As the new communication of webfeeds (RSS and Atom format) continues to grow, online publishers and advertisers are growing increasingly interested in finding ways to make money from webfeeds.
On June 29, Jeff Jarvis wrote a piece in Buzzmachine that strongly favored increased webfeed advertising. He noted that in order for webfeeds to become a more appealing medium for advertisers, they must become more accountable….
Specifically, Jarvis notes that webfeed publishers ideally should be able to provide advertisers with supportable and precise figures for:
- Unique users. “If content creators cannot report unique users they cannot get advertising. Period. So [feed] readers must set unique-user cookies. Period.
- Traffic. “[Webfeed] readers must allow content creators to count displays – versus just downloads – of [feed] items.
I agree with Jarvis that this data would be nice to have, but I don’t think it’s absolutely necessary in order to support a thriving webfeed ad industry. And personally, I don’t have a problem with webfeed advertising – as long as it’s appropriate, not overwhelming, and easily distinguishable from feed content.
However, some people aren’t crazy about webfeed ads. For example, on June 30 Robin Good cited Jarvis’ article and refuted several of Jarvis’ pro-ad arguments in detail. (See: RSS Monetization? The Game Has Changed; Same Rules May Not Apply) Good raises some important issues and concerns, most notably:
“RSS users and readers have expressed need to receive dedicated info on a topic with maximum privacy. If you start to poison your quality content with stuff that you, as a publisher have not yourself chosen, what kind of service are you really providing that is different from traditional email blasts and newsletters?”
And in his June 10 article, Google: Let Me Mix My RSS AdFeeds, Good made some even more pointed (and rather philosophical) points about his aversion to webfeed ads. But he does raise another intriguing option: adfeeds. These would be feeds dedicated to publishing ads on, “very specific topics, according to a specific editor/author/blogger, or matching a specific research/interest area connected to the site/publisher.”
Hmmmm…. it could have potential in some cases….
UPDATE July 6: More thoughts on the webfeed ad debate from Pamela Heywood’s Online Business Journal. Also, read Antone Roundy’s weblog entry, Freeloaderism.
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