The Future of Ad Networks
I want to start talking about a concept that is on the bleeding edge (it has recently just started to circulate): user centric ad networks.
There are a few companies who are getting close, NebuAd is one of them. NebuAd and similar companies pull targeting data from ISP’s.
I plan to describe several different network architectures— but I’m only going to do one per post.
Today’s installment is derived from the user contribution architecture. This model has an unbelievable data asset. The idea is that users are willing to sacrifice targeting information for privacy in certain sectors. Hypothetically, users would sign up, enter age, geographic information, interests, etc. In exchange for this information, they are able to select sectors where they will not see advertisements (email, etc). If advertisements want access to this data, they have to abide by those rules.
Now, this might only work at scale, and aside from obvious risks such as users entering false data, it has some serious network effects. The most important effect is that it shrinks the market. If advertisers want to use this targeting data, they will have to cease advertising in certain markets. For every $1 that this network makes, a competitor (such as an email marketer from the above example) loses $.10 because of this restriction.
I don’t want to get into too much detail, because I’m going to save that for a later post, but I think you get the point. It is definitely interesting. Feasible? We’ll find out.
