Is that a blog, or a billboard?
I speculated a while back that a trend for blog ads would be to incorporate advertisements into RSS and XML feeds. Apparently, the solution is to just post an advertisement as an entry.
I don’t fault any bloggers for trying to make money off of their blogs. If they can, more power to them. But some blogs are becoming big billboards. My only problem with this trend is that it detracts from links, like blogrolls. But if you can make money doing it, go for it.
June 3rd, 2004 at 11:19 am
I stopped reading Bill’s site when he started posting ads.. It was bad enough with the 80 billion iframe ads on each let and right column.. It took longer to load his page than I spend every morning reading blogs at all..
Big billboard indeed.
I take your stance as well – if you can make money, hey, go for it.
But I think what it comes down to is that blogads on the site are one thing, but actually posting entries as ads compromises some of the legitimacy and authenticity that is at the core of what people love about reading and writing blogs.
If I’m not confident that what you’re posting isn’t just fodder for an advertiser, why am I reading your site at all?
June 3rd, 2004 at 5:58 pm
Ah hah… I hadn’t made the RSS feed connection to his ads. When he did it the first time, I left a comment wondering if he implicitly endorsed that particular product more than any other. The next time I went back, the comment was gone and comments have been closed on ads ever since.
June 4th, 2004 at 11:09 am
I’m wondering if the blog ads will go the way of the dot.com bust? They can’t be making that much money via clicks (except for the political ads promoting a candidate perhaps). I have never bought anything due to a pop up ad or clicking on an ad from a blog site. I just checked out Bills site from your link…pathetic…but power to him if ppl want to pay him for the ads.
June 3rd, 2004 at 12:52 pm
Blogs going NASCAR
One of the unique things about NASCAR is the fact that they plaster advertisements over every square inch of everything that they can put an ad on. The cars and drivers are speeding billboards. Contrast that to Baseball which had…