Prof Mireille Hildebrandt will give a Public Lecture for the 25th Anniversary of TILT on 12th November 2019 on Why micro targeting does not work and nevertheless disrupts the public sphere.
In this public lecture she will argue that micro targeting based on behavioural data does not work as professed, while causing turbulence in the public sphere. The ineffectiveness of behavioural micro targeting will be explained based on the kind of feedback loops apparent in the Campbell and Goodhart effects. Moreover, she will address the pitfalls of the behaviourism that informs data-driven micro targeting, taking note that - quoting Hannah Arendt - the point is not whether behaviourism is true, but that it might become true.