A Modest Cookies Proposal

Assert your property rights. Don't let anybody steal valuable information about your browsing behavior. Make them pay for it, like me.

By David DeJean Desktop Pipeline

So many PC users, fearful of the invasion of their privacy, have begun routinely deleting cookies and spyware that companies that make money from tracking Web users' online behavior are trying to stop it. An ad industry group is being formed to clean up cookies' image, and the story covering the announcement reported that 58 percent of Internet users have deleted cookies, and 39 percent do it on a monthly basis, according to JupiterResearch.

This can seriously undermine website operators' ability to measure consumer behavior on their sites, according to the research firm. And you know what that means: sooner or later the advertising industry will do what the recording and film industries have done: they'll go to Washington and buy favorable legislation, and we'll be forbidden by law to delete cookies.

My thought is, why should all that money go into the pockets of politicians? Why shouldn't I get some, too? So I hereby serve public notice of the following:

Whereas my browsing behavior and any information about it are of obvious value to many individuals and companies, they are therefore declared to be proprietary intellectual property, not only in the future, but all the way back to the first time I used a Web browser. (If J.D. Salinger can use the copyright laws to prohibit publication of letters he wrote years before without notice of restriction, then I can do the same for my Web browsing.) If your Web site places, or has caused to be placed, a cookie on my PC and you or your company uses this cookie, data about its placement, or data subsequently collected about its existence, you are in violation of my property rights.

However, this proprietary information is for sale. If your company desires to place cookies on my PC and track my behavior online, a schedule of fees and related service charges for storage and retrieval of the cookie data is available upon request. (Spyware -- including, but not limited to, home page redirection, "toolbars," keyloggers, and rootkits -- carries substantial additional charges. Please contact me directly to discuss your application and the percentage of your company's assets that would be required as down-payment.)

Because my Web-surfing activity stretches back to 1995, many companies have already incurred substantial liabilities. Companies wishing to know whether they have outstanding balances due to me may determine their status from the indexes of cookies maintained on my various PCs and laptops. I offer part of the "A" listings below as a free sample. The entire index is, of course, proprietary, and information about its contents is available for a fee. I am currently running an introductory special offer on this information and the related outstanding balances, so if you think your company might have planted a cookie on me, you could save substantially if you act now, before you are contacted by my lawyers:

pc@247realmedia[2].txt
pc@a.websponsors[2].txt
pc@acvs.mediaonenetwork[1].txt
pc@ad.reunion[1].txt
pc@ad.yieldmanager[2].txt
pc@adcentriconline[2].txt
pc@adinterax[1].txt
pc@adopt.specificclick[2].txt
pc@adrevolver[2].txt
pc@ads.addynamix[1].txt
pc@ads.as4x.tmcs[2].txt
pc@ads.businessweek[1].txt
pc@ads.monster[2].txt
pc@ads.pointroll[2].txt
pc@ads.vnuemedia[2].txt
pc@adsfac[2].txt
pc@adtech[2].txt
pc@advertising[2].txt
pc@allrecipes[1].txt
pc@alternet[2].txt
pc@amazon.co[2].txt
pc@amazon[2].txt
pc@ancestry[2].txt
pc@apple[1].txt
pc@archiver.rootsweb[1].txt
pc@ardownload.adobe[1].txt
pc@ask[2].txt
pc@atdmt[1].txt
pc@atwola[2].txt
pc@audiencematch[1].txt
pc@austin360[1].txt