Rafat Ali leads us to IntelliTXT(sm), a product from Vibrant Media that will be putting green double lines under text when companies buy “ads” with words on various websites.
I think that it’s okay if ads, like those on Google’s AdSense, are relevant to the page they are on - at least there is some element of similarity, but they aren’t part of the article.
The last time I saw this technology used it was because some stupid website installed adware on my computer through my IE browser (thank goodness for Mozilla) and it started tagging words on pages with little ugly popups. I can’t see how people think this is a good idea for journalism. How annoying would that be? Sheesh.
AdAge has a quote in this article that Rafat linked to where, Bob Gordon of Auto Channel says “I think most people understand and appreciate the links.” I beg to differ. They might understand, but they don’t “appreciate” them at all.
But then again, there’s that guy who likes to receive spam, so what do I know.
1 response so far ↓
1 anon // Jun 23, 2004 at 11:16 pm
if i see those ads i leave the site, unless there’s a damn good reason for having to stay. and then, i won’t stay and consider signing up at the site after i’ve found what i’m looking for on that one occasion like i might otherwise have done. google ads i don’t mind, they don’t intrude