Search Insider:In the advertising world, the perfectly targeted ad channel is pure gold. A channel that allows advertisers to identify and reach the perfect customer can charge a premium for its inventory, because it offers the promise of incredible ROI.That’s always been the premise behind search: keywords help advertisers locate the right customers at the right times, and so advertisers will pay top dollar for them. And it’s the same premise, many experts say, that’s driving Google’s efforts at building up histories of users’ activities: the better picture Google can build of a particular user’s search behavior, the more targeted Google can make its advertising. And more targeted means more lucrative.The same thinking holds for Google and DoubleClick. DoubleClick, which has access to user behavior across huge portions of the Internet, could allow Google to create a still more precise picture of its users — and deliver still more targeted, and more expensive (but also more effective) advertising.

If the assumptions here are correct, then we’re looking at an attempt on Google’s part to create highly precise profiles of millions of people — and that’s a privacy dilemma. But on the flip side, the more money there is to be made in online services and information, the more incentive the online service providers have to work harder at driving eyeballs toward their ads. To drive those eyeballs, the services need to constantly improve their free offerings (like Google Search). That, in turn, means that the very forces that may be undermining our privacy are the forces that drive stunning advancement in the free Internet, improving our online lives.

And that’s the crux of the question our society faces now. Assuming that our privacy fears are real, then how willing are we to trade at least some of our privacy in exchange for a better, free online experience? >Read More

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