Items tagged with Advertising
Months after the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election concluded, there are still allegations that Russia meddled in the process to help sway voter opinion. Google has been running an investigation to see whether Russian operatives might have exploited its advertising system in an attempt to interfere with the election. According to people who claim to be familiar with the investigation, evidence has been found that Russian operatives did indeed use the advertising platform to spread disinformation. The sources claim that Google found tens of thousands of dollars were spent on ads by Russian agents during the elections across multiple Google products including YouTube. Other places the ads showed...
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Companies can be a little overzealous when it comes to serving up ads. Even so, HTC appeared to hit a new low when its TouchPal keyboard that comes pre-installed on some Android devices started pushing out ads to users. This did not sit well with affected users, many of which took to posting their grievance on Reddit. Doing so attracted a lot of negative attention. It also resulted in an apology from HTC, which chalked the ads up to some kind of "error.""Due to an error, some HTC customers have reported seeing ads on their phone's keyboard. This is absolutely not the experience we intended, and we're working to immediately fix the error and remove the ads as quickly as possible," HTC said in...
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Feel left out not seeing advertisements in Facebook's Messenger? Don't fret: that's going to be changing real soon. Following what Facebook touts as being a successful test in Australia and Thailand, the social media giant is planning to expand advertising in its Messenger service to the rest of the world. For advertisers, this is a great move, although the verdict remains out as to whether or not it will cause Messenger fans to revolt. In an example provided, it appears that the advertising never appears inside of chats, but will instead be nestled in the contact list screen. Located here, the ads wouldn't be too intrusive - especially not to the extent they would be if they broke up one of...
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It is often said in regards to free online services such as Facebook that if you are not paying for a product, then you are the product. Fair enough, but that does not mean there are no lines that can be crossed. Facebook seems to have stepped over one with a sophisticated algorithm that lets advertisers target teenagers during vulnerable states, such as when they are feeling "insecure" or "worthless." This came to light when The Australian got its hands on a confidential 23-page Facebook document outlining how the world's largest social playground is able to identify "moments when young people need a confidence boost." Like every other creepy thing that happens when a company has widespread...
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YouTube remains a free service for all (well, as long as you aren’t a subscriber to YouTube Red), so we have to put up with ads from a time to time to enjoy our daily allotment of cat videos and other time wasters. However, Google has finally gotten the hint that one particular format for its video advertising may be annoying viewers a bit too much. The company announced this week that it will no longer bombard YouTube visitors with TV-style 30-second ads. "We're committed to providing a better ads experience for users online,” said a YouTube spokesperson in an interview. “As part of that, we've decided to stop supporting 30-second unskippable ads as of 2018 and focus instead on formats that...
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In no uncertain terms, Facebook says "discriminatory advertising has no place" on the world's largest social network. To keep it off of there, Facebook last fall started providing better education to advertisers about its prohibition against discrimination. It also beefed up the procedures it uses to enforce prohibition. Now it is taking things a step further by implementing strong enforcement tools and testing machine learning solutions. This is not a new frontier for Facebook, or technology companies in general. Machine learning is one of the hottest areas of computing right now. Just last week, Facebook explained how it was using machine learning and artificial intelligence to understand the...
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This past weekend, we talked about how Facebook and its founder Mark Zuckerberg were planning to combat the "fake news" problem we've likely all seen on a regular basis. This comes hot on the heels of Donald Trump becoming president-elect, as it's a no secret that this political season has been rife with misleading headlines and information. Well, Zuckerberg isn't immune to irony, and has just been hit with what might be his biggest dose. In the very post where he talks about his company's plans to eradicate fake news, two blatantly fake news posts could be found right beside it: What makes this truly ridiculous is that these ads were paid, and Facebook is supposed to give the a-OK to all ads...
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If you're responsible for creating advertising campaigns for a website or a Web service, you need the confidence that you're going to see a good return-on-investment. To gauge that, you're going to listen to the promises of the company or site that hosts the advertising platform. Unfortunately, those promises are sometimes inaccurate - even if it's by accident. Such is the case with Facebook. The world's largest social network has just admitted to fudging up the view counts of videos used for advertising, though it insists that no one has been ripped off. The crux of the problem is that Facebook counted a video as a "view" for a mere three second watch. It's safe to assume that in three seconds,...
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If Google had been hoping that the European Union would back off on its pursuit of proving that it's anti-competitive, it appears that the company hasn't been hoping hard enough. Today, the EU shot another set of charges at Google for anti-competitive practices, this time squarely targeting its AdSense for Search platform. Previous antitrust charges against Google have involved Android, search, and shopping, with this third set expanding on the latter two. Anyone who's ever browsed the internet will have likely passed by an AdSense advertisement, as they're simply everywhere. We reinforce Google case on search/shopping comparison with new, strong evidence and send statement of objections t Google...
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For nearly a decade, Verizon ran a series of ads featuring actor Paul Marcarelli delivering the tagline, "Can you hear me now?" It's still a phrase that's familiar to many people, but in case you haven't heard, it's 2016 and apparently "every network is great," or so says the former Verizon pitchman who's made the switch to Sprint, the fourth largest carrier in the U.S. High profile defections in advertising sometimes happen, though it's not an everyday thing. For one, it requires a successful initial ad campaign, which Verizon certainly had. It also requires that the initial company that used a recurring pitch person maintain relevance long after the ad campaign has run its course, and again...
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If you enjoy seeing recommended apps in your Windows 10 Start menu, then you're going to love the fact that the upcoming Redstone update doubles the number you'll be able to see. Who knew Windows 10 could get even better? Alright, so that's a bit of an exaggeration, but considering the fact that it is happening, it does make us wonder what Microsoft is actually thinking. As it stands today, if you open your Start menu in Windows 10, a couple of recommended apps might appear. The goal is obvious: to lead user to the Windows Store to download an app or two. Ultimately, Microsoft hopes that you may eventually find your way towards paid software, for which it'd get a cut. In the current iteration,...
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While much of the autonomous buzz right now revolves around vehicles, the ever-evolving world of technology will see many other sectors become automated in the future -- including simple things like customer service. The problem, of course, is that most businesses can't invest in advanced 'chatbots', either through purchasing a solution from another vendor or developing it themselves. That's where Facebook wants to help. The social media giant already offers a number of tools to businesses, but according to a leak, it will unveil chatbot and Live Chat solutions at its upcoming F8 developer conference. When launched, these chatbots will run through Facebook Messenger, a piece of software that...
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Have you ever noticed that your online activities affect the types of advertising you see when surfing the web and using online services? That's called targeted advertising (or stalking, if you prefer), and AT&T's partnering up with a company called Videology to bring the same type of creepiness to television. I'm calling it creepy because advertisers sometimes tend to know and share more than they should. This is anecdotal, but I recently typed the world "Mucinex" in an email to colleagues (it was in reference to me being sick) and later that day my Facebook feed was splattered with sponsored ads for Mucinex. Go figure. Let's give AT&T the benefit of the doubt that it's not going to...
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Facebook's Messenger app isn't the most-liked on the planet. Why? Well, the company thinks that everyone is a-OK with the fact that two separate apps need to be used for the same service, something that caused quite a stir in the summer of 2014 when the company forced people install the Messenger app in order to keep in touch with friends and family. Well, if you haven't liked Messenger up to this point, just wait until you see what's in store for Q2: advertising. According to a document that was leaked to TechCrunch, Facebook is planning to bring advertising to its Messenger app, which up to this point has been completely devoid of anything resembling an ad. However, this is a case where it...
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Users of the Chrome beta for Android are in for a bit of a treat, as the latest version has added support for "Physical Web" beacons. Don't worry if you've never heard of these, because most haven't. Google did talk about it a bit last summer, and it seems like a feature that could be incredibly useful at times. The logic behind the name of "Physical Web" is that data is distributed locally; not over the Internet. The goal is to relay information to those nearby that would prove useful. Say, for example, you're in a restaurant, and as you wait for a seat, a beacon beams the menu to your phone so that you can get a head-start on your choices. Or, you're waiting in line at the airport, and use...
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It seems certain that we've all managed to wind up on a website at some point in time that had misleading elements, such as fake download buttons. While piracy is going to be the first thing that springs to many minds when this kind of sketchiness is brought up, it's hardly exclusive to that area. Some websites that host completely legitimate software still have misleading advertising, and let's face it: we've been dealing with it for way too long. Well, if Google has its way, we're not going to have to worry about such misleading advertising in the future. Back in November, the company released an update to its Chrome Web browser that helps protect users from deceptive tactics (causing you to...
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Through a message that's kept as succinct as possible, Apple has announced that it will be pulling the plug on the iAd App Network on June 30. If this service doesn't sound familiar, don't fret: it was designed for developers to allow advertising in their apps for other apps. If you just launched a new app, for example, you could promote it through other apps to gain exposure. A simple mechanic, but one that apparently hasn't delivered the results Apple would have liked to have seen. "The iAd App Network will be discontinued as of June 30, 2016," Apple writes. "Although we are no longer accepting new apps into the network, advertising campaigns may continue to run and you can still earn advertising...
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Google might be in the midst of dealing with some EU antitrust accusations regarding its shopping platform, but that hasn't slowed it down from making worthwhile upgrades to the service. Just in time for the holidays, the company has overhauled its Google Shopping search engine, and has put a major emphasis on mobile shopping, as the company has monitored some massive growth there in recent years. Because mobile shoppers tend to shop in quick bursts, Google has designed its new interface to complement that. At home, it's more comfortable looking into a big screen and browse, whereas on-the-go, there's a point when we're going to want to look up and let the sun readjust our eyes. A major perk...
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YouTube has been planning to introduce subscriptions to remove advertisements from its website for quite some time, and it seems we're on the verge of it finally rolling out. Yesterday, the company sent out an email to content providers requesting them to agree to updated terms; if they fail to do so, their videos will either stop being monetized, or stop being shown in the US. In the email, it's noted that 95% of partners have signed up so far, and given the side-effects of not doing so, that's not too much of a surprise. If you happen to be a YouTube content creator, you'll want to log in before October 22nd and agree to the terms. What remains to be seen is how this revenue will be split up,...
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As with many things, there are both good ways and bad ways to go about advertising. Unfortunately, far too many opt for the latter - especially when your options are limited. The latest culprit is AT&T, which has begun taking advantage of those using its free Wi-Fi hotspots by injecting ads into websites they visit. Right now, some of you might be thinking, "Well, you're using AT&T's free service. It has a right to monetize it.", and that's true. But if there's one thing we've learned from corporations in recent months (or years, for that matter), user security and experience tend to not weigh that heavily on their lists. In this particular case, ads can be injected both at the bottom...
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Amazon is the latest major tech company to kick Adobe's Flash platform to the curb. Effective September 1, 2015, the world's most popular online retailer will no longer accept Flash-based advertisements on its main site or through it's third-party Amazon Advertising Platform (AAP), the company announced this week. Interestingly, it's not Flash's history of security woes that prompted Amazon's decision. "This is driven by recent browser setting updates from Google Chrome, and existing browser settings from Mozilla Firefox and Apple Safari, that limits Flash content displayed on web pages," Amazon explained. "This change ensures customers continue to have a positive, consistent experience across...
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Adobe's Flash platform is running out of friends. You may recall that a few weeks ago Mozilla disabled Flash by default in its Firefox browser due to the discovery of multiple critical vulnerabilities, and around the same time, Facebook's chief security officer urged Adobe to set a kill date for its buggy API. Expect more of those sentiments following a recent week long attack on Yahoo's ad network. Security outfit Malwarebytes discovered the "malvertising" campaign, which kicked off on July 28. It involved hackers purchasing ads across Yahoo's various sites and then injecting them with malicious code. The malware would then seek out vulnerable versions of Flash to deliver payloads and ultimately...
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