Authors Prahalad and Krishnan refer to it as N=1 -- customer intimacy at the individual consumer level -- and it's a founding principle of the New Age Of Innovation. But a new Harris Interactive poll suggests a majority of U.S. consumers might have a ways to go before they're comfortable with that level of intimacy.

How intimate is too intimate? In a survey of 2,513 U.S. adults conducted online between March 11 and 18, Harris Interactive found that a majority of respondents are skeptical about Web sites using information about their online activities to customize advertising or Web site content.

A six in 10 majority (59%) are not comfortable when websites like Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft (MSN) use information about a person's online activity to tailor advertisements or content based on a person's hobbies or interests. A quarter (25%) is not at all comfortable and 34% are not very comfortable.

Of those on the comfortable side of customized content, only 7% were "very comfortable," and 34% "somewhat comfortable."

As might be expected, comfort level with customized content varied by age: 49% of Echo Boomers (18-31) put themselves in the comfortable camp, while only 45% of Gen-Xers (32-43) did, 34% of Baby Boomers (44-62), and 31% of Matures (63+).

Then Harris presented these recommendations by the Federal Trade Commission for use of online data as guidelines for a Web site contemplating using customized content:

• Explain to all users how it would use information about their online activities to customize content or advertising to their interests;

• Offer users some choices about the type of tailored content and advertising shown to them;

• Apply reasonable security measures to safeguard online user information;

• Promise not to share any user's personally identifiable consumer information from their online activities with other companies without the user’s consent.

With those guidelines added, the comfort level of survey respondents rose: 55% described themselves as comfortable with regulated customized online content, 9% very comfortable, and 46% somewhat comfortable.

That still leaves a considerable number -- 45% -- uncomfortable about the use online customized content even with privacy policies in place. That's a significant hurdle to overcome to reach the benefits of N=1.