A couple of things on here and my facebook have got me thinking, which are the best conspiracy bollocks you have heard recently?

I love this one as I work pretty much exclusively on 5G these days...

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10219870648422466&id=1408443354

 

13 minutes ago, Spider said:

You sound vaccinated

Haha that’s the usual reply or “how many jabs you on now” utter moonmen

34 minutes ago, royal white said:

Not a conspiracy as such but it’s all the conspiracy nuts that are posting on social media about this……self service checkouts. The melt down taking place by these cranks is on another scale. Also add the “cash only” crew literally dozens of groups naming and shaming businesses that only take cards .yes because the government really want to know what Tracey from Tonge Moor is spending her Giro on. 

Not a conspiracy and not for the government but using cards and loyalty schemes is hugely beneficial for the supermarkets and the credit card companies.

Its there to ensure they know what to stock and what prices in what regions and how to geotarget with offers to help you spend more money.

A thousand Tracey's from Tonge Moor is truly valuable. Data is the new oil and so its been proved.

We've happily given away so much information on ourselves, and a lot of it we don't really realise to the benefit of large commercial business - you have to decide if the trade off of points on your nectar card or discount promotions from using your CC is worth it. Personally I do, the genie is out of the bottle and I like my petrol coupons at Sainsburys.

Good read here: https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-12190197/Supermarket-loyalty-cards-big-discounts-expense-privacy.html

Also its good to know before you sign up to these and CCs which sell the data onto third party marketing companies.

6 minutes ago, Not in Crawley said:

Not a conspiracy and not for the government but using cards and loyalty schemes is hugely beneficial for the supermarkets and the credit card companies.

Its there to ensure they know what to stock and what prices in what regions and how to geotarget with offers to help you spend more money.

A thousand Tracey's from Tonge Moor is truly valuable. Data is the new oil and so its been proved.

We've happily given away so much information on ourselves, and a lot of it we don't really realise to the benefit of large commercial business - you have to decide if the trade off of points on your nectar card or discount promotions from using your CC is worth it. Personally I do, the genie is out of the bottle and I like my petrol coupons at Sainsburys.

Surely a barcode will cover that? 

21 minutes ago, Not in Crawley said:

Not a conspiracy and not for the government but using cards and loyalty schemes is hugely beneficial for the supermarkets and the credit card companies.

Its there to ensure they know what to stock and what prices in what regions and how to geotarget with offers to help you spend more money.

A thousand Tracey's from Tonge Moor is truly valuable. Data is the new oil and so its been proved.

We've happily given away so much information on ourselves, and a lot of it we don't really realise to the benefit of large commercial business - you have to decide if the trade off of points on your nectar card or discount promotions from using your CC is worth it. Personally I do, the genie is out of the bottle and I like my petrol coupons at Sainsburys.

Aye, though I think the paranoia is they think they're being specifically watched 

It's just data, it's nothing personal

I knew a lad who genuinely thought someone was manually checking his Google searches 

The same people probably don't realise their movements and actions are constantly checked all day every day by their mobile sending data off here there and everywhere 

3 minutes ago, Zico said:

Aye, though I think the paranoia is they think they're being specifically watched 

It's just data, it's nothing personal

I knew a lad who genuinely thought someone was manually checking his Google searches 

The same people probably don't realise their movements and actions are constantly checked all day every day by their mobile sending data off here there and everywhere 

Yep more this 

25 minutes ago, Not in Crawley said:

Good read here: https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-12190197/Supermarket-loyalty-cards-big-discounts-expense-privacy.html

Also its good to know before you sign up to these and CCs which sell the data onto third party marketing companies.

As long as they can't see my internet search history then I'm comfortable with this! 😁

Card only saves the big boys money and makes the banks even more. And everyone's spending is tracked.

It's a winner for them.

Not so much for small business and folk who simply want to spend cash.

A £10 house for me is no longer a £10 house if I take Card or bank payment. 

As ever the system will always favour the top end.

28 minutes ago, royal white said:

Surely a barcode will cover that? 

No, because it doesn't link the purchase to the person, they want to know if they push things at certain price points who is buying and where.

Sadly, its one of the biggest con tricks business ever pulled to get people to hand over data in exchange for ceratin discounts. And yes I'm afarid it is personal - as it links down to household level - certainly from Credit Cards, so yes the population is generally being tracked on trends, buying, credit scores etc etc so to not understand the granularity of  personal data does shows the level of naivety that the population overall has about this topic which in 2024 is worrying. What people have to do is remove this from the 'everyone is watching me' nut jobs.

But we've even invited tracking into our home with Alexia - it does track your purchases and sells onto third parties - its also how if we want to sell you products via Meta or Google - this is how we tag the audiences, and you go folk going oh I was talking about Garden hoses and then I got served some ads for it. No shit sherlock....

 

I mean, don't get me wrong is hugely useful - even in my industry we use big data all the time, most of it all given freely and linked back to household data from companies such as Experian, but as I say it can be helpeful to the consumer, my issue with it is that its always been opaque so people can get rich and I think it'd be good for people to know more about how they've given away their personal inofrmation and how it is then subsequantly used.

3 minutes ago, Not in Crawley said:

No, because it doesn't link the purchase to the person, they want to know if they push things at certain price points who is buying and where.

Sadly, its one of the biggest con tricks business ever pulled to get people to hand over data in exchange for ceratin discounts. And yes I'm afarid it is personal - as it links down to household level - certainly from Credit Cards, so yes the population is generally being tracked on trends, buying, credit scores etc etc so to not understand the granularity of  personal data does shows the level of naivety that the population overall has about this topic which in 2024 is worrying. What people have to do is remove this from the 'everyone is watching me' nut jobs.

But we've even invited tracking into our home with Alexia - it does track your purchases and sells onto third parties - its also how if we want to sell you products via Meta or Google - this is how we tag the audiences, and you go folk going oh I was talking about Garden hoses and then I got served some ads for it. No shit sherlock....

 

I mean, don't get me wrong is hugely useful - even in my industry we use big data all the time, most of it all given freely and linked back to household data from companies such as Experian, but as I say it can be helpeful to the consumer, my issue with it is that its always been opaque so people can get rich and I think it'd be good for people to know more about how they've given away their personal inofrmation and how it is then subsequantly used.

The club card is a choice though. I doubt those who are complaining about being tracked by the government and Bill Gates will be signing up for club cards. It’s against all they preach .

3 minutes ago, Not in Crawley said:

No, because it doesn't link the purchase to the person, they want to know if they push things at certain price points who is buying and where.

Sadly, its one of the biggest con tricks business ever pulled to get people to hand over data in exchange for ceratin discounts. And yes I'm afarid it is personal - as it links down to household level - certainly from Credit Cards, so yes the population is generally being tracked on trends, buying, credit scores etc etc so to not understand the granularity of  personal data does shows the level of naivety that the population overall has about this topic which in 2024 is worrying. What people have to do is remove this from the 'everyone is watching me' nut jobs.

But we've even invited tracking into our home with Alexia - it does track your purchases and sells onto third parties - its also how if we want to sell you products via Meta or Google - this is how we tag the audiences, and you go folk going oh I was talking about Garden hoses and then I got served some ads for it. No shit sherlock....

 

I mean, don't get me wrong is hugely useful - even in my industry we use big data all the time, most of it all given freely and linked back to household data from companies such as Experian, but as I say it can be helpeful to the consumer, my issue with it is that its always been opaque so people can get rich and I think it'd be good for people to know more about how they've given away their personal inofrmation and how it is then subsequantly used.

Again - I'm not really too concerned about any of this. I don't see what the problem is in targeting ads to me for products that I either need or am likely to be interested in buying. Rather that than having to sit through an advert for SAGA holidays. 

Incidentally - I've got £30 in my ASDA cashpot since opening a loyalty card with them in January. 

If that means I've got to sit through a few targeted ads on Facebook for mail order brides, KY Jelly and cucumbers then I think that's a fair price to pay. 

PS - although I wish they had a way of changing the adverts once I'd actually purchased said item.

PPS - was it hose you were talking about? Or Hos (in different area codes)?

1 minute ago, royal white said:

The club card is a choice though. I doubt those who are complaining about being tracked by the government and Bill Gates will be signing up for club cards. It’s against all they preach .

Thing is you mention Tracey spending her giro money....

Of course the authorities want to know what's she's spending on. If she's waxing £500 in Harvey Nicks and claiming only £150 a week pip then it will flag up.

There's a huge system called connect driven by HMRC for starters. Evem passport activity is linked to it.

 

Just now, royal white said:

The club card is a choice though. I doubt those who are complaining about being tracked by the government and Bill Gates will be signing up for club cards. It’s against all they preach .

They are all a choice. No one has to sign up to anything.

However, the point/issue is, because of the incentives offered, the way in which you can benefit with small savings (be under no illusion that the shops aren't making a loss on their Nectar Point/Club Card discounts) by signing up, the way that using cash in many places is now more difficult than using cards means people are corralled into using them by defacto marketing stealth - and many times people doing it and not even knowing (as this thread is sort of proving) without CC companies and big brands having to advertise what you are giving away and what they are going to use the data for.

9 minutes ago, kent_white said:

Again - I'm not really too concerned about any of this. I don't see what the problem is in targeting ads to me for products that I either need or am likely to be interested in buying. Rather that than having to sit through an advert for SAGA holidays. 

Incidentally - I've got £30 in my ASDA cashpot since opening a loyalty card with them in January. 

If that means I've got to sit through a few targeted ads on Facebook for mail order brides, KY Jelly and cucumbers then I think that's a fair price to pay. 

PS - although I wish they had a way of changing the adverts once I'd actually purchased said item.

PPS - was it hose you were talking about? Or Hos (in different area codes)?

And that's why they are genius - because everyone works on a personal level - taregted ads, price discounts etc thats all the benefits.

The issue comes when looking at it all as a whole rather than one postcode in BL1. That is worthless, but you get something out of it. But then add in all the BL1s and then all the other areas and you've then got a Big Data pot and what they do with that is the real problem. Push certain products for reasons beyond simply profit with certain lobby interests from certain suppliers? Sell onto Third parties? Who are the third parties?

Supermarkets need to tread carefully in using customer data, even when they have permission via loyalty schemes, as retail media expands its horizons. Supermarkets already offer “off site” advertising on the wider web to brands. The next frontier, something Ocado is exploring, is so-called non-endemic advertising, where supermarkets’ rich data sets are used to advertise products not sold by the grocers, such as cars, holidays or credit cards.

One question for investors is how much media profit is simply reinvested into competing on food. Another is how this affects supermarkets’ crucial (and sometimes fraught) relationships with suppliers. The line between traditional trade budgets, for product promotions, and newfangled retail media campaigns is currently murky. 

https://www.ft.com/content/26959b97-90ad-4bc1-b9df-1b7461ba71f9

 

 

 

12 minutes ago, Not in Crawley said:

They are all a choice. No one has to sign up to anything.

However, the point/issue is, because of the incentives offered, the way in which you can benefit with small savings (be under no illusion that the shops aren't making a loss on their Nectar Point/Club Card discounts) by signing up, the way that using cash in many places is now more difficult than using cards means people are corralled into using them by defacto marketing stealth - and many times people doing it and not even knowing (as this thread is sort of proving) without CC companies and big brands having to advertise what you are giving away and what they are going to use the data for.

Thats the point. Theyre being denied the choice of using money. 

This facial recognition shit is a bit Black Mirror.

methinks It could go wrong very quickly

9 minutes ago, royal white said:

Thats the point. Theyre being denied the choice of using money. 

Well, yes, quite that's one of the issues I was outlining that's its not all tin foil nutters - there are real questions that need to be asked of retailers and other Big Data companies.

1 hour ago, gonzo said:

Card only saves the big boys money and makes the banks even more. And everyone's spending is tracked.

It's a winner for them.

Not so much for small business and folk who simply want to spend cash.

A £10 house for me is no longer a £10 house if I take Card or bank payment. 

As ever the system will always favour the top end.

Get them to do a bank transfer. Costs nowt.

Wife pays our wheelie bin cleaner that way- he doesn't have to tromp around the streets for 3 quid or so per house.

3 hours ago, royal white said:

Not a conspiracy as such but it’s all the conspiracy nuts that are posting on social media about this……self service checkouts. The melt down taking place by these cranks is on another scale. Also add the “cash only” crew literally dozens of groups naming and shaming businesses that only take cards .yes because the government really want to know what Tracey from Tonge Moor is spending her Giro on. 

Not sure what the self-service till conspiracy is but, my take on the tills is that we shouldn't use them.

This enables supermarkets etc to make job cuts, putting more people out of work and the money saved isn't passed to the customer.

Same applies to those steak houses, where they ask you to cook your own meat on a fucking stone.

15 minutes ago, Tonge moor green jacket said:

Get them to do a bank transfer. Costs nowt.

Wife pays our wheelie bin cleaner that way- he doesn't have to tromp around the streets for 3 quid or so per house.

It doesn't cost nowt, but it's the most effective way. Bank transfer into a legitimate business account still attracts a small transaction charge.

Ours costs us 50p, but if you consider that on a £10k holiday, I might make £400-£500 profit pre-tax & NI, then 50p is fuck all. Consider when the client sticks it on a card and I get billed 1.2% ie £120, that can be 30% of my profit gone.

On self service tills there's amove back to moving to manned tills as people just prefer them and apparently self-service doesn't save a huge amount of time. 

I'd guess you'd see the higher end shops moving that way first. Waitrose usually only have a small number of self service anyway when I pop in for my free coffee on my waitrose card after getting petrol and sainbury's on my nectar and the weekly shop at Tescos on the club card 😁

1 hour ago, Not in Crawley said:

And that's why they are genius - because everyone works on a personal level - taregted ads, price discounts etc thats all the benefits.

The issue comes when looking at it all as a whole rather than one postcode in BL1. That is worthless, but you get something out of it. But then add in all the BL1s and then all the other areas and you've then got a Big Data pot and what they do with that is the real problem. Push certain products for reasons beyond simply profit with certain lobby interests from certain suppliers? Sell onto Third parties? Who are the third parties?

Supermarkets need to tread carefully in using customer data, even when they have permission via loyalty schemes, as retail media expands its horizons. Supermarkets already offer “off site” advertising on the wider web to brands. The next frontier, something Ocado is exploring, is so-called non-endemic advertising, where supermarkets’ rich data sets are used to advertise products not sold by the grocers, such as cars, holidays or credit cards.

One question for investors is how much media profit is simply reinvested into competing on food. Another is how this affects supermarkets’ crucial (and sometimes fraught) relationships with suppliers. The line between traditional trade budgets, for product promotions, and newfangled retail media campaigns is currently murky. 

https://www.ft.com/content/26959b97-90ad-4bc1-b9df-1b7461ba71f9

 

 

 

Again that's all very interesting, but I've got £30 in my cashpot 😁

1 hour ago, Tonge moor green jacket said:

Get them to do a bank transfer. Costs nowt.

Wife pays our wheelie bin cleaner that way- he doesn't have to tromp around the streets for 3 quid or so per house.

We pay our shiner by bank transfer, he doesn't take any cash or card payments

4 hours ago, royal white said:

Not a conspiracy as such but it’s all the conspiracy nuts that are posting on social media about this……self service checkouts. The melt down taking place by these cranks is on another scale. Also add the “cash only” crew literally dozens of groups naming and shaming businesses that only take cards .yes because the government really want to know what Tracey from Tonge Moor is spending her Giro on. 

They want to be able to control what Tracy is spending her Giro on.

So she will be blocked from buying beer and tabs but can buy fruit and veg,

1 hour ago, Tonge moor green jacket said:

Get them to do a bank transfer. Costs nowt.

Wife pays our wheelie bin cleaner that way- he doesn't have to tromp around the streets for 3 quid or so per house.

We do plenty.

Banks aren't free btw.

3 hours ago, gonzo said:

Thing is you mention Tracey spending her giro money....

Of course the authorities want to know what's she's spending on. If she's waxing £500 in Harvey Nicks and claiming only £150 a week pip then it will flag up.

There's a huge system called connect driven by HMRC for starters. Evem passport activity is linked to it.

 

Some one is Hanging Out The Back of TRACEY 

and Treating her to Harvey Nicks 

that's the way it  Works