When "man" is not a "gender"

[benhamilton]

I found this interesting snippet on wired.

Microsoft's paid-search platform will provide detailed -- but not personally identifiable -- information, such as gender, age and location, for many people who use its search engine, allowing advertisers to target their ads to specific audiences.

For example, a car company could choose to have Microsoft (MSFT) display its sports car link when a man types in certain keywords,.....

Emphasis mine.

:-) This seems to be contradictory....

[edit]DOH! When I first read this, it looked like it was saying it wouldn't reveal the gender.... now I see that it's saying it will reveal gender etc, but not in a personally identifiable way... it pays to re-re-read.

Ben.

[brian.mark]

Since there aren't ever situations where 2 or more people share a computer, and it never happens that people borrow or buy someone else's computer, I'm sure it'll be 100% accurate on the gender of the person searching. I know that at my house everyone goes to the correct gender of computer when they want something...

Brian.