

DoGood: Replace ads with "Good Ads" - hailpixel
http://eu.techcrunch.com/2010/02/01/another-headache-for-web-publishers-dogooder-blocks-ads-for-a-good-cause/

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javery
A couple notes on this horrible idea (yes I run a couple ad networks).

1) Giving up 50% of their revenue to charity isn't that impressive considering
if they actually paid the publishers whose content they are running their ads
on they would most likely be paying 50% or more. This is like if Robin Hood
kept half of the stuff he stole, wouldn't seem so noble.

2) You are essentially opting in to see these ads. Sure you might be a good
target market since you wanted to see the ads, but chances are it's going to
be a small and quickly saturated audience. Advertisers will most likely see a
quick drop-off in results.

A much more interesting implementation would be one that continues to show
normal ads (through ad networks, etc) but takes the revenue from them and
gives them to charity. You could even hijack affiliate links as well and
donate that to charity. I always thought it would be super evil, but
interesting, for someone like Bing to sell a toolbar that displayed their own
PPC ads on Google's search results and paid some of it back to the user or
charity.

~~~
ippisl
Some version of this can still might happen if Microsoft would be seriously
threatened by Google.

If Microsoft task would be to replace each google-ad with a much more useful
ad(which they probably could, since google optimized for money per ad), they
could offer much better ads.

If those ads could really help people , this could have a really strong PR for
the common people. And maybe Microsoft could even wrap it in some ethical
claim.

~~~
mseebach
> Some version of this can still might happen if Microsoft would be seriously
> threatened by Google.

Hardly. I don't think Microsoft would want to play dirty with Google.

> since google optimized for money per ad

Google only gets paid if people will click on an ad. People will only click if
an ad seems useful, so optimizing for money is optimizing for usefulness.

If you want the objective, not-for-money results, look in the big column on
the left.

~~~
ippisl
The Google optimization is more complex than utility. They optimize for clicks
* revenue per click.

One example they don't optimize for - if there's a free way to achieve
something , they don't show it to you.

Another - if the competition on a certain keyword is very high , you can get
really high cost per click , which would push out good offers.

Another - if you can write great ad copy to lousy product.

Another - if a different way to display the products is more useful. that's
the reasons google have different way of showing mortgage ads.

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mseebach
I think the ethics is questionable, because the average DoGood user is someone
who'll actually click on ads (otherwise their business-model falls apart),
which denies the site-owner revenue. It's basically zero-sum: the only money
DoGood will make (for their benefactors), is money that a site-owner would
otherwise have made (last I checked, most money were made from clicks, not
impressions).

This was tried last year by Danish AidOnline, but after an intense PR fallout,
they lost almost all of their advertisers and shut down.

The PR fallout was at least partly due to their 20% administration fee, which
didn't fit well in their philanthropic guise.

~~~
manvsmachine
_the average DoGood user is someone who'll actually click on ads_

I don't know if that's necessarily the case. I honestly can't think of a
single banner ad that I've ever actually clicked and followed (though there
have been some that I've noticed and kept in mind for later). I think that
there is a large demographic out there, possibly including myself, who who be
compelled to click on ads _only_ because they realize that they are
contributing towards something that they support. Personally, I don't
particularly need help figuring out what to buy, but I wouldn't mind being
better informed about causes I may be interested in.

This opinion, though, is not taking into account the business ethics of the
service as a whole.

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stingraycharles
From <http://www.dogoodhq.com/publishers>:

"The DoGooder does not block ads from being served on websites. Consequently,
any CPM revenue agreements you have with your ad network / servers remains
unaffected- yes, you still get paid."

I wonder what that means; they don't get into the technical specifics, but I
get the impression that they will simply download the ads, and replace the ads
with DoGood ads as soon as they're downloaded. This might be even worse: it
messes up statistics for advertisers, and in the end, it will cause your
inventory's value to decrease, thus resulting in a lower CPM value.
Additionally, it gives advertisers yet another reason to push for performance-
based (CPC/CPA) campaigns, instead of the CPM-based campaigns used for premium
content nowadays.

~~~
chaosmachine
Yes, it seems like this will kill CTR, and distort CPM. Damaging to the
publisher and damaging to the advertiser.

This makes it much worse than normal ad blocking, imo.

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mahmud
Activism and cause-fetishism is a good way to side-step people's critical
faculties. If you couldn't get rational people to install your adware toolbar,
reframe it: call it Green Advertising and drape it in some vague altruism, and
viola.

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motters
It's a nice idea. Although I use ad blocking I have no fundamental objection
to advertising online. What I do object to are ads which are annoying or
offensive. If I could have greater control over what type of ads are
displayed, so that they're always discreet and tasteful, I'd have no need to
block them.

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ErrantX
This brings an interesting twist to the question: "is blocking ads on a
website denying the owner their revenue stream and therefore wrong in some
way?"

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apowell
How is this an interesting twist? As a website owner, it not just as bad --
it's worse, because it gives the user an additional incentive (beyond
convenience) to block my ads, and feel self-righteous doing it.

~~~
mahmud
Editorial ads :-)

~~~
apowell
Oh, absolutely! But that doesn't mean I want to see the Adsense/Casale revenue
dry up at the hands of some opportunistic do-gooding scheme.

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scrrr
Install my browser extension! Each page-load will save a patch of rainforest!
:)

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thibaut_barrere
This is one other reason why we may move to paid content with no ads...

