Ads, Online Advertising | featured news

France's government says it has persuaded a leading Internet provider to stop blocking online advertisements — a controversial move that would have hit online search giants such as Google.

Facebook is so large that it now accounts for about one out of every three ad impressions in the U.S., according to the latest statistics from comScore Ad Metrix. In the first quarter of 2011, comScore estimates that 1.1 trillion ads were served to U.S. Internet users, and 346 billion of those (or 31 percent) were on Facebook.

Spending on U.S. Internet ads rose 15% to $26 billion last year, outpacing traditional media and surpassing newspaper ad revenue for the first time.

Ads tailored to online shoppers based on the products they have perused are leaving consumers with an eerie feeling.

Last week, media consultant Frederic Filloux argued in his Monday Note and, through syndication, in the Washington Post that the digital ad industry is like an early-stage cancer patient -- already dying but still in denial. And, as the Post called them in its headline, smug.

Internet advertising revenues in the U.S. hit $5.9 billion for Q1 2010, representing a 7.5 percent increase over the same period in 2009, according to numbers released moments ago by the Interactive Advertising Bureau in tandem with PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Ads will be rolled out to two to 10 percent of users via search on Twitter.com beginning today.

Digg took a big risk when they added in-line advertisements that users could digg or bury. Four months later, however, early signs indicate that DiggAds are a win for all parties involved: users, advertisers, and especially Digg.