Advertising in RSS

As some of you may
have noticed, we are running NewsGator
ads in some of InfoWorld’s RSS feeds (example here). These are the
first ads of their kind that we’re aware of. I think what happens here will, to
some extent, set the precedent for RSS-based advertising.


Any comments on this?
RAI and InfoWorld both would love to hear your
thoughts…

18 Comments

18 thoughts on “Advertising in RSS”

  1. Anil

    I noticed the ads, and it’s a great idea. I’d considered the same thing in my RSS feed for my Daily Links a while back, and I’m glad to see you pursuing it.

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  3. Matt McAlister

    Speaking for InfoWorld, I would love to hear ideas on how to do this right. We’re posting Greg’s NewsGator ad as an item in the top of our feed, fixed there for a week. He will pay us per click as it seems impossible to measure impressions.

    I’d like to know if there is a smarter way. Or maybe this medium is just averse to advertisements…I don’t feel that way, personally, but I may be alone. Hopefully, it will work for Greg, too.

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  4. Ritchie Hughes

    This is inevitable, but I don’t like the idea. I can’t help feeling that it dilutes the whole purpose of simple syndication and resource description. I’m subscribing to a feed to know when a particular set of resources are updated and nothing else. If the feed degenerates to adverts I’ll unsubscribe or use software to block them. Arguably, because I’m _pulling_ content it’s the perfect “opt-in” scheme and because it isn’t unsolicited the term spam doesn’t fit. Software based filters will be tricky (no dubious IP addresses or suspicious headers that can be blocked) but not impossible. I wonder whose newsreader will be the first to implement them? (I’m guessing not Greg’s ;-)

    And here’s a thought: I’m grabbing the feed over HTTP so what if my newsreader starts supporting cookies? What if my cookie-aware content provider starts using cookies to dynamically customize the feeds I receive? This could be useful to me for some purposes, but more likely would be used to generate trackable click-thrus and directed content by advertisers. Shudder. Please don’t support cookies…

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  5. JimS

    Part of me doesn’t mind, as I’d love to see the sites that still don’t have RSS feeds and the ones that do but contain only the headlines and not the brief/abstract (like Slashdot) actually all give me everything. My thinking was that those folks wanted me to visit their site and see the embedded advertising there, as that is the only way they were actually going to get paid for providing the content that they do. So if ‘allowing’/promoting RSS feed providers to put ads in their posts gets ALL possible feed providers to create the ‘richest’ possible RSS feed, them I’m all for it. NewsGator and RSS in general has so greatly simplified my ‘eternal search for more information’. Too bad that it’s also taking up a lot more of my time now too…

    To make a blanket statement about internet advertising… as long as it’s something that I don’t have to take action to get rid of (meaning I HATE pop-ups), then I don’t mind it. I’ve actually been a huge proponent of advertising on the internet to pay for content, as people have to make money somehow (as opposed to subscription sites which I refuse to use because I’m too cheap). And for as much as we hate commercial tv, I’d much rather have to deal with the commercials than pay $2-$3 a tv show to watch them (which Comcast’s PPV charges for old TV shows).

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  8. Advertising in RSS - No Thanks

    The NewsGator team are soliciting advice about Advertising in RSS. Web pages have developed pop-ups, email has spam and now it seems RSS is to have advertisements. Pop-ups and spam are not opt-in services. In many cases they aren’t even…[more]

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  9. John S.

    I really don’t mind the ads any more than I really mind website banner ads or TV commercials. If the advertisement intrigues me, I may wish to get more information on the product. If not, I can simply ignore the ad altogether.

    As long as the use of ads doesn’t become too personally intrusive (e.g. tracking cookies, popups, Flash ads…), I merely see them as another viable revenue stream to keep the actual product (in this case, the RSS feed) alive.

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  15. Martin

    This is not a great idea. RSS is often bring me to a site to see the full article. This is where and when I would expect advertisement. Personally I see this as SPAM.

    Can these ads be filtered out? I recommend this be added to tools like SharpReader and NewsGator.

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  16. Martin

    This is not a great idea. RSS is often bring me to a site to see the full article. This is where and when I would expect advertisement. Personally I see this as SPAM.

    Can these ads be filtered out? I recommend this be added to tools like SharpReader and NewsGator.

    Reply ↓
  17. Advertising in RSS

    The NewsGator team are soliciting advice about Advertising in RSS.

    Web pages have developed pop-ups, email has spam and now it seems RSS is to have advertisements. Pop-ups and spam are not opt-in services. In many cases they aren’t even opt-out. RSS at the moment has no mechanism to identify which posts are advertisments and which are not. It is opt-in, all-in.

    If NewsGator leads the way in putting advertisements into RSS feeds then they are also beautifully positioned to make them an opt-in service from day 1. An extension to RSS that marks a post as advertisement means they can be easily filtered out. The other, more insidious, alternative is the change in policy. “By agreeing to take this feed you…”.

    Many of the feeds I subscribe to are personal and so are unlikely to carry advertisements yet I’m still uncomfortable with the idea unless I am given a choice up front. [thought horizon]
    That choice is your decision to subscribe or not. A weblogger will do well to balance his content with advertising, lest the signal-to-noise ratio fall too low. Get over it, it’s gonna happen…

    …[more]

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