I don't know if you have noticed this, but the targeted ads on Facebook are getting ridiculous.

I am all for them making money, but it seems every ad on there lately is:

a) Stupid and useless to me (ie: not at all relevant or targeted)

b) Using the worst kind of scummy ad techniques

Listen, I am not against Facebook making money. I love Facebook, and they should make millions from that idea. But I also prefer the ads I see to be more subtle AND useful. The idea behind targeted ads is that advertisers know I am a male, late 30's, make a decent income, married, etc. etc. And so they show me golf club ads. Gadget ads. Car ads. You know, THINGS I ACTALLY MIGHT LIKE. Targeted advertising is great on paper.

Instead, Facebook delivers me this:

ARE YOU 35-39 YEARS OLD?

Really? Really? Come on, really? That's the STUPIDEST thing I've ever seen. And if the "tagline" wasn't the worst kind of targeted ad I can imagine, the product itself - free samples? So you want to trick me into giving over my name address and income data for no gain?

I am an adult male with disposable income. SELL ME SOMETHING. I want to buy it. I spend hundreds or thousands of dollars a year on stuff I really didn't need. And with all this demographic information you have on me, the best the computational algorythm can come up with is... free samples?

I'll just refresh the page here. Get a new ad...

What's the problem? Why won't they advertise good things to me? Why is it always dumb stuff?