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Doubleclick Exits The Ad-Tracking Business

Posted by timothy on from the these-things-travel-in-packs dept.

Masem writes: "Cnet is reporting that Doubleclick closed down its ad tracking program as of Dec 31 2001, and is shifting from a media company to research and development for online ventures. Doubleclick claims they had upwards of 100million unique tracking profiles at the height of their run, but with the dot-com bust and lower ad revenue rates, ad tracking ran into the red. Even after the worrisome aquition of Abacus Online (which was rumored to allow Doubleclick to connect online and offline consumer profiles), the company could not turn a buck on ad revenues. Time to remove that 'doubleclick.com 127.0.0.1' from /etc/hosts now?""

3 of 209 comments (clear)

  1. Well, it's something at least by M_Talon · · Score: 2, Redundant

    Nice to see there's a business case out there now against profiling Internet users for ads. Too bad it will most likely be looked at as a fluke failure ("oh they charged too much, we'll charge less") that won't stop the practice. Doubleclick ultimately failed in this venture because they found themselves in a PR fiasco. They gave people a way to opt out, and a lot of people did it. If I was buying advertising, I wouldn't pay the extra for a service that was slammed in the news and that people could choose not to use. Doesn't mean some marketroid out there won't still think it's a great idea.

    We haven't heard the last of the advertising profiles. There might be a light at the end of the tunnel, though. The decision will ultimately be decided by the Net surfers who choose to avoid intrusive advertising.

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    Electronic Frontier Foundation for online civil rights information
  2. DIE by Sarcasmooo! · · Score: 1, Redundant

    This is obviously not going to be one of my more insightful contributions, but DIE. DIE DIE DIE you horrible load of crap. Who knew before you that a 'trojan-esque', full frontal assault on personal privacy could ever be legitimized as 'harmless, wholesome, American, capitalistic marketing'. BUUURRRN.

  3. Confusing the facts (again)... by Brendan+Byrd · · Score: 4, Redundant

    They are getting out of the profile-tracking business, not the ad business. If you didn't notice, DoubleClick's ads are used on virtually every major web site everywhere. They aren't just going to walk away from that.

    Frankly, this is barely newsworthy. I guess it's worth mentioning because it's good news for privacy advocates, but other than that, it's just "ad product gets cancelled...big whoop".

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    Zodiac Survey