I wanna know why I keep getting so much "christian dating" ads on my facebook/other sites i visit as well as tons of christian dating spam. I'm PAGAN. wtf internetz? I think some internet robot is trying to convert me.
Targeted advertising is one of my biggest internet hates. It really bugs me that websites are able to track what I've been looking at, and I don't mean just the naughty stuff. In my mind it's worse than email spam.
If you are using Internet Explorer go to Tools on your menu bar, click on Internet Options and Delete Cookies and History. This will usually help eliminate all of the unwanted ads.
Get the HOSTS file from this website: Blocking Unwanted Parasites with a Hosts File and learn about what it does as well as how to use it (you can skip straight to the download links near the "Donate" button to download it directly, as it comes with a Readme that will explain how to use it). It helps block essentially ALL of the banner ads and Google ads, as well as malicious websites. As for why you as a pagan get Christian dating ads, perhaps Christian dating sites deliberately target you because your Internet activity suggests that you're pagan.
Targeted advertising does fail pretty badly at times*, though when it comes to religion, it can be hard to tell what is intentional proselytizing, as Chouchou suggested, and what is a failed algorithm. I suspect that it's mostly just messed up algorithms. The browser sees you doing something related to religion, and, because most Americans are Christian, it assumes you're Christian. There wouldn't be a huge amount of pressure to change it, either. The non-religious, if not non-Christians in general, find it more amusing than anything else. *My favorite: This one dating site has ads all over the place for men seeking girlfriends. I know that they got my gender from the site (the browser thinks I'm male), so why didn't they also get my orientation?
Advertisements can be served based on your geographical location - does your area have a large Christian population? I haven't looked at the one they have available on that site, but a large hosts file will lead to slowdown as Windows must iterate through the entire thing for every outgoing request and attempt a match for the address. I add things to my hosts file manually when I need to, to keep it small.
Well better than getting links to male underwear sites like Aussiebu....wait never mind, that's a good thing
xD thanks guys. And if it was related to my location, i'd probably get more greek orthodox or jewish dating site ads if that were the case. Outside of my family I don't know a lot of christians.
