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Mandrake Linux 9.2, Adware Version

Posted by michael on from the maybe-microsoft-will-advertise dept.

thedarb writes "Mandrake has decided to sell ads to be seen during installation, web browsing and in screen savers. This all comes in their upcoming 9.2 release. Seven G's and you could put your face in their installer." Update: 09/12 18:07 GMT by M : Mandrake has a page about the ads.

2 of 618 comments (clear)

  1. I was a bit worried about this... by Future+Man+3000 · · Score: 5, Informative
    Until I read in the article that it's just the download version. Hey, it's a better form of revenue generation from free products than spyware, I guess.

    There might be other slow-loading free software projects that could benefit from this, too, such as KDE or Mozilla. As long as the ads are for techie/computer stuff that's interesting I'm cool with it.

    --

    I never vote for anyone. I always vote against.
    -- W.C. Fields

  2. Re:I can't help but think... by digidave · · Score: 5, Informative

    Web site ad revenues aren't spotty, they're quite good. Do you think Google is having problems finding advertisers?

    The trouble is that any doofus who runs a web site expects that clickthrough banner ads should generate some revenue. Webmasters try to generate revenue from mediocre traffic. You can't do that in any other form of advertising, so I don't see why you should be able to on the web.

    The web site I run at work generates about $350,000/year in legitimate ads (Ford, TD Bank, Esso, McDonalds, Government of Canada, etc) and none of that money comes from clickthroughs. We charge appropriately for the size of the audience and because we have good audience demographic information it makes it really easy to sell ads. And no popups!

    --
    The global economy is a great thing until you feel it locally.