On Mon, 19 Oct 2015 09:29:38 -0400, "Mayayana"
wrote:

| Note how for the same watch, shop.com and overstock.com charge about
| twice what target, walmart, and top one charge. The first two
| pretend they're cheap, but only on a few things, I think.
|
| At least those are the places in my first line of "Sponsored" links.
| I'd be curious if other people have something different.
|
| https://www.google.com/search?q=Casi...utf-8&oe=utf-8

I took the unique string out of your link:

You're right. I didn't even think of that.

Wait. you also took out the watch model number. That's what yielded 5
sponsored ads, little ones side by side with pictures, for the same
model watch. The only thing you should have taken out is
&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8 and they both refer to character set, utf-8.
That's for how it's rendered back, isnt' it, not for what results it
shows.

https://www.google.com/search?q=Casio+Men%27s

The resulting page shows me 2 ad links, from
Sears and Overstock.com. If you allow any of
the numerous ways that Google tracks your
movements online then they know who you are

That's true. In this case, I don't think I've ever dealt online with
any of the five companies whose ads show, and I don't think I've ever
looked at any of their webpages except walmart (which is less than a
mile away, and the only place nearby with certain kinds of stuff, as
well as a 24-hour grocery store that otherwise I don't like much.)

OTOH, maybe I do other things that appeal to the 5 of them. Or maybe
I don't and the predominant thing is that they push this model watch.
So model is important.

and the returns are customized for you personally.
That can also apply to prices you see. If you don't
make efforts to maintain privacy then Google results
are of dubious value,

They are what they are. That's why I was interested in comparing
them.

as is their news.

AIUI, that's true, and that's a real problem.

It's all about
what they think is relevant to you. And the way
they define "relevant" is in terms of what will keep
you browsing, buying stuff and clicking ads. That's
likely to be combined with various parameters
chosen by the advertisers: Maybe I don't see
shop.com because they only want to pay for ads
seen by particular demographics and not any ads
seen by unknown visitors.

You have to do it again with the watch model included.

An interesting comparison might be to find a
youngish woman who does a lot of online shopping
and see what returns she gets.

I've forwarded this to, as you call it, "a youngish woman" who buys
shoes online, and sometimes granola and maybe she'll try the search at
the top and let me know. I'll report back.