Slashdot Mirror
Verizon to Allow Ads on Its Mobile Phones
srizah tipped us to a New York Times article, which has the news that Verizon is going to introduce ads to their phones. The offerings will show up when users browse the internet via their cell service, and will exclude streaming ads that might not work in the mobile format. Sprint began offering ads right on their cell 'deck' in October, and the article indicates that access to cellphone screens is a going concern with online advertisers. From the article: "Even without cooperation from carriers, advertisers have been able to reach consumers visiting off-deck sites, and such marketing has grown in size and in scope. The first advertisers drawn to mobile phones tended to be quick-serve restaurants and hotels -- businesses that people might want access to on the go. But increasingly, there is traditional brand marketing, said Jeff Janer, chief marketing officer for Third Screen Media, a mobile ad management company that pairs advertisers and agencies with providers of mobile content, like USA Today and the Weather Channel."
I was under the impression that we were already paying for the phone service. Granted that there is advertising on Sky and cable services but this is just a drain on battery power. Just because you can doesn't mean you should.
Username: memyself4
Password: memyself
So does this mean subscribers get a fucking discount ?
perpetually dwelling in the -1 pits
I already pay a lot of money for cell phone access. You charge me minutes and money for data access time. If I have to waste some of my money and minutes on advertisements, I will switch cell phone providers. I do not need to be told where to find hotels or shown ads. If I want one, I'll look it up.
For example, Slashdot has slashdot.org/palm for small displays. Do the advertisers all have optimised sites for mobile phones, or do they all continue to spit out 70+ kB of worthless data?
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'
So... they're going to put ads on something I'm already paying extra for? Thanks, Verizon!
Just about every LG phone can be easily changed to use non-Verizon WAP.n et-on-vx8300.html
http://vx8300.blogspot.com/2006/08/free-wap-inter
Colin Dean Go a year without DRM
Operators here haven't tried the described style of advertising. If I understood it correctly, verizon forces users to use their proxy while browsing, and feeds the ads to customers through it.
I'm not sure about mobile data transfer pricing in US but here in Finland operators charge $(euros)/MB rates depending on plan.
Loading ads while browsing would mean you're actually paying your operator for displaying you ads!
There are no atheists when recovering from tape backup.
Free cellphone access? Reduced rates? Free internet access from my cellphone in return for these ads?
Great, not only will they offer terrible service, but now I get an offer to waste my time and bandwidth with advertising.
And whether the advertisers pay for the space (or I would get asked to pay, since it is my phone and service time), it doesn't matter, because I'll be goddamned if I'm going to have a cellphone company foist their own content on me.
All I want to do on my phone and my time is make or receive my phone calls. Since Verizon apparently has a problem sticking to that script, I'm sure there are still others willing to play along...
The problem with socialism is that they always run out of other people's money. - Margaret Thatcher
Didnt the gizmondo try this already? look where they ended up.
The war with islam is a war on the beast
The war on terror is a war for peace
...you better discount my service. I currently have VZW Mobile Web and think it's overpriced due to it's limited content/capabilities, even at only $5 a month. The minute you force me to see ads one of two things will happen: you reduce the price and keep me a subscriber (to Mobile Web) or I drop the service and you lose my $5 a month. You can't make me pay the full price if you're forcing ads. Ads = free or substantially reduced rate.
It's called lose not loose LOSE LOSE LOSE GODDAMNIT
pheww... Now I'm ok [/venting]
Syllable 0.62 is here at last!!!
Might be a marketing executive.
Personally, i make it a point of not shopping at places that shove their ads in my face. And reward the ones that dont, with my business. not that my little influence in the world will close a company down, but i at least did my part. Have you?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
So in addition to charging advertisers for ad space, Verizon will also be charging users for the additional data download. Not just text, but images, and potentially video in the future.
Given Verizon's past on screwing their customers, like locking down BlueTooth features on phones, and even wired data connections on Treo's, why am I not surprised.
I'll sign up for Verizon data service just as soon as it's free, which will be the case because of the ads. Surely they don't expect me to pay twice. Right? Right?
I eagerly await the Java phone port of Bonzi Buddy.
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
Well, since cable providers make you pay for commercials, I can see where there backwards logic comes from. I watched a Dateline episode about advertiers recently and I bet they saw this coming. You see, their research lead them to believe that as advertising becomes more present in daily life it becomes background noise an over time the advertisers must continue to annoy the customer even more to keep their attention.
I fully expect the ad oriented entertainent system to die horribly in 30 years. Either that or we all get remotes in our heads telling us what to do.
I don't get it.
On the other hand, if I was the CEO of Verizon, I would probably be itching for a cut of the advertising profits. It's a global economy, what can you do? Get on, or get out of the way.
IANAL, but it would seem that some of this could fall under many states newly enacted statutes with regard to Unsolicited Advertising [naw.org].
Verizon had better be careful, lest they end up with a barage of class-action lawsuits...
Opinion:=TMyOpinion.Create(Me);
-b.
I don't live in US but my mobile service provider has this annoying habbit of flooding their customers with SMS ads of their latest-and-greatest campaign.
Granted, they sent us the campaign ad once, that's, let's say, bearable. But then they proceeded sending it every day and on every reload. My parents, which have mobiles, are not 100% familiar with the additional features of their mobile phone (besides making you know: phone calls), so those messages confuse them additionally and needless to say every time I receive an SMS I have to go out of my way to stop, open my cellphone, read it, delete it (since it may actually be important).
So this way armed with bad feelings I called them and said "ok, can you please tell your supervisors up the chain that I do not wish to receive any more ads on my personal cellphone, especially I don't wanna receive the same exact SMS message telling me to join your campaign every day. If I wanted to join it, one SMS would be sufficient, thanks".
The answer from the support: "well there's nothing wrong with the ads, I mean: there's also ads on the TV right, if you don't like them, you don't watch them".
Me: "But I pay for this service, why augment it with ads? If I don't want those ads what's the use of sending them to me?"
Support: "Well you also pay for your cable right?"
After a conversation like this you know the root cause of the issue: zero respect for the customer and zero research on what effect their actions have.
Well, guess who's switching to the competition next year (when a new law comes in place that mandates I can keep my phone number..)
And if they make it there don't pay the data bill for them.
Micro pop-ups! Test your IQ! Spank the monkey and win a prize!
The world is my oyster. That's why it's always in a stew.
Cell phones and last mile connectivity to your house. Very different things but both suffer from the same problems. Until the service and the connectivity or end device are separated out, consumers will be stuck with what a few companies are willing to offer.
Image having Verizon DSL and having to use a Verizon supplied computer with a two year contract. We can't have anyone plugging just any old computer into our network, imagine the performance, disruptions and interference that would cause! Sounds just like the AT&T argument with home phones that lasted well into the 70's until they were broken up.
The air waves and last mile connectivity should not be tied to a specific company. Cell phones and cell service providers should be separated. Until that happens, we are all stuck in a lack of innovation and being nicked to death due to the lack of real competition.
First time I see spam on my mobile phone, I will drop that vendor like a bad habit.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Well that's great. Maybe I'll get a good Sprint, T-Mobile or Cingular sales add so I can change my service over to get away from it.
-JWR
They want you loosed! Free from the confinement imposed by non-mobile phones. And being loosed is no reason to find a new cell phone service. The sooner you realize that, the sooner you can stazt dealing with problems caused by cell-phones.
Charging you for ads that they make money on is a problem to switch companies, of course, but that's something that you should worry about after you realize that you've been loosed from the confinement imposed by traditional phones. I don't really think you're ready for that yet.
You've got to crawl before you can walk. Deal with being loosed first.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
I know that I'm probably old fashioned, but doesn't the word offer indicate the ability to refuse said offer? If a mobile service provider is forcing advertising on you, that's not an offer...to me it's nothing more than the same kind of deal where your neighborhood maffia "offers" you protection against potential damages that might be incurred if you don't pay them.
I feel like death on a soda cracker.
Well, it's a good thing I don't pay for mobile web.
And how long before audio-ads appear when you call someone? Or before they add ADs in your phone's contact book?
-Em
RelevantElephants: A Somatic WebComic...
Your mobile networks suck. It's sucks to be a customer, it even sucks to be an inbound roamer.
Send a message and stop using the phone for web surfing! I'm betting they make more off the bandwidth charges than the ad revenues, and really - who needs to do this? Why not just use a laptop with a wireless connection?
I may be a Luddite as I just use the damn phone for calling people and as an alarm clock, but I'm not the one paying to look at ads on my phone, either.
Interesting concept. Aggravate the cell phone user directly, and then s/he won't want to use a cell phone while driving or at the movies.......
Well as I see it Advertisments are well and good just as long my next bill is lowered. They Don't charge me for the adds. And they explain in the bill how much I have saved in the adds. If you are paying for a service and you are going to get adds in it they should show you how much you are saving due to these adds.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
The day I see unsolicited ads on my cell phone is the day I shitcan my carrier for another one, and I won't care what it costs in termination fees. There's a limit to the amount of bullshit I can put up with.
.nosig
Sprint began offering ads right on their cell 'deck' in October. Observe that even our /. poster has been reprogrammed by our Advertising Overlords. I would welcome them, but they arrived long ago.
I am reminded of a time in the distant past, when I used AOL for DOS when they charged per minute and dialup POPs were 14400bps. It took me forever to figure out why I couldn't connect faster than 2400 baud. Turns out that AOL's POPs were only 14400 in major metro areas; I was not in one, so my POP was 2400 baud.
And then, on each connection, I was "downloading new art" for five minutes. When I finally put all the pieces together (no thanks to the existing AOL support), I canceled immediately.
People are much smarter these days. When someone sees an advertisement, they know that the merchant selling the product is paying the media service to deliver the ad, whether it's TV, newspaper, billboard, radio, internet, whatever. There will be a lot of "Hey, WTF?" being shouted by Verizon mobile internet users.
Web 2.0 == Giant Blogspam Circle Jerk
"I don't see it as unsolicited."
This is MY web connection. I pay Verizon for this service. What you are suggesting is akin to saying that my ISP can force me to view their advertisments before allowing me to surf the web. Nope, sorry, won't wash with me. I am paying a "provider" to provide "access", not "content". there is a HUGE difference here. I don't want their content, so I see no reason why I should have to pay (see bandwidth utilization) for their "content".
As for "If you don't want ads then pick one that does not show ads. You also have the choice of not using cell service at all. There is nothing unsolicited here. Every party enters these agreements voluntarily.", that is a specious argument at best. There are a limited number of players in this field, and if Verizon is allowed to do this, OF COURSE, the other providers will follow suit. Its a revenue stream they cannot ignore. I'm not saying they can not offer this as an optional service, but they will need to re-work the contracts and offer discounts to customers who opt for "content-equipped" access.
I, like I am sure many others here, now depend on cell service. Simply rejecting cell service is not an option, and it shouldn't have to be. There is no argument Verizon, or any other "access" provider can make for these ads other than as a pure-profit center. In so being, they can either offer discounted "access" service along with their "content", or content free access. They can not have it both ways, and my reading of the current legislation indicates that's NOT going to wash with the public or the legislature.
Opinion:=TMyOpinion.Create(Me);
Too true... seems like Verizon needs a visit from Uncle Paul and cousin Vito.
I think that's already been done. One of the long distance companies (AT&T?) had a service that made you listen to an ad before it completed the call.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
For an extra three dollars a month you can get Verizon Popupblocker!
But I have an even better one. How about I give you the finger...
... and you give me my phone call.
Oh wait.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
I thought that it was my phone when I bought it. Are there things that DON'T have any advertisement?
And we all know what will happen. Phones with ads will not become much cheaper. Phones without them will just become more expensive.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Big Deal.. I am in India & they are already sending advertisements disguised as genuine phone calls. You will be in the middle of a meeting or working your a** off when the phone rings. You attend to it & hear a mechanical voice - "Hi.. Get the latest XIIOXXI product @ just Rupees XXX only! To order please call XXXX". WTF!!?
We need the software that runs on our phones to be completely seperate from and uninfluenced by the carriers. Phones, like PCs, need to be accountable directly to their owners, not to someone else. We need serving us to be their very first priority. Ads are just one aspect of this conflict of interest, and it's just going to get worse.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Wow, man. Once you go down that road, where does it stop? We'd have to subtract all the stuff that pollutes our world, the healthcare costs that are used to heal what the pollution does to us, the entertainment sales that go to fund lobbyists that buy laws like DMCA, etc. USA might not even be in the top-10 countries for GDP anymore. That would be a pretty nasty blow to our national ego, don't you think? What are you, a terrorist? ;-)
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
No need to loose your temper.
Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
Yeah, losen up a bit and have a good time.
I am very happy about this. The faster Verizon
self-destructs the better. They regularly cheat their
customers in numerous ways. Perhaps they anticipate WiMax
eliminating their business and have decided to simply
sqeeze every dime out of a dying paradigm.
He just meant that he would cut Verizon loose. Right? Right?
Mencken had it right. So glad that's old news.
That's EXACTLY what they Want you to do. Do you really think it costs them $200+ to do paperwork to cancel your contract? Paying a termination fee on your contract is the equivalent of paying for 4+ months of service instantly.
I don't want to know about your bowel problems or wonder why a cellphone would have anything to do with your asshole, asshole.
It's probably just a post-holiday dip in my reading comprehension skills, but I couldn't figure out wether they are talking about adding ads to their "On Deck" (VZW 'run') sites or to all sites in general. Could someone whose wits are less tinsel addled figure it out and get back to me?
If I start seeing ads while surfing 'general' internet sites on my Samsung 730 then I'm leaving Verizon for the first time since 1994. I am NOT paying $45 a month for unlimited data in a 1X RTT coverage area for VZW and it's 'partners' to push a bunch of crap onto my browsing experience.
for keeping my Motorola StarTec. Lets see Verizon post one of their advertisements on that phone.....
douchebag losers
Ah, I believe that's "douchbag loosers".
Which is kind of gross, actually.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Languages evolve. Live with it. If you're willing to use the word "okay" and misspell it "ok" or at the very least not capitalize it, you can live with "loose". It's a more sensible spelling anyway.
If you're unwilling to put up with "loose" then you shouldn't be using "OK" either.
... if they cut the charges for ringtones down from $2.99 each and maybe even reduce my monthly bill. I'd gladly view an ad when I'm texting or whatever, if it means I can save a few bucks a month.
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
the phones aren't Verizon's, they belong to the customer.
If they want to send me advertising, it might be OK with me if they also subsidize my airtime, say with 2 minutes of usage credit for every ad.
Regardless, I'll still make a concerted effort to avoide buying from these spammers.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Bite me.
If the g'vt kept the data on you that google does you'd better believe you'd be calling it "doing evil"
you'll be lost if you lose your cool over loose being used as a loss.
Shadus
Hey.... relax man..... losen up!
You are checking your backups, aren't you?
Yes, but (unless things have changed a lot since I looked last) US cable providers don't inject ads into the web sites you view.
As an Australian this worries me, because sure as fuck some arsehat over here is going to look at this and think its a great way to double shaft users, I was thinking about upgrading to a 3g phone from my old nokia brick, but now I might not.
...
Ditto... if I am trying to perform business over my phone on my company website at the fringe of signal range on 1xRTT getting maybe 33.6kbps and I start getting verizon injected ads over my company website sucking up my barely there bandwidth, I'll drop Verizon in an instant and I've been with them since 2000. I pay the extra $60/month for unlimited data and PAM for business, not for playing around looking at ads.
What is next? Forcibly injected ads on your PC when using Verizon PCCARD or using Phone-As-Modem??? OTOH if verizon wants text ads on verizon run sites, I could care less though with max res of 320x200 there is barely room for content much less ads. Why don't we have 640x480 windows mobile yet? C'mon... at least 512x384 or 400x300 (I feel like I'm setting resolutions for DOOM II).
Check out how COOL I am by being able to block MySpace advertisements!!!
www.myspace.com/bboyneko
Nothing you can do to stop me. You're all n00bs and my page blows yours away.
It's called lose not loose LOSE LOSE LOSE GODDAMNIT
Don't loose your cool, man.
I am not a sig.
I don't know about Verizon, but my provider in Germany (Vodafone) has so many adds on their WAP cards I wrote myself a script to dissect a few RSS streams and post them on my own site just so I can get the weather and some news without clicking past 5 cards of ads.
-- Put crudely, the world is an extremely large problem instance. (Russel/Norvig Artificial Intelligence)
Dude, your loosing it.
I realize it probably won't help you, but for anyone else reading this there's one thing that will stop your carrier from spamming you with text messages: ask them to "deprovision" text messaging from your account.
This has the side effect of blocking all text messages, which is a pleasant side effect for me, but may be unpleasant for other people. At any rate, it may be your only recourse...but don't forget to file a complaint with the FCC (if you're in the US) if for no other reason to make you feel better.
I loathe spam -- I administer an email system for a small company -- and being harangued by advertising really rubs me the wrong way. Text messaging spam is way over the top.
So, verizon can choose to offer me up as another set of eyeballs to advertisers. Can I opt out of receiving this newfangled feature? Or do I have to bounce to a new carrier until they adopt that policy, and then to the next, so forth and so on?
Wow... you've got to be kidding me here. How is this evolving language in the slightest? The linguist in me wants to kill you.
I'm a high minute user of mobile phones for business. My Verizon V710, the model with crippled bluetooth, has a camera, can download ring tones, and has a system which would charge me a quarter for each picture I email. It can also web browse. Which of these features do I use ?? NONE ! I wanted to use the phone to synch to my car, but luckily found out Verizon crippled bluetooth prior to spending megabux at the car dealer for the phone package. Pay for a picture ...not
buy a ringtone ? are you guys tripping ?
the video game idea was cool, but when I found out it was $5 per month for tetris, I passed.
Just make the phone work.....don't sell me crap, don't make it my web browser, don't ever, ever send me an ad on a PAY service I spend a lot of money on....you don't need advert support, you already have paying customer.
Now, if you'd figure out a way to let me synch the phone to my Palm device, I'd pay for that, but that's not happening...it would be too useful and too many rights holders would have to agree.
as they're not lypozene, proactive, or that fuck-my-penis-up type medication. god damn! do i hate those comercials!
Bitching, Bitching, Bitching... If people posting here are like 95% of the american consumer base, you'll do what everyone else does: Accept it. Face it - As long as it comes in increments, the US citizens having an amazing tolerance to others chipping away what we take for granted. Ads in movies, Gas Prices, Electricity, Cost of Milk at your grocer, Privacy Laws etc. That first price wasn't bad - Oh Well. *1 MONTHS LATER* Oh. It went up again, well, it wasn't that much of a jump from what it was last time - *2 MONTHS LATER* DITTO *3 MONTHS LATER*....... To those who would actually switch your plan, or complain: Kudos to you. You've done more than most any other individual would. To everyone else, well suck it up. And even if you don't now, you will eventually.
Fuck this.
I knew there was a reason I stopped paying my cellphone bill.
You can't take the sky from me.
Well, I'm a VZW customer who was already contemplating his exit for the end of contract in April '07, but now I'm PLANNING it. I might even eat the early termination fee and jump ship within a month.
It's not like my current phone can actually do wireless web; it's a Nokia 6015i with a 96x65 12-bit color screen. But I was contemplating getting a rather nice dumbphone, since I'm supposed to be the techie with the flashy phone that has an onboard digital camera, mobile web, and hi-res screen, and not the econobar. But Verizon has almost nothing for the bar / slider format aside from two LG models (and I really don't like much of what LG is offering lately). Your VZW dumbphone vendor must be LG, Motorola (and almost none of Moto's good products), Samsung, or Pantech. And of course, CDMA 1x at least, which will be useless in Europe and much of the rest of the world.
And then you have the Borg interface. All Verizon dumbphones now have the exact same interface. Even if the specific port of the VZW UI interface is much slower than the phone's native UI, it goes on there. This results in the unavoidable menu lag. Once upon a time, you could get their lowest-end phone, and it would only have the Verizon bitmap on powerup (in fact this is exactly why I picked up the 6015i; Verizon's Borg interface was restricted to the more expensive phones then).
So if I did stick with Verizon, I'd be trapped with either a crappy phone with no Bluetooth, or an expensive phone with restricted (or hacked) Bluetooth, the laggy red Borg UI, the Pay Us Now! feature, the VCast spamvertising network, and now WAP spam. As for the choices, Sprint has more spamvertising and no phones to speak of, Nextel has Vegas odds for radio reception, and Cingular has their legendary customer disservice department. Gee, I wonder where I'm going...
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
When Verizon popped up ads for the cell phone users, I remained silent; I was not a cell phone user.
When Verizon popped up ads for FIOS users, I remained silent; I was not a FIOS user.
When Verizon started dialtone ads on my land-line, I cance<NO CARRIER>
I am SO happy that the operator subsidized model of mobile phone business did not take off in India. Here we use both GSM and CDMA (GSM dominates) and mobile operators just sell phone connections (GSM SIM cards). So no 'locking the phone down' bullshit.
That said, I was surprised to note my provider Hutch was blocking access to a couple of free ringtone websites that offered download via WAP.
This proves no problem to me, as I can anyway transfer anything between my phone and PC with the data cable.
The downside is that high end mobile phones are expensive, and they depreciate in value rather fast as newer models are introduced.
Oh, and both incoming calls and SMSes have been free since 2001, by order of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India. In fact, the mobile phone market in India really took off only after this move.
"..One hosts to look them up, one DNS to find them, and in the darkness BIND them."
This sounds like the first major example of a Network Neutrality violation. If I read the article correctly, this is an ISP inserting ads into other people's web pages. Or are they talking about browsing only Verizon pages? At which point this is dumb, but not a big shocker. How does an individual consumer contact the FCC?
The early termination fee is supposed to cover the cost of the subsidy on the cost of the phone, the sales droids (commission,) etc. IMHO, it should be prorated from the date you had service, but it's not.
Likewise, anybody selling ad space on their website specifically aimed at mobile users would surely be annoyed learning about the mobile network provider messing up the users' experience with additional ads. If the user can't easily identify the source (website or network provider) of each ad visible on that tiny display (say, by having a fixed portion of it reserved for network ads), then I could definitely see a case of copyright infringement.
Filing a lawsuit over it would obviously be out of the question for most websites, but anybody could use a DNS-based blacklist to ban the IP address ranges of providers known to sell this kind of advertising space. Then the users would be left with ad-sponsored 403 messages instead, telling them about their providers ripping them off. I wonder how many advertisers would appreciate being associated primarly with rip-offs and error messages?
If you want to advertise on the Internet, you should buy space on the public website itself, not on individual HTTP sessions accessing said website or any other private communication channel. What if I were to buy ad space on the christmas cards you send to friends and family, after you have mailed them?