Comments on: Programmatic Advertising http://www.scrambledbrains.net/2013/04/26/programmatic-advertising/ All things Mike McGranahan. Mon, 13 Apr 2026 02:47:18 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=1.5.2 Comment on Programmatic Advertising by: Mike McG http://www.scrambledbrains.net/2013/04/26/programmatic-advertising/#comment-51142 Sat, 27 Apr 2013 20:12:59 +0000 http://www.scrambledbrains.net/2013/04/26/programmatic-advertising/#comment-51142 Oh geez. Nevermind about OpenX. Kinda shoots a hole in Linus's Law. http://www.adexchanger.com/online-advertising/openx-shuts-down-its-onramp-ad-server-after-big-malware-attack/ Next up, Adzerk. Oh geez. Nevermind about OpenX. Kinda shoots a hole in Linus’s Law.

http://www.adexchanger.com/online-advertising/openx-shuts-down-its-onramp-ad-server-after-big-malware-attack/

Next up, Adzerk.

]]> Comment on Programmatic Advertising by: Mike McG http://www.scrambledbrains.net/2013/04/26/programmatic-advertising/#comment-51137 Sat, 27 Apr 2013 19:08:59 +0000 http://www.scrambledbrains.net/2013/04/26/programmatic-advertising/#comment-51137 Very true about malware risk. User trust is fundamental to success. And there is already enough skepticism arising from the whole "create a detailed profile of each user and trade it for ad dollars" model. But the fact that this process also introduces the risk of giving unfettered access to user's computers to third-parties raises the bar for earning user trust very high. Putting your ad-serving into the hands of any third-party service means you trust them to not abuse/undermine the trust of your users. And therefore it's certainly something worth a lower ROI on the part of publishers for. But it seems so difficult to determine if an ad servicer is trustworthy. I need to investigate more but it would be interesting to know if there are secondary services that can monitor websites for malware ads (periodic sampling). (One problem with that is that such audits cannot be counted toward ad buys.) And on top of all this, is the inherently insecure nature of electronic communications. I might be willing to take the hit on revenue by disabling all but static image ads, but how can I be sure a malicious advertiser doesn't manage to load scripts through the IMG tag. I might whitelist my advertisers, but what if their ad management account gets cracked, or the ad asset hosting service gets cracked. Or if the ad service itself is cracked. Bleah. Ultimately, if you want to ride this new programmatic wave, I find all of the above reason to build your own solution. And I can't imagine an open source solution appearing any time soon, given the cultural distaste for the ad model amongst hackers and the competitive-mindedness of those that are cool with the ad model. (Though I need to look more at OpenX, which I thought was just an ad network, but now I'm seeing it might have programmatic features.) I know, as a user, I'd be a little more willing to trust a website relies on an ad server that is subject to Linus's Law. Very true about malware risk. User trust is fundamental to success. And there is already enough skepticism arising from the whole “create a detailed profile of each user and trade it for ad dollars” model. But the fact that this process also introduces the risk of giving unfettered access to user’s computers to third-parties raises the bar for earning user trust very high.

Putting your ad-serving into the hands of any third-party service means you trust them to not abuse/undermine the trust of your users. And therefore it’s certainly something worth a lower ROI on the part of publishers for. But it seems so difficult to determine if an ad servicer is trustworthy. I need to investigate more but it would be interesting to know if there are secondary services that can monitor websites for malware ads (periodic sampling). (One problem with that is that such audits cannot be counted toward ad buys.)

And on top of all this, is the inherently insecure nature of electronic communications. I might be willing to take the hit on revenue by disabling all but static image ads, but how can I be sure a malicious advertiser doesn’t manage to load scripts through the IMG tag. I might whitelist my advertisers, but what if their ad management account gets cracked, or the ad asset hosting service gets cracked. Or if the ad service itself is cracked. Bleah.

Ultimately, if you want to ride this new programmatic wave, I find all of the above reason to build your own solution. And I can’t imagine an open source solution appearing any time soon, given the cultural distaste for the ad model amongst hackers and the competitive-mindedness of those that are cool with the ad model. (Though I need to look more at OpenX, which I thought was just an ad network, but now I’m seeing it might have programmatic features.) I know, as a user, I’d be a little more willing to trust a website relies on an ad server that is subject to Linus’s Law.

]]> Comment on Programmatic Advertising by: Chris Forno (jekor) http://www.scrambledbrains.net/2013/04/26/programmatic-advertising/#comment-51116 Sat, 27 Apr 2013 04:49:28 +0000 http://www.scrambledbrains.net/2013/04/26/programmatic-advertising/#comment-51116 Interesting post, and I'm hoping the technology catches on. One thing I'd have to have before trying to sell ad-space directly to advertisers is some sort of automatic ad-safe subset verifier (for Flash/JavaScript/whatever). I don't know how much value the ad networks really provide, but at least the better ones are expected to keep malware out of your inventory. Now what would really be cool is some sort of automated-but-still-friendly-to-the-user micropayment system... Interesting post, and I’m hoping the technology catches on.

One thing I’d have to have before trying to sell ad-space directly to advertisers is some sort of automatic ad-safe subset verifier (for Flash/JavaScript/whatever). I don’t know how much value the ad networks really provide, but at least the better ones are expected to keep malware out of your inventory.

Now what would really be cool is some sort of automated-but-still-friendly-to-the-user micropayment system…

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