Contact emails [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]
Explainer https://github.com/patcg-individual-drafts/topics Specification https://patcg-individual-drafts.github.io/topics/ Summary The intent of the Topics API is to provide callers (including third-party ad-tech or advertising providers on the page that run script) with coarse-grained advertising topics that the page visitor might currently be interested in for the purposes of advertising. These topics will supplement the contextual signals from the current page and can be combined to help find an appropriate advertisement for the visitor without the advertiser having to track the user’s detailed browsing history as is done with third-party cookies and fingerprinting today. Blink Component Blink>TopicsAPI <https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/list?q=component:Blink%3ETopicsAPI> TAG Review Early design review for the Topics API · Issue #726 <https://github.com/w3ctag/design-reviews/issues/726#issuecomment-1379908459> TAG review status Pending Risks Interoperability and Compatibility Gecko: Negative (https://github.com/mozilla/standards-positions/issues/622) WebKit: Negative (https://github.com/WebKit/standards-positions/issues/111 <https://github.com/WebKit/standards-positions/issues/111#issuecomment-1359609317> ) To reduce risk in the event that we later decide to replace this API with one that has more browser support, the API can be effectively disabled without breaking pages by rejecting the promise or returning empty lists of topics. Web developers: We’ve had significant OT participation <https://github.com/patcg-individual-drafts/topics/blob/main/topics-tester-list.md> and feedback in our periodic W3C PATCG calls <https://github.com/patcg-individual-drafts/topics/tree/24c87897e32974c1328b74438feb97bf2ec43375/meetings>, discussions on various GitHub issues <https://github.com/patcg-individual-drafts/topics/issues>, Chrome-facilitated office hours, discussion with industry trade groups representing a variety of stakeholder groups, and more. Some initial feedback on utility has been published by Criteo <https://medium.com/criteo-engineering/is-googles-topics-api-a-viable-replacement-for-interest-based-advertising-297076192bd>, Google Ads <https://github.com/google/ads-privacy/blob/master/Testing%20IBA%20with%20Privacy%20Preserving%20Signals.pdf> and Retargetly <https://retargetly.com/blog-en/a-brief-dive-into-retargetlys-experience-testing-googles-privacy-sandbox>. We recently announced <https://developer.chrome.com/blog/topics-enhancements/> upcoming improvements to utility (not API surface changing) based on that initial feedback. Activation Starting in August 2023, enrollment <https://developer.chrome.com/en/blog/announce-enrollment-privacy-sandbox/> will be required to use the API. This is not a compat risk in the sense that the API will simply reject for callers if they are not enrolled. Other signals: WebView application risks None Debuggability There is a useful internals page: chrome://topics-internals, which shows the user’s current topics, allows for querying the API’s classifier, and provides developer experimentation tooling. Will this feature be supported on all six Blink platforms (Windows, Mac, Linux, Chrome OS, Android, and Android WebView)? All but WebView Is this feature fully tested by web-platform-tests <https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromium/src/+/main/docs/testing/web_platform_tests.md> ? IDL surface is tested <https://wpt.fyi/results/browsing-topics?label=experimental&label=master&aligned>, the actual returned topics are not as they are browser dependent. Note for the failing tests: Chrome will roll out this feature via Chrome Variations <https://developer.chrome.com/docs/web-platform/chrome-variations/>, rather than enabling the runtime features <https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromium/src/+/HEAD/third_party/blink/renderer/platform/RuntimeEnabledFeatures.md> directly. This means related WPTs need to be virtual, and it isn't supported in wpt.fyi. Requires code in //chrome? No Launch bug https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=1286877 Anticipated spec changes As mentioned above, we anticipate changes to the classification model, the taxonomy, the top topics selection algorithm, and possibly some parameters in the future as we try to improve the API’s utility over time. The API already provides version numbers with each returned topic for each of these features, as changes of this nature were anticipated from the beginning. These changes will not break sites. Developers may need to retrain their models and adapt to the new underlying algorithms, so we will announce the changes via channels such as blink-dev FYI as well as on the various support mailing lists. Link to entry on the Chrome Platform Status https://chromestatus.com/feature/5680923054964736 Links to previous Intent discussions Intent to prototype: https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/g/blink-dev/c/59uTw_dxM3M/m/vF9lF9BVAgAJ Intent to experiment: https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/g/blink-dev/c/oTwd6VwCwqs/m/pk7JPbXLAQAJ Intent to extend origin trial: https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/g/blink-dev/c/SD8Ot2gpz4g/m/A9uA-_cGAwAJ https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/g/blink-dev/c/gpmaOi3of_w/m/SyMclFhMAAAJ https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/g/blink-dev/c/CBrV-2DrYFI/m/RTojC6kHAgAJ -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "blink-dev" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/d/msgid/blink-dev/CAANMuaNc94moaqPPWepai4THP1rOvXoxvixS%3Dostu2QGMLPtvA%40mail.gmail.com.
