How I missed this gimmick, I don't know. Last month, to highlight the issues of personal privacy and the juxtapositioning of micromarketing and intrusiveness, Reason magazine mailed out every copy of the June issue with a photo of the recipient's house circled on the cover. For 40,000 readers.

David Carr

[from Putting 40,000 Readers, One By One, On The Cover]

In some respects, Reason's cover stunt is less Big Brother than one more demonstration that micromarketing is here to stay. "My son gets sports catalogs where his name is imprinted on the jerseys that are on the cover," Mr. Rotenberg said. "He thinks that's very cool."

In his editor's note describing the magazine's database package, Mr. Gillispie left open three spots - commuting time, educational attainment and percentage of children living with grandparents - so he could adapt his message to individual readers. Mr. Gillespie said that the parlor trick could have profound implications as database and printing capabilities grow.

"What if you received a magazine that only had stories and ads that you were interested in and pertained to you?" he asked. "That would be a magazine that everyone would want to read."

This is likely to creep people out, rather than getting all excited about how neat the technology is, just like the response when you show someone their house mapped at Google just from their phone number (see When You Put Things Together, They Are Changed).

[pointer from Keith Hampton]