Can you hear me now? Good; now look at this ad
Advertising has long been ubiquitous on the big screen (pre-feature ads, Coke-sponsored trivia questions, product placements in films) and television's small screen, but the smallest screen of all has been holding out against the trend. No longer: Verizon has just announced that banner ads are coming to a cell phone near you.
The New York Times is reporting that Verizon wants to show the banners above web content when mobile phone users access the Internet. Details are sketchy at this point, but Verizon VP John Harrobin delivered the lump of coal to subscriber stockings, saying, "We know we can make significant dollars in mobile Web advertising in 2007. That said, we likely will not—we want to take it carefully and methodically, and enable the right experience."
Any galaxy in which "the right experience" equals "watching ads on the cell phone that you've paid for when you access the Internet" is certainly far, far away. Customers have already paid for the phone, the service, and (usually) a separate data plan, all before seeing the ads. Will Verizon reduce its prices as a result of the sponsorship? Is the company trying to lower its bills? Do we really need to keep asking these questions?
Harrobin told the Times that "we offer voice services. Advertising is tertiary on top of that." "On top of that" doesn't inspire confidence in a future rate cut, but too few details are currently available to say exactly how the company plans to implement the ads. Considering Verizon's recent approach to USF fees on DSL, it's unlikely that the company has altruistic motives with its new plan.
You might recall that Google has been talking about free cell phones lately, arguing that the devices could be ad-supported like television, radio, and web searching. This is not Verizon's vision, which seems more in line with that adopted by video game developers: charge customers for a product, then use that product to show them ads.
:source: Source: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20061226-8497.html
