READING REPORT 28


A company will monitor phone calls and devise ads to suit.
Source: http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/09/24/business/24adcol.php
Date of publication: September 24,2007


Vocabulary: 1- Toll: a charge for a service, such as a long-distance telephone call.
2- Trade-off: an exchange in which something desirable, as a benefit or advantage, is given up for another regarded as more desirable.
3- Doodle: to scribble aimlessly, especially when preoccupied.
4- Log: to enter into a computer the command to begin a session.
5- Wary: prudent, cautious.
6- Broadband: of or having a wide band of electromagnetic frequencies
7- Filter: To remove by passing through a filter.
8- Profanity: obscene or irreverent language.
9- Intelligence: the work of gathering secret information, espionage.
10- Start-up: are connected with beginning and developing a new business.

Main Ideas: - As Google scan their e-mail users’ in-boxes to deliver ads related to those messages a company is trying to do the same with phone conversations.
- The company will eavesdrop conversations in order to display ads on the screen that are related to the conversation.
- The way of receiving those ads will be by e-mail or on a person’s cell phone screen.
- This method is on the limit of the violation of privacy.
- For advertising companies this new technology is a great advantage but they are aware that they are getting more intrusive.
- The company will only use current phone calls and will not keep a record on old ones.
- The focus is put on young people who supposed to be less concerned with maintaining privacy.
- To be more accurate the company is interested on the age, sex native language of the users.
- The company’s software filters out explicit words in determining which ads to select.


Personal Reaction: The passing of time is bringing new technology, which is applied in every field of society. We can see this example of how technology is used to advertise through phone calls, which was previously done with e-mails. The negative point about this is that in order to be more accurate about the ads that they are sending the companies plan to eavesdrop private conversations. In this way, they will listen intimate subjects or anything that we are talking about. This kind of device is an option for users but maybe someday we wont have the chance of choosing to allow someone listening our conversations. E-mails are a proof that we can lose our right of privacy since anyone can have access to what we are sending and receiving.