The combination of 5 sponsored links that Gmail just showed me seems to have been selected to tell me once and for all that They got me all figured out. Seriously, none of those ads are really on target, but the did get the breadth down: one in Portuguese, one in Russian, three in English, one about travel, one about bibliography, one about IBCs (no, I don’t have an IBC, but I did do a search on this a few months ago). And of course my wife’s name everywhere.

Speaking of them knowing. I started discussing a book with a friend and the next thing we know is he starts getting spam in Russian. Coincidence? Well, my brother-in-law started getting Russian spam a week after our wedding. Seriously, THEY know. That’s what I wrote to my friend. He replied: “Quite good: CT on the web and it’s using our messages to redirect russian spam do my account – obviously Google is part of it, as IT belongs to THEM, or at least collaborates with THEM.” Except, THEY don’t even need to read your mail. THEY just know.