aTypical Joe: a gay New Yorker living in the rural South
Sunday, October 29, 2006
High hopes for GooTube (continued)
Google, which announced this month that it was buying online video site YouTube for $1.65 billion in stock, has big plans to expand into video advertising. The firm hasn’t announced exactly what it plans to do with YouTube, but both properties are pushing a new kind of Internet advertising called “click to play.” The ads are essentially online video commercials that don’t play unless a visitor clicks on the image.
Google said it opposes “pre-roll” Web ads, which resemble TV commercials by interrupting site visitors and forcing them to watch a video before they can see the content they are seeking. With Google’s click-to-play ad service, advertisers will be able to select specific Web sites where they want their video ad displayed or allow Google to select the sites, based on whether the audience of a Web site or its content matches that of the advertiser.
Google thinks the ads will do well with movie studios, which could use trailers as click-to-play ads, and with carmakers, who can use video to draw Internet users shopping for a car. But the format remains new and largely untested.
Google should make the YouTube player the ad. And get the message to Comedy Central that fans are promoting their shows not stealing their shows. These fans are prime ad propagating agents. Embrace them.
