I'm not only getting the Scrivener ad on the Community page again, but now I'm getting one that is definitely targetted at me ...advertisements for a cottage in County Longford in Ireland ...where I'm going next spring. I've been interacting with a site we're booking a cottage with, and now its adverts are on the Writers' Forum, in the upper-right-hand corner of the Community page? How is that happening?
That is the power of cookies. Adsense checks your cookies, or the record of sites you've been to stored on your computer, and then uses it to target ads at you. I have gotten ads that are local to my zipcode before... it's kinda freaky, but it is the nature of the internet beast....
A lot of sites use google ads, which are customizable based on where you've been. If I've shopped online, or looked at something on an online store, that item will show up on this site and others for weeks. (And if you do online research for a story, especially if it's in any way sexual in nature, you can get really weird ads for several weeks.) The ad that's currently showing for me is of a broadway play I looked up last week. I actually don't mind it because it reminds me that I'm interested in seeing the play, and I can remember the name. If I head over to zappos or something, it will change.
Yeah, I get the same stuff on many other sites. But for some reason, I thought this was banned from Writer's Forum. Ach well. No big deal. But I do remember people (@Cogito in particular) mentioning Scrivener - which is at least writing-related - appearing in that spot on the page. I thought that had been sorted as well.
