shirt in their house, and shortly after there were ads appearing on their phone that mentioned that rock band.
Don't know how accurate that is, but I wouldn't doubt it after reading some comments here.
The most common occurances I experience is with things that I shop for on Amazon. Those items and ones very similar seem to follow me around for days after. Not here though. Not sure if the "wish list" feature over there is a component or not.
Mod-man, now you're getting "Forever 21" ads? Oh well, jus do what I do and enjoy the scenery.
By the way, Lady Firestorm wouldn't be caught dead in their either! Even if she was young enough for those fashions they just wouldn't suit her tastes.
On Amazon, you can scroll down the page to where it shows the latest things you have viewed... there is a link at the top of that area that allows you to edit the list. I regularly remove things that I was just curious about or accidently clicked, but have NO intention to ever buy anything like it, so I don't get advertising for them from Amazon. I do keep things in the list that I have an interest in and might want to purchase similar items in the future.
Also, Google search keeps track of what you have searched for, and often you get some unintended meanings to words you used. Thus you start seeing advertisments for those "other" things. Search for "bar-b-que Chicken breast recipes" and you might get advertisments for bras and human breast implants.
My advice is to stop using Google or Bing... There is another search engine that "CLAIMS" that they do not track your searches. Go to www . DuckDuckGo . com (I put spaces in there to keep the words from becoming a link in this forum). It is very similar to Google or Bing and I think just as good (or better).
Another thing you can do is run your browser in "InPrivate" or 'Incognito" mode. This will make the browser, when it terminates, delete cookies and other files that get written to your computer when you visit web sites. There are some sites that deliberately will not work if you access them in the InPrivate/Incognito mode and those sites I avoid if I can.
Another thing you can do is delete the Cookies that web sites write to your computer. Often one web site can read another web site's cookie(s) and thus see what that site stored on your computer, including the name of the site you visited. There are programs that will delete these cookies off your computer.
Personally, I use "CCleaner" (yes there are 2 "C"'s at the beginning) from Piriform Software (see: www . ccleaner . com). There is a free version of this program. It provides a way to set some cookies aside to not be deleted, but will get rid of all the rest. If you do not change the default selections it has, I have found it to be a very benign program, but usefull to clean up my PC of junk files, and just as importantly, remove the tracking cookies. I run this program at least once per day, when I shut down my PC for the day, and more often if I have been surfing a while and have visited sites (newspapers, magazines, blogs, social media, etc.) I don't ever intend to visit again that had advertising that is outside the realm I want to be associated with.
You do need to understand that often these cookies are where a site keeps track of whether you are logged-in to that site. You go to the site, log-in and check the little box to remain logged-in. Then when you shut the computer off or terminate the browser, that cookie is still there. The next time you run the browser and go to that website, the first thing it does is check to see if the cookie is there. If it is, then it automatically logs you in again. The web site did not remember you, your computer did! If you delete that cookie, then the next time you go to that site, you will have to remember your log-in ID and Password... it can be painful to suddenly have to remember those things, so be careful what cookies you have a program delete!
Semper Vaporo
Pkgs.
Semper VaporoPersonally, I use "CCleaner" (yes there are 2 "C"'s at the beginning) from Piriform Software (see: www . ccleaner . com). There is a free version of this program. It provides a way to set some cookies aside to not be deleted, but will get rid of all the rest.
I'm a big believer in CCleaner also. My only gripe is that it always deletes the theme I use in my Chrome browser. Chrome, for whatever reason, seems to load multimedia intensive sites faster than the other browsers I use....so I continue to use it.
Overmod Here's a fascinating, and perhaps sobering, observation: I just spent a few minutes discussing the Foxconn water diversion, which came up in a thread referencing 'pipeline replacement' trains and coal-slurry pipelines. I made and then edited a post with reference to using a pipeline to restore water to the lake from one or more of the water utility's treatment plants to balance the draw. At which point I look over and see pipeline-specific ads being served to me. Now, while I do have some interest in pipelines and their technology, I am not, shall we say, someone who'll agitate Kalmbach into articles on modern pipelining in Trains. So it stands to reason that some part of the ad-serving engine is either reading posts or referencing what is being typed into posts, and perhaps even retaining this (probably relatively short-term) in order to serve more 'contextually-relevant content' (I'll be happy to unwind buzzwords for those with actual interest). That's clever, but it'd be pretty spooky too. We might watch a little more carefully to see what the 'causal connections' for some of the apparently-strange things that show up might be.
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
BaltACD Also be careful of what searches for products you do on the net - you will get ads targeting the kinds of items you did your searches on - even after you have actually purchased one of those items.
When all's said and done I really don't mind the pop-ups all that much. I mean somebody has to foot the bill for all this. I subscribe to "Trains," "Classic Trains," and "Classic Toy Trains" but I'd probably draw the line if I had to pay for Forum use as well.
There is one news site I look into from time to time that only gives you ten free article reads a month unless you subscribe to the site. Considering the amount of pop-up ads I get blitzed with every time I visit that site I think they've got a hell of a lot of nerve. You damn near can't see the articles anyway on account of all the pop-ups!
Possibly this has something to do with the poutine discussion, but I just had an ad for something out of relative left field that I've never heard of, from a part of the world I don't recall ever going to ... but I think ought to be encouraged.
https://www.orbakers.com
They get points for advertising to Kalmbach communities, and I don't mind helping their stats a bit.
I use Chrome on both my Android phone and Windows laptop computer. No ads, ever, except for K-bach stuff now and then.
Murphy Siding BaltACD Also be careful of what searches for products you do on the net - you will get ads targeting the kinds of items you did your searches on - even after you have actually purchased one of those items. My wife has an estate sale business. She researches a lot of odd things on our home computer. The ads we get are sometimes waaaay out there.
My wife has an estate sale business. She researches a lot of odd things on our home computer. The ads we get are sometimes waaaay out there.
Norris: I for one appreciate your problem...My wife 'stages' houses in the local market... { I'm the resident 'slepper' }. She is constantly 'Searching' sites for ideas, and stuff to use in her work. All sorts of adds drift into sites around here.
Overmod, got me to investigate the search engine 'Opera' to resolve my problems with "Firefox" and the Forum website. So far, his advise seems to be spot-on! Still working with it, and the 'd.duck-go" for search...May resolve the addvertisement thingy as well (? ) I'm still working with my 'training wheels on' at least so far it seems to be working.....Just sign me ' woke up ' in Kansas.
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