New Jersey lawmakers are considering new legislation that would require Facebook, MySpace and others to police social networking sites for offensive posts or else face potential consumer fraud lawsuits. But some lawyers say that even if the measure is enacted, it's not likely to have much impact on social networking sites because the federal Communications Decency Act immunizes such sites from lawsuits based on material posted by users. The bill is part of state Attorney General Anne Milgram's Internet safety initiative. "The social networking site safety act is intended to deter cyber-bullying and the misuse of social networking Web sites," the Office of Attorney General said in a statement about the measure. "The bill empowers users of social networking sites to take steps to stop harassment or exploitation." Last year, Milgram garnered headlines by launching a fraud investigation of gossip site JuicyCampus.com -- where users frequently posted insults about college students -- but no legal action resulted. (That site folded last month for financial reasons.) Attempts to rein in cyberbullying might be politically popular, but this type of state effort to regulate global Web sites is also likely to prove useless, say cyber lawyers. "We need to recognize that legislating on the Internet can't be done on a state-by-state basis," said Parry Aftab, an expert on Web safety and cyber-abuse. "We can't have a different law in each state." Among other provisions, the Social Networking Safety Act (A. 3757, S. 2705) says social networking sites potentially violate state consumer fraud laws by failing to revoke the access of anyone accused of making a "harassing communication." The law makes an exception for sites that establish a reporting mechanism -- in the form of "a readily identifiable icon" -- for members to complain about posts. The sites would then be required to investigate and make referrals to law enforcement where appropriate. They also would have to allow users to block messages from offenders. The act also imposes civil liability on users who make offensive posts. A Facebook spokesperson said the company hasn't taken an official position on the bill, but already has the infrastructure the measure requires. "We will remove offensive or harassing content reported to us and may take further action, including disabling the account of the user who is responsible," the spokesperson said. A MySpace spokesperson declined to comment because the bill is still taking shape. Cyberlaw experts say the bill in its current form presents several problems. Not only do the portions directed at Web sites appear to be preempted by the federal Communications Decency Act, but they might also violate the constitutional ban on state regulation of interstate commerce, said Eric Goldman, director of the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University. (The most recent version of the bill says that civil lawsuits against sites are only allowed to the extent that the federal Communications Decency Act doesn't preempt them. But some lawyers say that provision only makes it more obvious that the bill would be ineffective, because the Communications Decency Act would preempt all civil lawsuits against the sites.) Goldman adds that the bill's definition of "harassing communication" itself is problematic. The measure defines such statements as "any communication which is directed at a specific person, serves no legitimate purpose, and a reasonable person would believe is intended to threaten, intimidate or harass another person." But that broad language is potentially unconstitutional, Goldman says. While courts have carved out exceptions to free speech laws for "threats of imminent unlawful violence," speech that carries a less immediate threat might be constitutionally protected. Sam Bayard, assistant director of the Citizen Media Law Project, adds that the law could give Web sites an incentive to err on the side of blocking users because doing so will avoid lawsuits. That itself could chill users' free speech rights. Also, the bill's definition of social networking sites extends far beyond Facebook and MySpace to encompass any Web site with social networking functionality. That would include many smaller sites that might not be able to easily deploy the measures the bill envisions. The trade group NetChoice is lobbying against the bill, arguing that it could affect Web users' free speech rights and also harm online companies. "It imposes obligations on online sites that are unprecedented," said Braden Cox, policy counsel at NetChoice, which includes member companies like AOL, eBay, News Corp, and Yahoo. He added that a one-size-fits-all approach made no sense, given the variety of sites that would be subject to the law. Cox also questioned the wisdom of asking people to report threats to social networking sites rather than to the police. "If a communication is truly harassing or makes someone fear for their life, they should go to law enforcement. 911 should be the response -- not www."
In an effort to offset depressed CPM rates with more impressive ad units, online media company Giant Realm today is slated to roll out its biggest Flash video overlay ever. "This is partly a reaction to ever-decreasing CPMs," said James Green, CEO of Giant Realm. "We were looking to do something that (advertisers) were willing to pay for." Targeting men ages 18-34, the New York-based entertainment portal/ad network was founded by the William Morris Agency in mid-2007, and has since grown to encompass dozens of sites geared toward video games, sci-fi and independent movies and music. Measuring 938 x 518, Giant Realm's new custom-designed placement consumes a users' entire screen during the time it takes for a video player to load. Once the overlay unit resolves and the requested content begins to play, a 300 x 250 companion unit appears beside the player and remains for the duration of the video. Both the custom-designed overlay and the branded companion units are clickable, in order to drive traffic to an advertiser's site. Advertisers -- which already include The U.S. Air Force, Nikon, Gillette, and Lionsgate -- are paying a $20-$30 CPM for the units, according to Green. Eventually, he anticipates the units to run across about 80% of the company's domestic network, which presently has a reach of about 18 million monthly users. Within the Giant Realm network, the first communities to experience the new units will be Myndflame.com, GotGame.com, ScrewAttack.com, Starfeeder.com and Noobflicks.com. Along with the William Morris Agency, Giant Realm's shareholders include SoftBank Capital, Comcast Interactive Capital, and the Edison Venture Fund.
NeXplore plans to unveil today a search advertising platform that enables marketers to create and manage paid search ad campaigns through images, text and video. NeXplore Ads 2.0 also lets brands interact in real time with potential or existing customers by linking to the ads via video chat, call scheduling, email and instant messaging. The fledgling search engine launched in January 2008 will go head-to-head with rival Yahoo, which revealed in February that it had been quietly testing the sponsored search tool Rich Ads In Search with national brand advertisers Pedigree and Pepsi. The brands noted seeing click-through rates increase by as much as 25%. NeXplore also has been testing video search ads. William Reisel, a World Discount Telecommunications (WDT) member of the board of directors involved in strategic development, has been working during the past month with NeXplore to deploy video ads for Allvoi, a WDT subsidiary focused on voice over Internet protocol (VOIP) services. WDT has several locations throughout the U.S., but through Allvoi the Dallas, Texas company has found a niche in supporting Indian families now living in the U.S. who want to stay in touch with loved ones back home in India through VOIP services. "We are looking to buy into the new features in a big way," Reisel said. "I'm monitoring Web traffic and getting six-figure results in the number of visitors to our Web site from NeXplore. It has really made a difference in our monthly stats." The new advertising and interactive features allow small- to-mid-size (SMB) businesses such as Allvoi to reach millions of consumers through video ads without adding major production costs to budgets. From search engine results, one click lets people watch a brief video commercial. Another click initiates a real-time video chat with a call center representative of the advertiser. The features aim to draw in NeXplore's more than 5.5 million unique monthly visitors, as of January 2009, according to Dion Hinchcliffe, chief technology officer for the Frisco, Texas-based company. Hinchcliffe said self-service video ads allow NeXplore to "literally service advertisers for pennies per month." Brands upload the media assets to NeXplore, which screen them before advertisements are created and appear in search results based on keyword bids tied to paid search campaigns. In a demonstration for MediaPost, Hinchcliffe created an advertisement in about 120 seconds. Within 10 minutes, the ad returned in search engine queries based on predetermined keyword searches. NeXplore Search runs on cloud computing, distributed architecture, Ruby on Rails, Ajax and DoJo. Search query results appear in three display options such as summary, gallery and line item. Scott Grizzle, NeXplore's CMO, likens the ad pricing model on NeXplore Search to pay-per-click auctions offered by Google or Yahoo. He said the prices are similar, but NeXplore adds fee branding, video commercials and interactive features.
Online advertising growth was cut by more than half last year to 10.6% as the recession put the brakes on Internet ad spending after years of eye-popping gains. According to the latest figures released Monday by the Interactive Advertising Bureau and PricewaterhouseCoopers, online advertising last year reached $23.4 billion, with the fourth-quarter total of $6.1 billion virtually unchanged from each of the four previous quarters. The 2.6% increase in fourth-quarter ad revenue compared to a year ago was the smallest since 2002 as the usual holiday season surge in ad spending failed to materialize. The 51% of total online ad dollars spent during the second half of 2008 was also the lowest percentage for the last six months of any year since 2002. "The economy has had a significant impact on the short-term growth of the Internet ad market," acknowledged David Silverman, a partner in the entertainment, media and communications practice at PricewaterhouseCoopers, during a webinar Monday on the IAB report. He added that the double-digit increase against economic "headwinds" underscored the sector's underlying strength. Still, it's a far cry from the 25% or better gains of the last several years as the advent of Web 2.0 helped power an Internet ad revival. And with online ad growth all but stalled in 2008 and the near-term outlook on the economy not improving, some experts have gone from predicting flat-to-slow growth in 2009 to a decline. At least week's OMMA Global Hollywood conference, economist Dr. Paul Kedrosky projected online ad dollars would fall 8%-9% in 2009, with traditional ad spending falling even farther amid a slumping GDP. Earlier this year, Jeff Lanctot, chief strategy officer at Razorfish, said a flat 2009 for online ad spending would be a "best case scenario." Most analysts still predict single-digit growth in online advertising. But with the IAB releasing its new figures, eMarketer revised downward its 2009 online ad estimate for the third time to $24.5 billion, or 4.5% growth. It previously projecteGd 8.9% growth to $25.7 billion. Other research firms and analysts may soon follow suit. Not surprisingly, search increased its share of online advertising to 45% from 41% of online advertising in 2008 as marketers increasingly turned to the category as a more reliable and efficient way to allocate interactive ad budgets. Likewise, performance-based advertising overall jumped to 57% from 51% of online ad dollars, highlighting the shift toward more accountable ad formats in tough economic times. Display advertising, which has suffered more than search as a result of the downturn, nevertheless remained about one-third of online ad spending. One bright spot was digital video advertising, which nearly tripled in 2008 to $734 million. At 3%, however, it still accounts for only a tiny sliver of online advertising. With the newspaper business in turmoil, classified advertising continued to shrink to 14% from 16% of the total, dropping from $3.3 billion to $3.2 billion last year. Among industry sectors, retail -- the largest category -- had the biggest decline, slipping to 22% from 25% of spending, or $5.4 billion to $5 billion.
Aiming to make mobile advertising easier, the four major U.S. wireless operators have agreed to align their mobile marketing practices to form a standard set of guidelines in conjunction with the Mobile Marketing Association. Under the agreement, Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile USA will consolidate their respective mobile marketing rules and codes of conduct, or "carrier playbooks," into a single document to be released by the end of June. The new uniform code will follow consumer best practices promulgated by the MMA. The trade group calls the step a "milestone" in improving the efficiency of mobile campaigns, estimating it will lead to $200 million in reduced costs industrywide. Among the key goals of the effort are to provide uniform disclosure policies, streamline short-code marketing programs, accelerate the rollout of mobile campaigns, and ensure more consistent auditing of campaign results. "The MMA's unified best practices are an important step in streamlining the processes and reducing barriers and cost to enter the direct-to-consumer market," said Venetia Espinoza, T-Mobile Director of Mobile Apps and Partner Programs, in a statement echoed by executives at Verizon and Sprint. Differences among the carriers' competing technologies, handsets and marketing practices have long proven an obstacle to the growth of mobile advertising. The less fragmented and complex the process is, the more willing new advertisers will be to experiment -- and existing ones to increase spending. In that vein, mobile ad executives welcomed the initiative. "In addition to eliminating this uncertainty over rules and compliance, uniform guidelines will also eliminate a lot of cost and inefficiency for everyone in the ecosystem," said Steven Rosenblatt, senior vice president of advertising sales for ad network Quattro Wireless. He said he is also counting on the agreement to accelerate carrier approvals for proposed mobile marketing programs, so that "the carrier ecosystem will move at 'advertiser speed' to launch and modify campaigns." Jason Spero, vice president and general manager of the Americas for rival ad network AdMob, agreed. "Having all four of the largest U.S. operators agree to one standard should help grow mobile advertising by making it easier for advertisers to run large campaigns across multiple networks," he said. A report issued this month by Lauren Rich Fine, research director at ContentNext Media, suggested the mobile landscape is slowly becoming more amenable to advertising. "While mobile advertising and marketing has yet to live up to expectations, the medium is increasingly becoming accessible and scalable and the creative is improving such that there are a growing number of campaign success stories," she wrote in "The Changing Mobile Industry And What It Means For Media Executives." Juniper Research estimates mobile ad spending totaled $1.3 billion last year. With consumers increasingly embracing mobile applications beyond the carriers' walled gardens -- via the iPhone or Google's Android mobile operating system, for example -- the operators may feel more pressure now to cooperate to boost mobile marketing. "Consumers are demanding more than what AT&T and Verizon want to give them and now want to directly access what (mobile) developers are willing to provide," according to Fine.
Casual gaming is on the rise, particularly among women. While Nickelodeon's game division has plans to expand that reach into other markets, an interesting shift has taken hold to draw in a variety of demographics. Dave Williams, senior vice president and GM of Nickelodeon Kids and Family Games Group, sees a move to build games around current news and events that can educate people and promote social awareness and change. Gaming division execs have begun to shift their thinking away from "a game as a product that gets built, shipped and sold," and more toward a "media that's consumed, similar to television with an interactive twist," Williams said. "We are starting to see news and culture become deeply integrated in game play." Nickelodeon has developed a series of games that spoof events or promote awareness. Many have become huge viral hits. Most recently, the group created "Hero on the Hudson" in less than 72 hours, from conception to launch. It has raked in about 4.0 million game plays since launching Jan. 21. "It's making gaming more current and tying it into popular culture," Williams said. "It's bringing more people into the game space and pushing gaming into the mass media, rather than product category." For news-related games the development turnaround typically is between two and seven days and a few sleepless nights, Williams said. The games are designed to provoke thought around a sensitive subject. Nick.com ran games for "The Big Green Help" campaign that focuses on the environment. Since April 2008, more than 25 million game sessions have been logged. In December, a campaign ran asking kids to pledge volunteer virtual hours in the "Global Challenge," a cause they could take from online and carry out in their homes, communities and schools to make energy-saving and earth-friendly activities a part of daily life. Development costs for this new type of immersive game run the gamut. Games on AddictingGames.com, geared toward teens and tweens, run from simplistic Flash games, which generally cost less to develop, to those with price tags in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, Williams said. "Advertisers have started to adopt the category, so budgets are growing," he said. "This allows us to invest more in content." The Nickelodeon Kids and Family Group of Web sites include Nick.com, NickJr.com, The-N.com, Neopets.com, Shockwave,com, AddictingGames.com, ParentsConnect.com, Nicktropolis.com, NickatNite.com, Noggin.com, NickArcade.com and myNoggin.com. The group has experienced growth in casual games. Within AddictingGames.com, Trillion Dollar Bailout has had 1.7 million plays since Feb. 19 and Escape the Oval Office has had 1.8 million since Jan. 16. Citing comScore stats, Nickelodeon said the U.S. audience for online gaming sites grew to from 67 million visitors in December 2007 to 86 million in December 2008. The total time Americans spent playing online games grew from 3.7% to 4.9% during that period. Casual games like solitaire and Tetris have experienced a surge in popularity among adults. Last week, Shockwave.com launched a subscription-based online gaming service for adults. For $29.95 per year, Club Shockwave will offer subscribers social community features and hundreds of skill games and puzzles, along with opportunities to win cash prizes and accumulate rewards.
MySpace plans to introduce a new mobile application for Windows Mobile devices aimed at delivering users a more robust version of the social network on the go. Specifically, the new app will be compatible with Microsoft's Silverlight browser plug-in, allowing MySpace developers to create more sophisticated mobile applications using open-source tools. It also tailors MySpace's main social features and functionality to the Windows operating system to streamline access. The MySpace app will be available on Windows Mobile 6.1 phones this summer and through the Microsoft's forthcoming Windows Marketplace for Mobile by fall. Windows phones from LG are due out in the second half of 2009 will come preloaded with the MySpace app. The move is part of MySpace's push to become the leading social network on cell phones. The social network currently has more than 20 million mobile users and expects more than half of its traffic to come from cell phones in the next few years. In addition to Windows Mobile, MySpace has also developed apps for smartphones including the iPhone, BlackBerry, Sidekick, G1, and others made by Nokia and Palm.
Interactive One -- the digital division of African-American-focused multimedia company Radio One -- has named former Napster executive David Wolfe as its new chief product and operating officer. In his new position, Wolfe is tasked with driving the direction and strategy for Interactive One's network of sites and brands, while spearheading a multi-platform play in partnership with Interactive One's parent company, Radio One. In a word, Wolfe's mission is one of growth. "We intend on continuing the tradition of creating innovative Web products that both add value to existing users and strongly attract new users," said Wolfe. Wolfe will manage a staff of approximately 50 people and will report to Interactive One President, Thomas Newman. He will also be charged with further developing Interactive One's media sites and advertising platform, and he will lead the conversion of Radio One's 52 station sites to create a more consistent online presence across Radio One's multimedia operations. Many of the responsibilities that fall under this new position were previously handled by Ben Sun, the founder of Community Connect, the parent company of BlackPlanet.com and other niche social networking sites. Sun will continue to serve as a strategic advisor to the company, according to a company spokesman. At Napster, Wolfe served as the chief technology officer, as well as a senior vice president. Prior to Napster, Wolfe served as Reunion.com's president of product and technology for five years.
Content personalization on the Web means different things to different people. Generally, most marketers think of it as the process of serving distinctive messages and offers to their customers, all in the hopes of making online experiences more specific, relevant and enjoyable. It sounds simple enough. Unfortunately, personalization gets increasingly confusing when one considers all the capabilities and technologies available to help in the process. One expert tells marketers that personalization means incorporating a product recommendation engine; another calls for segmenting visitors into different like-minded groups. Marketers should avoid getting lost in definitions and recommendations, understand that many approaches to site-side content personalization exist, consider each tactic as just one spot on a personalization continuum, and progress through the continuum to continue boosting conversions and revenue. On the "one to all" end of the continuum, marketers offer a single site with no variations. Each visitor receives the same content and promotions. On the opposite "one to one" end of the spectrum, marketers serve unique content and offers to each individual. While most marketers cannot realistically achieve this one-to-one ideal today, many seek to get as close as possible, knowing that conversion rates and revenue improve with each step taken along the continuum. Three fundamental tiers of segmentation can help marketers get more personal: 1. Academic segmentation 2. Pre-meditated segmentation 3. Real time, automated persona segmentation Academic segmentation, the simplest form, consists of random A/B or multivariate testing. Academic segmentation randomly serves visitors varying messages, button colors, page layouts or variances of any other element a marketer desires to test and tracks outcomes to determine the most effective elements. Testing can be applied to any part of a Web site, from the home page to a shopping cart or registration form and virtually any page in between. Academic segmentation helps marketers answer a specific question or determine an ideal design element or workflow. It helps them optimize their site to increase performance but only on a one-to-all basis, applying findings to improve the single experience they offer to all visitors. Marketers can get more personal by applying A/B and multivariate testing in tandem with pre-meditated segmentation. Sometimes called segmented testing and targeting, pre-meditated segmentation gets much more personal by focusing on groups pre-defined by the marketer under any logical classification system. The types of pages users view, the time of day they visit the site or any host of other factors can define these segments. More advanced than a one-to-all approach, pre-meditated segmentation enables marketers to develop and serve messages and offers specifically for different groups, but marketers can take content personalization efforts even further. The ultimate nirvana of content personalization, true one-to-one communication, is only achieved through real time, automated persona segmentation. Already generating impressive results for marketers large and small, automated persona segmentation uses next generation algorithm-based applications. The algorithms tap a vast array of available user data (IP addresses, time of visit, browser type, etc.) to make real time decisions, learn from those decisions and their associated outcomes, and get smarter with every piece of content it serves to visitors. Marketers already using pre-meditated segmentation or those considering their first personalization program can use these technologies to offer highly personalized content and promotions to visitors and improve conversions and revenues without spending much time or effort behind the scenes. Where to focus? Content personalization efforts can flourish on home pages, category and product pages, shopping carts, forms, subscription and registration pages, and just about any other area of a Web site. They can optimize site design and structure, serve up targeted promotions, and better engage visitors. Today's most sophisticated personalization applications help marketers segment customers across the entire personalization continuum. It's never been easier for marketers to effectively personalize site-side content for visitors, but they should remain wary of the many shades of personalization and focus instead on the continuum. Ultimately the same goal remains; achieve an optimized customer experience that results in improved conversions and increased revenues.