APML stands for attention profile mark-up language, and it’s being dubbed as one of the next big things on the net. Attention data is all the stuff that you spend your time on whilst surfing around the internets, i.
e. your interests, your likes, and your hobbies; with APML you’d be able to share your attention profile with advertising companies and marketers, thus enabling you to gain control over your info. You’d be given more filtering power, thus making it easier for you to select what you want to be known about yourself. As deep, behavior analyzing adverts become more popular, APML should be embraced as it gives consumers a mantle of protection over their private and sacrosanct data. Advertisers wouldn’t have to do so much snooping as it were, and it’d be much easier for them to sell you stuff. Of course, APML may not go over so well with consumers, what with questions of efficiency, privacy, and the sheer amount of work involved. Currently you can see APML at work on Engagd, Particls and Clutzr among others.
APML.org In Their Own Words
“APML allows users to share their own personal Attention Profile in much the same way that OPML allows the exchange of reading lists between News Readers. The idea is to compress all forms of Attention Data into a portable file format containing a description of ranked user interests.”
Why APML.org It Might Be A Killer
APML seems like a lesser of two evils. Basically, the way advertising is developing, consumers need a service like this. This gives them a handle on their private info. Rather than having marketers uncover your interests using various and somewhat nefarious methods, APML sounds like a godsend. It gives consumers a sense of privacy again.
Some Questions About APML.org
Really how much control will consumers have? What about acceptance—most likely consumers will feel uneasy about this, it’s not exactly something they’re going to be happy to do. If this depends on content creators and their ability to categorize and tag, some useful and relevant blogs, etc may be missed due to poor tagging. 
