Top AAA online games have to budget HALF all their income on Advertising.
Sometimes that's a 1 with this many Zero's after it 00000000. or 1,000,000,000. think really big game company rhythms with Bony.
I didn't really realize it till people got concerned about a program called REDSHELL.DLL
I wanted to know what it was, and why it was needed.
I try to break it down here.

MOTHERBOARD ONLINE MAGAZINE reports:
Game Developers Dump 'Redshell' Tracking Program After Privacy Backlash
Developers of games like Total War and Civilization are apologizing and removing the software from their games.
Jun 18 2018, 8:25am

Personally it wasn't as big a deal as people made out.There are so many marketing ways to track consumers you probably don't even realize Your local grocery store keeps tabs on you.

Here is selection from MORRISON FOODS : "We know that an anonymised card number paid for a particular basket of groceries one week and how much was spent with the same card number the following week," says a Morrisons spokesperson. "It means we know when customers are lapsing because we won't see their card for a week. We use it to measure the effectiveness of promotions and events."

Supermarkets can use your card details to learn more about you.
When asked whether its customers give permission for their card numbers to be tracked in this way, the supermarket says customers "would only need to opt in" if Morrisons intended to send them any form of communication.

Maybe you didn't realize Your local T.V. provider can sell your browsing history.

Consider this:DirecTV combines data it collects from viewing habits from its customers’ digital video recorders with information from third-party market researchers in categories such as income, gender, age and buying habits. This is how it figures out how to send the right ad to the person on the other end of the pitch.
“We can target based on demographics, household income, geo-targeting, home owners versus rental - a wide variety,” said Paul Guyardo, chief revenue and marketing officer for DirecTV.

Did you know the following information about you is accessible by your service provider at any time.
All unencrypted IP packets: the addresses in the header, and the data payload.
All unencrypted E-mails that are ever stored at their E-mail server.
All unencrypted files you store in their web server (or "Cloud Storage" service). All encrypted files to which they have the encryption key.
All IP Addresses you exchange traffic with, without exception (these cannot be encrypted because they are used to route the traffic and thus are subject to Traffic Analysis). This can be slightly mitigated with use of Virtual Private Networks, but that still will not mask how much data you’re moving, or when you’re moving it.
All E-mail addresses for correspondence you send/receive through their SMTP (E-mail) servers (as with IP addresses, these are used to route E-mail messages and must be unencrypted). Also subject to Traffic Analysis.
All Domain Name System queries you make through their DNS name servers.

If you stop and think about it The Marketing companies were trying to be helpful to you. "Hey We notice you like to call your Pizza in around 7 p.m. Friday evenings...We special offer yada yada yada just for you..."

You know what THE BIGGEST COST for a game is, hell any business...ADVERTISING.
If I told you "HALF the budget for an online internet game goes just in Advertising." 9 figures in top AAA games. Would you consider they could save a HUGE amount money if they knew which adds actually work? They wouldn't have to spend so much in areas that offer no return. They could narrow down a lot of wasted money, if they just knew a way to find out what you might want in the future.
Hence a tool that's been around longer most you been on Earth called "MIDDLEMAN"
That's just another person with their hand out trying just make an honest living keeping a notebook about what other people are up to.

REDSHELL could've saved gamers and and game makers millions, the only mistake was not telling those on the targeted end that we would like to peruse your purchasing history of OUR PRODUCTS to better allocate The funds we use to know what to continue to make and what not to make.It all stayed in house, What gaming company wants to give up what you might like to buy?

Lets look at the World as a Whole and in closing You might find this amusing and less threatening to Your Information comfort zone.

You read in The Headlines one day a Foreign country has accessed your banks information and may have targeted your account. You know stealing from a bank that way is a one time gig...If you just want to know what everyone over there is buying, You could build a factory way ahead everyone else and start supplying the goods before other nations realize the potential.Think of the savings, no guessing where to invest when starting up that company, Heck its a blank check.
That how valuable your spending habits are. Your actually money is safe that's not their agenda. They just want to know more then the other guy, and offer You The Thing You exactly wanted for along time...before you even realize you need it.

Bottom line? Someday not too far in the Future... a Game that's a must have and if you don't have it your loser, The Game decides You can join, but here is what We need you to agree to...and from there depending on how bad you wanna play that game, you will be willing to put on clown shoes, ride a unicycle, and call yourself MARY! Just so you can have that game.
They all ready got your attention focused to their world the size of hand held phone. VR and real time heart rate monitoring, instant brain wave mapping, and soon You won't even need a cord to plug in any more, all you need is a little chip behind your ear, and you take your gaming anywhere.