August 22, 2007 1:30 PM PDT
New ads jar some YouTube fans
- Related Stories
-
YouTube tests 10-second ad format
August 21, 2007
Harding, who is seen dancing in famous spots around the world in the clip "Where the Hell is Matt?" hadn't viewed the ads until CNET News.com sent him a link to a video featuring one of YouTube's mini-commercials, which the company started testing today against a handful of videos (but not Harding's).
"As a viewer, I don't like this at all," said Harding, whose video has been viewed more than 7 million times since it was posted a year ago. "As someone who makes videos, I would object to allowing them to put an ad on the screen. Put it on the margins, above the player but not on the screen itself."
Fans of Google's YouTube are starting to react to overlay advertisements the company began testing on Wednesday. Some find them jarring, some in international quarters wish they could see them, and still others are wondering if they can make money off their own videos with these ads. While there's hardly a unanimous opinion, one thing is for certain: Google is finally looking to cash in on its $1.65 billion YouTube acquisition.
"If YouTube starts with accessory advertising while the video is playing, I leave YouTube," said one poster on YouTube's blog with the screen name "Amgervinus."
Another viewer who refers to himself on YouTube as "quepasakoolj18" put it more succinctly in his post: "Yuck."
News.com Poll
The ads appear at the bottom of a video shortly after the clip starts to play and disappear after 10 seconds. They resemble the TV-style ads that often feature the image of a celebrity walking onto the bottom of a TV screen for a few brief moments. YouTube executives said Tuesday that extensive testing showed that viewers rejected any format that forced them to sit through a commercial prior to a clip being played, a process known as a pre-roll.
Using overlays, executives said, was the least intrusive way to get a message in front of their audience, or so they believe.
Critics don't have to worry about the ads appearing on the iPhone or AppleTV--at least at this point. Google has said that the ads will appear only on the YouTube site "at this time." The ads only show up at YouTube in the United States, and some international users were upset when they couldn't check them out.
One British user responded, appropriately, in a video blog he posted to YouTube.
"Now, this idea will thrust the adverts in people's faces, which means the click-thru rate might be a bit higher," said the YouTube video creator who calls himself Nuodai. "In my estimation, if an advert comes up, people are going to be just as uninterested as, say, a banner ad at the top of the page.
"Eventually people are going to get used to these adverts popping up and their automatic reaction will be to click the close button or just letting it go away, which is why I don't think this is going to be as effective as they make it out to be," he said. "Personally I think this is a very disruptive way of advertising."
A smaller number of those who posted to YouTube's site were taking a wait-and-see approach. ThoughtScientist wrote that "as long as the situation doesn't evolve to the point where ads are forced on all videos, there should be no problems."
Others sympathized with YouTube's plight.
The company has long said it was looking for a way to post ads but in a way that wouldn't irk users. "(YouTube fans) can't really complain about it annoying them or being intrusive to the video because you can manually click it away easily," said "123woow." "Good job YouTube."
Plenty of others who posted comments to YouTube were confused about whether video creators could profit from it.
YouTube has said that it will insert ads only into videos created by a select number of "partners." Google, which acquired YouTube last October for $1.65 billion, is planning to charge advertisers $20 for every 1,000 times ads are displayed. Google also will share the ad revenue with those partners.
Even the promise of money couldn't sway some YouTube fans to embrace the videos, and they threatened to unsubscribe to any video makers who were too commercial. But Internet viewers, of course, are often fickle with any sort of ad.
"I'm okay with this," said Rrandiicom on YouTube's blog. "But eventually it would get boring. I wouldn't subscribe to anyone who does this, but it wouldn't stop me from watching one of their videos. It'd be great though to get money for the videos you've made."
See more CNET content tagged:
YouTube,
margin,
viewer,
YouTube Video,
Google Inc.
Some is just LESS annoying.
Sticking anything in my face is the best way to get me to dislike the product being advertised.
"TV viewers have grown accustomed to watching a show and seeing the image of David Letterman or some other star walk across the bottom of the screen as part of a promotion" Note the use of the phrase "grown accustomed". No one likes it. People just put up with it because they have little choice.
I am tired of the useless and irritating junk that constantly swirls around on commercial TV.
Thank goodness for pop-up blockers, ad blockers, and other tools that allow me to control my web surfing experience.
Google is NOT a web search company. They are now an advertising company that just happens to use a search page as one of their ways of getting ads in front of people. Their motto "Don't be evil" is becoming a joke.
("Women on a ship bring bad luck"....16 century mariners' credo).
Larry, Sergey, Chad Hurley:
Tommorow, take Eileen to one of the finest Google cafeterias. Feed her, and then...FIRE HER!
Remember the bubble, folks? The reason it happened is that a ton of internet startups came up with ideas to provide services over the web without bothering to figure out how to generate revenue. Where are most of them now? Gone!
You can't have your cake and eat it too... either be prepared to pony up cash to pay for the storage, bandwidth, developers, support personnel, etc. or get used to seeing some (IMHO) fairly unobtrusive advertising.
videos are most annoying.
duh.
Pretty soon, a lot of members will start looking for other video sites.
I use YouTube as a simple way to share videos with friends and family and I don't object to banner or text ads at all. But if this "experiment" becomes permanent, I'll close my account and put up my own site for that purpose. It's really not that hard. I've built video sites before.
Maybe I'll do it in a big way and sell subscriptions. I, for one, would rather pay for the service than have to put up with intrusive advertising. It seems that the advertising industry in America won't be satisfied until our lives are one non-stop commercial.
These were built for hire for businesses who needed a simple way for field service people to make videos of inspections (along with other files) available to others in the company who needed access to them. They were not "public" sites in that authentication was needed to access them (which is also why I can't link to them, and you'd be unable to authenticate anyway).
My point is that the technology to create a video site isn't all that complex. In fact, you can even purchase it if you don't care to code it yourself. The only complex part is the transcoder, and even that can be licensed if you like.
If I were to create an advertising-supported video site, it would work exactly like my existing advertising-supported sites: There would be affiliate banners and text ads, but no pop-ups, pop-unders, slide-in DHTML ads, links to full-page Flash ads in between parent and child pages, or other intrusive advertising.
If I were to create a video site solely for my own use and that of my family and friends, it would, of course, be ad-free.
But it's not advertising I object to. I derive a significant portion of my income from ads. It's intrusive advertising that I object to. When the ad obstructs the content, then something is wrong with the Webmaster's priorities, in my opinion.
I do think that a subscription-monetized video side a'la Smugmug would do well, and that Google should explore that option. Photobucket also offers an ad-free "Pro" account that I'm told is very popular. A lot of people, including myself, are willing to pay for ad-free content if the content itself is decent and the site works well.
With Tivo, if you happen to be watching an actual ad, Tivo has started (not very often) hitting you with: "if you like the product you've just seen, hit the "Thumbs Up" for more info."
those who create the video should also have a share in the profits.
That should be a negotiated percentage based on popularity.
While they didn't pay anything upfront to those content provider...
5:5......
No way! I think those people desire at least 8:2 ot 9:1 5:5 just don't make sense
Quick... Move away!
there is sooo many different websites better than youtube, just missing you who upload videos!
I would suggest users move to
MSN Soapbox,Revver or iFilm
While they didn't pay anything upfront to those content provider...
5:5......
No way! I think those people desire at least 8:2 ot 9:1 5:5 just don't make sense
Quick... Move away!
there is sooo many different websites better than youtube, just missing you who upload videos!
I would suggest users move to
MSN Soapbox,Revver or iFilm
But the "Liberal" comment... get a life. Why do you morons have to bring your agenda into everything?
Most people understand you have to make a profit, and most would rather see adsense ads on the sides of the clips not in it. That is the problem? Can you understand that? I doubt it...
- Just Another Type Of Pop-Ups!
-
by Steph0314
September 4, 2007 6:14 AM PDT
- Didn't like the Pop-Ups back when they started ... still don't like them today. There has been several styles or method ... this will be just another method.
-
Reply to this comment
-
-
See all 35 Comments >>