Iger the Ignorant? Disney Chief Says Kids Don’t Care About Privacy?

July 24, 2009 Hey, kids, did you know the mouse house thinks it’s okay to mine your personal information and sell it to advertisers to make a buck off your back without your permission? Wonder what Maine legislators that just banned data mining of minors will say to that?  (h/t to Ypulse and Privo!) Reuters reports Disney CEO Robert Iger is bullish on direct web … [Read more...]

Raising Girls Amidst Meat Marketing: Carls Jr., Burger King Raunch

Jan. 27, 2015 Update:  It's achingly sad that I can reprise my own prose about "meat marketing" women with gobsmacking sexualization and objectification commodifying bodies as edible objects to be consumed, but alas Carl's Jr. is using the same stale crass-en masse trash for outrage baiting buzz in 2015 as they did five years ago.Guess they're consistent in their sexist tripe, … [Read more...]

Privo Privacy Vault: How Safe is Kids Digital Data? Part 2

July 14, 2009 Yesterday in my Part One preamble to the interview with Privo executives, I tried to give an overview of how 'kids online safety' is more than 'balancing safety and fun' it's politics, it's opportunistic marketing, it's regulatory, and...it's complicated. With dogged tenacity here's my attempt to sort out how to keep kids safe online (for parents, as well as … [Read more...]

Keeping Kids Safe From Predators (er, Marketers) Part One

July 13, 2009 Since researcher Sara M. Grimes opened up the conversation on data mining and privacy practices for us, I’d like to keep the focus on this important topic for a sec, because I DO believe we can use media and marketing to impact kids in favorable ways, and have founded our entire organization on that premise to sift out the sludge and elevate the possibility. … [Read more...]

Digital Data Mining 101: Echometrix Takes Kids’ Pulse

July 8, 2009 Still focused on "child predator" panic on the internet? I'd focus more on white collar stalkers like Echometrix, ubiquitous in far greater numbers, if I were you. Imagine digital tracking of every pop culture cue and kids' conversation in "real time" mode, self-described in their Echometrix blog as "opinion mining and sentiment analysis," to tap the "$190 billion … [Read more...]