Lost Art of Mystery

Every morning, first thing, she checked her emails. Mostly a force of habit from a past life, yet a comforting ritual of sorts. Her inbox hadn’t been very interesting lately, typically loaded with daily horoscopes, health newsletters and an assortment of sales ads. Over time, she’d slowed down on using social media because of the proliferation of targeted ads that seem, well, obviously directed to someone of her “age”, her “marital status’ and her overall “assumed” background. She started to not only decline the ads, but flag them as “inappropriate”. As a joke, she began “liking” odd posts and random products that were all over the place and geared towards every other demographic but hers.

Over time, her algorithm changed.

These days her inbox is infiltrated with ads offering up foreign brides to lonely middle aged American men. There are tons of Turkish plastic surgery deals with a focus on hair implants, as well as quite a few discounted orthopedic slippers. Occasionally, she gets an invitation to test drive the latest luxury car. She’s had offers for time shares in Dubai, and real estate on the French Riviera. Mostly, she receives a lot of literature on erectile dysfunction products, along with life insurance offers and a plethora of all inclusive funerary service, cremation and cemetery packages.

Algorithm ~ a hidden system used by an online platform (such as a social media, streaming, or retail site) to curate content for each user based on the user’s behavior, profile, etc