Amazon currently has 48 patents, 13 of them related to assisting online consumers based upon stored personal information. Some assist shoppers in finding desired products; some suggest recommendations based upon similar items either purchased or of expressed interest (such as content selection on a web site); some assist completion of search queries.

Amazon's personalization technology is often based upon similarity - you liked this, you might enjoy something similar. Similarity personalization relies upon correlations made through user feedback or other means.

A bit more direct than Amazon's similarity technology is profiling personal preferences based upon metadata descriptors of content in which a consumer has expressed interest, either through purchase (money talks), or selection.

Microsoft is test-driving this technology on its MSNBC Newsbot site. Newsbot offers personalized news story recommendations based upon stories previously read. Newsbot is fed by collated news from Moreover. Moreover adds metadata descriptors to news content that its spider crawls collate, allowing filtering based on categories and attributes. Newsbot tracks the descriptors of news stories selected by a user to create a profile of user interests, and is thus able to make personalized recommendations of news stories. The convenience potential is pointing out articles of interest that might otherwise be overlooked, owing to the surfeit of online news content.

This metadata personalization technology is, of course, patented, though not by Microsoft. 6,606,102, owned by patent troll Abstract Property Management, covers personalization based upon metadata using categories and attributes which cut across categories. There are other patents of the same ilk, but less sophisticated in not appreciating the profiling power of combining categories and cross-category attributes.

ChoiceStream sells to companies, for incorporation into their web sites, personalization technology like that of Newsbot and 6,606,102. AOL is ChoiceStream's first and biggest customer. For reasons unknown, AOL has yet to take full advantage of personalization.

Compare online personalization to personal financial data pimps (PFDP), euphemistically termed "credit reporting agencies"; such companies as ChoicePoint and Equifax.

Online personalization offers direct convenience to the consumer, with little prospect of personal detriment. By contrast, "credit reporting agencies" offer the continual threat of identity theft and serious, grievous financial consequences, with no direct consumer benefit. Of course, the pimps would argue that their information lubricates commercial transactions for consumers. Consumers could rightly retort that they might prefer controlling their own financial lubrication, thank you. Insert your own simile here about these pimps and their lubrication.

Where's the hue and cry in the press about the Big Brother industry of PFDP? The invasion of privacy and potential for abuse never stops. Yet the press has been relatively mute. Some politicians have grunted, momentarily lifting their snouts from the trough of campaign contributions supplied by these financial barons. Money keeps the noise down.

In perspective, what the flak about online personalization technology amounts to can be summed in one word: pissant.