MicrosofMicrosofMicrosofMicrosoftttt’’’’s s s s ““““SSSSCROOGLED!CROOGLED!CROOGLED!CROOGLED!”””” campaign gains momentumcampaign gains momentumcampaign gains momentumcampaign gains momentum
Blog Post Date: February 25th, 2013
Category: Technology made easy
Author: Ulrika Hedlund
Source: http://www.businessproductivity.com/ microsofts-scroogled-campaign-gains-momentum
The past two weeks the media has been filled with articles about Microsoft’s “Scroogled!”
campaign where they accuse Google of invading people’s privacy with their targeted email
ads. In the campaign, Microsoft encourages users to switch over from Gmail to
Outlook.com. By going to the campaign site www.scroogled.com, users can sign a petition
addressed to Google’s Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt, saying, “Please stop reading the
contents of our Gmail to sell ads.” Some experts are saying that this negative campaign,
very common in politics, is hurting Microsoft and that the campaign isn’t gaining traction. In
this week’s article I wanted to give you a better overview of what the campaign is all about
and the current momentum.
An overview ofAn overview ofAn overview ofAn overview of tttthehehehe MicrosMicrosMicrosMicrosoftoftoftoft ““““ScroogledScroogledScroogledScroogled!!!!”””” ccccampaignampaignampaignampaignssss The first phase of the “Scroogled!” campaign was launched at the end of 2012. The
advertisements warned holiday shoppers that searching for products on Google Shopping
would not give you true results – instead of giving you the most relevant search results,
Google’s “pay-to-rank” practice would return products based on which advertiser paid
Google the most. Users were encouraged to switch to Bing that guaranteed true search
results.
The current and second “Scroogled!” campaign was launched February 6th, 2013. In this
wave of the campaign Microsoft encourages people to switch over from Google’s email
service Gmail to their own, newly launched
Outlook.com by informing people about the
privacy risks in Gmail. If you go to the
campaign site, you can read research results
about email privacy, compare Gmail and
Outlook.com and sign the petition. As part of
the campaign, a number of videos have been
posted, showing people who have gotten
their privacy intruded by Google. In one
video you will see an example of someone
who had written an email about their cat
dying where Google targets an ad about a
free pet exam coupon.
MiMiMiMissssleading leading leading leading messagingmessagingmessagingmessaging There are certain elements in the video advertisements that are a bit misleading. For
example, in the videos you can see humans (or cartoons of humans) reading through
personal emails sent to people using Gmail.
This is naturally not the case. Google does not have people employed to read through
customers’ email. They do however use a computer algorithm that scans for keywords in
the emails and Google uses those keywords, along with other information from your
account such as age and gender, to target ads.
GoogleGoogleGoogleGoogle’s response’s response’s response’s response and alternativesand alternativesand alternativesand alternatives Google has issued a statement (which is similar to the text on their support page about
Gmail) that no humans read people’s email:
"Advertising keeps Google and many of the websites and services Google offers free of
charge. We work hard to make sure that ads are safe, unobtrusive and relevant. No humans
read your email or Google Account information in order to show you advertisements or
related information. An automated algorithm – similar to that used for features like Priority
Inbox or spam filtering – determines which ads are shown,” read the statement from Google.
If you want to stop getting targeted ads you can use the HTML view of Gmail or you can
connect another email client to your Gmail account. Another alternative is to pay for an ad-
free Google Apps account for $50 a year.
The target of 100,000 signatures has been reachedThe target of 100,000 signatures has been reachedThe target of 100,000 signatures has been reachedThe target of 100,000 signatures has been reached On February 24th at 10.05 am, the petition against Google reached 100,000 signatures.
The petition, which was launched February 6th, was slow at first and many people doomed
it a failure, but in the past few days, as the campaign has been rolled out internationally,
the number of signatures has increased dramatically. The number of signatures at the end
of February 24th, was 103103103103,,,,874874874874, beating the petition goal of 100,000 signatures.
Is it really a big issue? Is it really a big issue? Is it really a big issue? Is it really a big issue? Some people have no issues with a computer algorithm going through their email; they
prefer to have ads relevant to them. Most email service providers have computer based
algorithms to scan email for keywords related to spam, so some people don’t think this is
very different. Many people however do not approve, and even though Google makes no
secret of their advertising mechanisms, many people are taken by surprise and they are
appalled with this revelation as evident by some of the comments from the people who
have signed the petition. I’m all for relevant advertising, but I believe that people should
have a choice in what information gets used to target those ads. Personally I don’t want my
personal email communication to be a source for advertising so I signed the petition.