No, the cookies that I'm talking about are the fundamental layer to all web advertising. They get installed in your web browser pretty much every time you visit any site on this thing called the internet. Maybe you've heard of it. Those cookies either tell only that site (1st party cookies) or many other sites (3rd party cookies) where else you go on the web. That informs the ads that you're served on any given site. When you clear your cookies, the ad servers have no knowledge of what to give you - this is when I get hella ads for Viactiv...
These cookies aren't very good on mobile platforms because a lot of behavior is in app and not in browser. That means that all these ad-tech companies that are going public (click here for a sample) and otherwise raising a lot of money these days are running into monumental problems getting a complete picture of the person receiving their ads as user behavior shifts rapidly into mobile over desktop.
So Google, whose mission it is to collect and catalogue the entire world's information (Josh Gad's character in "The Internship" taught me that), might be taking a stab at replacing cookies. Given that it operates the OS and app store of choice for ~50% of the world's mobile community, it's got a pretty good platform from which to do so. They're also still trying to make G+ happen, but as a universal login as opposed to the destination site they initially tried with. Given the data I saw at numberFire, the G+ login is pretty compelling to users. Maybe even more so than Facebook Connect, which is used in 50+% of mobile apps. Granted, we had an 18-50 American male demo and not these tweens that are defining how tech will be used going forward, so I can't tell you definitively that all users prefer to login with G+ over Facebook Connect.
As this article says, if Google's able to replace cookies, they're not just going to be the biggest player at the ad buying poker table, they're going to be the casino which all other ad buyers depend on. In raising venture capital, you realize pretty quickly that investors want to be sold on this idea of how you become the platform for greater things. That's what F8 is for Facebook, same with Connect. Everyone wants to be electricity and not the light bulb because everyone needs electricity regardless of which brand of bulb, blender, computer, phone... they choose.
So, Google, in a precedented move of genius, can consolidate power and become the entire digital marketing ecosystem, allowing other companies to get some nutrients, but only enough to survive. So much more to say here from a privacy perspective, but later.
For now, let's realize that what Facebook was trying to do with Home is get all users' mobile behavior info. They failed. Apple might try too, but they're not nearly the competent software company that Google is - let's pour one out for our Apple Maps homie. So, Apple + Facebook partnership? Could make sense.
Finally, if the big 5 in tech include Google, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, and Twitter, where are Microsoft and Twitter in all of this? Because this is a big freaking deal.
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