As AdAge reports, a new online advertising model called IntelliTXT has already earned the ire of some . The ad would appear as links within the text of articles and message boards and would expand if you hovered over them. In other words, they'd perform a lot like a pop-up. And we all know how users love those.
Importantly for writers and journalists, though, there's the matter of their relevancy. For example, one poster to Off-Road.com complained about "not being able to write 'Jeep' without generating a pop-up ad." Even worse, might the ads be served up which oppose the tenor of your content? Let's suppose you're writing a piece about gun control. You might find text in your essay linking to pro-gun sites. If you're writing a piece decrying the legalization of pot, your text could be linked to Legalize! If you're writing about abortion rights, your text could include a link to the far right Abortion No site. Note how I didn't link to the site just then? Well, I mightn't have any choice in another venue.
Nothing wrong with presenting opposing views, of course, but shouldn't a writer's very words be left to stand for themselves?
IntelliTXT is a product of Vibrant Media. There's another link I elected to serve.
BetaNews already uses the technology, though it looks like the IntelliTXT links are restricted from the homepage. Hover over the words "portable" and "HP" in this story, however, for a demo.
(Via Slashdot) (More on new approaches to web advertising on News.com.)
P.S. Remember Microsoft's similarly bright idea with Smart Tags and how popular they were?
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