Gord Hotchkiss at MediaPost's Search Insiders Summit
"1. Search is 2% of all media budget. Big agencies aren't incented to 'get' search.

2. To agencies, search is DR (direct response) and should be relegated to a DR silo and judged on DR metrics.

3. Search is granular (lots of pushing little levers). That's not what big agencies do best.

4. Agencies exist to persuade people to buy something when they weren't considering it. Search is 'multiple choice' giving people a list of things to choose from when they're already in the consideration phase."

DoubleClick Performics experienced a system outage due to a complete power failure at their data center at approximately 9:30 a.m. CST on Saturday, Dec. 8, 2007. While data was protected, the issue affected tracking, links and system availability. Power was restored and tracking and links were operational by approximately 2:30 p.m. CST. The interface experienced intermittent downtime throughout the afternoon but tracking is operational. We sincerely apologize for this situation. The root cause remains under investigation and updates will be forthcoming as more is known.

Representatives makes Do-Not-Call Registry permanent
The US House of Representatives voted to make the Do-Not-Call Registry list permanent. The measure still needs approval from the Senate. Before the passage of the Do Not Call Improvement Act, consumers had to renew their participation in the registry every five years. The bill also requires that the FTC remove disconnected and reassigned numbers periodically.

Ask.com starts AskEraser for users seeking privacy
Ask.com yesterday launched AskEraser, a new product that aims to give Internet users more control over their privacy when they search online.

Mixx (a la Digg) + LA Times = ??
Mixx, a social news startup from McLean, VA which announced its first round funding in October, has now added an interesting strategic investor: Los Angeles Times, part of the the hopefully-soon-to-be-private Tribune. Mixx is a bit like Digg, though for non-geeks, and LAT will now integrate the service within its website: Mixx buttons will show up o each LAT story, and LAT's stories will also be syndicated within Mixx' site/service. Mixx sports a number of established media veterans among its ranks: CEO and founder Chris McGill was formerly at USA Today and Yahoo while board members include former AP chairman Burl Osborne and former Yahoo VP Dave Mandelbrot.

Autobytel Sues Insweb Corp
News on the online lead generation front... Autobytel Inc. said Tuesday it filed a patent infringement lawsuit against online insurance quote provider Insweb Corp. in a U.S. District Court seeking damages and a permanent injunction. In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission Autobytel said the suit also names as defendants Leadpoint Inc., Internet Brands Inc. and Auto Internet Marketing Inc. The company alleges infringement of U.S. Patent No. 6,282,517, entitled "Real Time Communication of Purchase Requests," but said it can't be sure the patent will be enforceable or the action will be successful.

(45 MINUTES)
This Week's Gossip and News:
- Search, Agencies, Gord Hotchkiss & Local!
- Debating Monetization of and Viability of Search (as we know it!)
- Search Privacy Erasers: PR or Real Movement?

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Perhaps best summarized by Kevin Ryan:


"I was surprised when getting involved with this conference how many people could not distinguish between strategy and tactic."

Great Conference Coverage Recaps: SES Chicago & PubCon Vegas 2007




THIS WEEK'S NEWS
Salesforce.com Launches Social Leads Network
Salesforce.com is rolling out features that allow customers to share sales leads, product info and other communications securely. With the site's subscriber base expected to pass the one million mark by the end of December, the firm hopes to turn its membership to an advantage by inviting them to make transactions and share information, according to ZD Net. The service focuses primarily on sharing and building sales lead and CRM-related information. Dell and DoubleClick are already on board with the new features. Connections between businesses cost just $100 a month, with the inviting party paying the fee.

Major Copyright Bill Boosts Penalties, Creates New Agency
Congress is preparing to amend copyright law. Politicians want to increase penalties for copyright infringement. Top Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday introduced a sweeping 69-page bill that ratchets up civil penalties for copyright infringement, boosts criminal enforcement, and even creates a new federal agency charged with bringing about a national and international copyright crackdown. The legislation, called the Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act, or PRO IP Act. Probably the most extensive part of the PRO IP Act is its creation of a new federal bureaucracy called the White House Intellectual Property Enforcement Representative, or WHIPER. The head of WHIPER would be appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate.

Nielsen Launches Video DRM/tracking/digital mark Service
Nielsen is releasing a new service that will guarantee that online videos are distributed in ways that are approved by the owners of the original content. The Wall Street Journal reports that the service may be announced as early as Wednesday. Nielsen is looking to offer this to media companies including the Discovery Channel and NBCU. It was reported that the company has already approached Fox and Google regarding the service called Digital Media Manager, which will be available next spring the report continued.

Google Offers Free Trackable Phone Numbers
As reported by Sebastien Provencher, Google is now offering free trackable phone numbers to advertisers in the U.S., with phone activity reporting through the AdWords interface.

Research: Social Media Spending to Zoom
A survey of 260 senior marketing PR and marcom professionals by the Society for New Communications Research found that two-thirds plan to increase spending on social media during the next 12 months and 81% expect to spend at least as much on social media marketing as on traditional marketing in five years. Someone is figuring this out.

Google and Yahoo Will Turn eMail and Personal Pages into Social Networks
Ignore Orkut, OpenSocial, Yahoo Mash and Yahoo 360. These are just the beginning. Google and Yahoo have come up with new plans to respond to the challenge from MySpace and Facebook: They hope to turn their e-mail systems and personalized home page services (iGoogle and MyYahoo) into social networks. Web-based e-mail systems already contain much of what Facebook calls the social graph — the connections between people. That's why the social networks offer to import the e-mail address books of new users to jump-start their list of friends. Yahoo and Google realize that they have this information and can use it to build their own services that connect people to their contacts.

Trademark Office Rejects Hormel's Claim Against Spam Arrest
In a stinging loss, meat company Hormel's effort to have anti-spam firm Spam Arrest's trademark registration canceled has been dismissed. This is a huge letdown for a company that has rigorously defended its SPAM trademark against dozens of firms. However, because of an odd accompanying decision, what this means to all the other technology firms battling Hormel over use of the word spam is unclear. A three-judge panel on Nov. 21 unanimously decided in favor of Spam Arrest, which argued that the word spam in relation to e-mail is a generic term that is not likely to dilute Hormel's Spam trademarks.

DoubleClick Performics Crashes!
DoubleClick Performics experienced a system outage due to a complete power failure at their data center at approximately 9:30 a.m. CST on Saturday, Dec. 8, 2007. They claim in an email that data was protected, the issue affected tracking, links and system availability. Power was restored and tracking and links were operational by approximately 2:30 p.m. CST. The interface experienced intermittent downtime throughout the afternoon but tracking is operational. The company reports, "The root cause remains under investigation and updates will be forthcoming as more is known."

Zuckerberg Flogs Himself, Apologizes
Perhaps Mr. Zuckerberg is the poster child for a coming bubble?

GSI Commerce agrees to buy European fulfillment provider Zendor.com Ltd.
Targeting retail e-commerce growth in Europe, turnkey e-commerce systems provider GSI Commerce Inc. has agreed to pay approximately $7.9 million in cash to acquire U.K.-based Zendor.com Ltd., a provider of fulfillment and customer care services with five U.K. retailer clients, GSI said today. The deal would increase GSI’s client base to 85 companies.

buy at, Inc. Launches Affiliate Network in the US
Read more from buy at Inc.'s President, Malcolm Cowley, as he describes his aim -- to eat the lunch of affiliate marketing networks/companies here in the U.S.

Nokia: The Future of Music
Nokia's plan to offer unlimited music downloads challenges the dominant pay-per-track sales model and is likely to upset carriers already worried that Nokia is poaching their customer relationships. The world's biggest cellphone maker announced a deal on Tuesday with top record label Universal that will give customers buying particular Nokia devices unlimited access to millions of tracks for a year and allow them to keep the music afterwards. Nokia hopes the deal with Universal Music Group -- a unit of Vivendi whose artists include 50 Cent, Sting, and Mariah Carey -- will be followed by deals with the three remaining major international labels, to whom it is already talking.

Google Unleashes a Google Local (Plus) Box Bidding Qar
Google is opening up new social media ad territory -- the coveted Local Plus Box. Ka-ching!

LA Times Invests in Online Music: Digg-like Site
Mixx, a social news startup from McLean, VA which announced its first round funding in October, has now added an interesting strategic investor: Los Angeles Times, part of the the hopefully-soon-to-be-private Tribune. Mixx is a bit like Digg, though for non-geeks, and LAT will now integrate the service within its website: Mixx buttons will show up o each LAT story, and LAT's stories will also be syndicated within Mixx' site/service. Mixx sports a number of established media veterans among its ranks: CEO and founder Chris McGill was formerly at USA Today and Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO) while board members include former AP chairman Burl Osborne and former Yahoo VP Dave Mandelbrot.

This Week's Gossip and News:
- SES, Pubcon and Conferences
- Salesforce.com Goes Social
- Google Offers Trackable Phone Numbers
- Amazon: Kindle, Whispernet and Disruption
- ProIP: Congress Amending Copyright Law

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(35 MINUTES)

This Week's Gossip and News:
- The Risks of Yahoo Stores and Outsourcing eCommerce
- Pacing Google: Mobile, Storage and Wireless
- Ain't Gettin' No Pay Per Click Satisfaction
- Another Facebook Blunder: Molson, Booze & Chasing Girls
- Yahoo, Online Jobs and teasing next week

Weekly Insight Talk Back Line:
641-985-5999 x20937#

Call and leave us your UNCENSORED feedback, comments, suggestions, news tips, saucy gossip! We'll consider sharing it with listeners on our next program.

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Amazon's Kindle Bypasses Affiliates and Then Some
Andy Beard asks if Amazon is looking to bypass its affiliates with its new Kindle eBook reader. Sure seems that way and affiliates aren't the only ones being bypassed! Wireless, digital downloads of books are made possible by Amazon Whispernet, a proprietary wireless delivery system that uses the same national high-speed data network used by advanced cell phones. Kindle users shop the Kindle store via the reader, and download books and other content without even having to find a Wi-Fi hotspot, according to Amazon.

Facebook Retreats on its Buying Beacon
ZDNet's Steve O'Hear: BusinessWeek is reporting that Facebook executives have been contemplating a backtrack on the social networking site's new advertising play, Project Beacon. The system automatically publish interactions users make on any of the 44 participating sites (from Blockbuster, Joost, to Overstock.com) onto their Facebook mini-feed, so that Facebook "friends" are able to track those interactions, such as making a purchase or renting a movie. As it stands, however, users are opted into Beacon by default, and only have the option to opt-out on a per site or per interaction basis.

Molson: The Latest Social Media Blunder
Molson brewing company has pulled a promotion on Facebook after complaints that they promote binge drinking. They ran a photo contest targeting 19-24 year old college students. Called the The Molson Canadian Nation Campus Challenge the ad said, "Be the #1 party school in Canada" and says that the school with the most pictures uploaded would win a trip for five people to spend spring break in Cancun, Mexico. The next line said: "Show everyone how you and your crew get the party started!" Then it listed the top 10 party schools.Universities and parents both contacted the company to complain. Xavier University administrator Joe MacDonald, who is the dean of students said: "This is not something that is welcome within our campus community."

The Federal Trade Commission has reached a settlement with Adteractive
The FTC is settling with Adteractive for its alleged use of "deceptive" spam e-mails and online advertising to draw people to its Web sites. The settlement, filed on behalf of the FTC by the Department of Justice, requires that the San Francisco-based company pay $650,000 in civil penalties. While doing business as FreeGiftWorld.com and SamplePromotionsGroup.com, Adteractive allegedly sent e-mail spam to consumers advertising free gifts such as flat-screen televisions and laptops. For example, one e-mail subject line used by the company stated, "Congratulations! Claim Your Choice of Sony, HP or Gateway Laptop," according to the FTC. However, when consumers went to Adteractive's promotional Web sites, they discovered that these items weren’t free, said Stephen Cohen, senior attorney for the FTC.

TV Stations to Sell Google AdWords
What this means is that Hearst-Argyle will now sell more comprehensive advertising solutions to its clients. Instead of just print and television, now they can also leverage online - helping to increase control over a client's advertising budget. Hearst-Argyle Television and Google have entered a new strategic agreement today where Hearst-Argyle, operator of 29 TV stations and more than 30 Websites, will become an official reseller and will use its Web sales force to provide marketers in its 26 local markets access to Google AdWords.

Rumor: News Corp to Buy LinkedIn
VentureBeat ran a follow-up story, also claiming a "well-placed" source. The post adds to Butcher's theory: News Corp. would incorporate LinkedIn into its various newspaper properties around the world. "News Corp.'s strategy, from what we understand: Somehow integrate LinkedIn's network with the Wall Street Journal as well as its other newspapers around the world, hopefully figuring out how to recoup News Corp.'s newspapers' declining classified ad revenue in the process."

Research: Social Media Spending to Zoom
A survey of 260 senior marketing PR and marcom professionals by the Society for New Communications Research found that two-thirds plan to increase spending on social media during the next 12 months and 81% expect to spend at least as much on social media marketing as on traditional marketing in five years. Someone is figuring this out.

Yahoo Stores Down on Cyber Monday
Ouch. There's already movement among marketers to sue Yahoo.

Google and Yahoo Will Turn eMail and Personal Pages into Social Networks
Ignore Orkut, OpenSocial, Yahoo Mash and Yahoo 360. These are just the beginning. Google and Yahoo have come up with new plans to respond to the challenge from MySpace and Facebook: They hope to turn their e-mail systems and personalized home page services (iGoogle and MyYahoo) into social networks. Web-based e-mail systems already contain much of what Facebook calls the social graph — the connections between people. That's why the social networks offer to import the e-mail address books of new users to jump-start their list of friends. Yahoo and Google realize that they have this information and can use it to build their own services that connect people to their contacts.

The New York Daily News Joining Yahoo's Newspaper Alliance
This is the fifth-largest circulation newspaper in the US. The consortium launched last November with Belo, Cox Newspapers and Hearst Newspapers as premier members, and membership has since tripled to include nearly 400 newspapers from 21 publishing groups. The Daily News, with a reported weekly online and print readership of 4.5 million, is the largest to join Yahoo's year-old group. Consortium partners use Yahoo's HotJobs to amp up their job listings and send out local ads to a national audience. HotJobs has launched 160 newspaper co-branded sites to date, serving 377 newspapers. In return, Yahoo is allowed to sell national ads on individual newspaper sites.

Google Readying for 'GDrive' Launch
Google is reportedly preparing to roll out its previously-dubbed "GDrive" online storage service in as early as a few months, according to sources cited in a Wall Street Journal report. While online storage services are already available from third-parties (including from rivals Microsoft and Yahoo!), Google's potential offering is of interest because of high expectations the company can offer a simplified, reliable service with tie-ins to its Apps suite. However, Google faces a number of obstacles in creating a service that meaningfully challenges Microsoft's long dominance of the way people access and store files. Key concerns are privacy, which is partially related to whether advertisements will be displayed as a part of using the service, and copyright issues related to the capability of sharing files, including media files. Also of importance is the reliability of the service and it having a simple on/offline user interface, which makes using the storage similar to accessing a local hard drive.

Fox Interactive to Power Other Web Sites Too
TechCrunch: Fox Interactive Media (FIM), the online arm of News Corp has plans to become a full service online advertising agency that provides advertising to non-News Corp sites. Peter Levinsohn said that the service, known internally as "FIM Serve" was originally built to serve advertising on MySpace, which would be presumed to be part of, or the same service announced by MySpace November 4. He also noted that the service focuses on graphical advertising and would not conflict with the Google/ MySpace search listings deal.

Google Puts SEO in the Hands of USERS!
Google is experimenting with Digg style voting features on search results that allow users to vote up or bury search results they see. The program, part of Google Labs, works like this: This experiment lets you influence your search experience by adding, moving, and removing search results. When you search for the same keywords again, you'll continue to see those changes. If you later want to revert your changes, you can undo any modifications you've made.

WebTrends joins forces with Silverpop

PPC Spending on the Increase but Satisfaction in the Crapper
Retailers are spending more on PPC and will continue to -- but their satisfaction is nil. Go figure. Kinda like cel phones -- we ALL pay lots of money for lousy service... and accept it.

Trademark Office Rejects Hormel's Claim Against Spam Arrest
In a stinging loss, meat company Hormel's effort to have anti-spam firm Spam Arrest's trademark registration canceled has been dismissed. This is a huge letdown for a company that has rigorously defended its SPAM trademark against dozens of firms. However, because of an odd accompanying decision, what this means to all the other technology firms battling Hormel over use of the word spam is unclear. A three-judge panel on Nov. 21 unanimously decided in favor of Spam Arrest, which argued that the word spam in relation to e-mail is a generic term that is not likely to dilute Hormel's Spam trademarks.

Once affiliate manager, blogger, recent reality show hopeful and now (I hear) reality show producer Shmuel Tennenhaus offers up his suggestion for putting together a new, improved and peaceful Iraq.

Brad's Deals

Questions from the audience ranged widely and included "what's the different between 'affiliate' and 'business development' partners?" Ghandi says it's all about perception.

"If you consider your affiliate partnerships to be just revenue share deals then you're limiting your scope," Gandhi says.

What's more he suggests that it's "a very cheap way (for merchants) to do branding" as an inherent part of the cost-per-action affiliate process. When controlled Gandhi suggested it's a boon for merchants.

"If someone starts an affiliate program worst case is the get no sales and free branding... best case is they get branding and sales," says Wilson.

Many of the questions posed to the panel in the Q&A session were aimed squarely at controlling affiliates, network quality and what networks are doing to facilitate greater control for marketers. Surprisingly most network representatives on the panel suggested that since 2004 network quality has been less of an issue for the industry (perhaps in an attempt to quell questions aimed on quality issues).

When asked to comment on trade articles suggesting that affiliate marketing has peaked and there's potential for dis-intermediation Wilson was quick to react by suggesting,

"I've read some of that too and I don't think it's right... I don't think it's sound. People (affiliates) are always going to be doing useful, interesting things. Whether or not we're still able to do that in five years that's a different story but someone will be... and I think there's going to be more of that. If you take the entire affiliate realm I think more of it is going to be that kind of thing and less is going to be the stuff you really can't place."

Henger believes there will be a role for affiliate marketing for a very long time based on its ability to add consumer-side value, "We've trained the consumer, when they shop online, to find a benefit. They derive some type of benefit and affiliate marketing has contributed to that whether it be in the form of a discount or... a rewards program or loyalty points."

Interestingly, Henger's comments seemed to put a box around affiliates that send repeat customers to marketers. Search affiliates were not mentioned and other panelists did not respond.

On the subject of "off line" (not tracked on the Web) affiliate tracking Littleton shared a case study scenario wherein a marketer coded individual catalogs (on affiliate basis) so as to reward future sales (of any kind) coming from customers who had requested a catalog from the marketer.

Sound familiar? It should and isn't this rather 1.0 in a 2.0 world?

Specifically, many affiliates are struggling to survive in a changing world -- from affiliate networks changing link structures to Google and Yahoo Search continually weeding out "thin affiliates" (those providing little or no value in the eyes of search engines). Specifically, affiliates are being forced to provide some kind of tangible value in order to attract regular visitors (not just capture them in search engines and shuttle them on to advertisers). Many affiliates have evolved into areas such as shopping comparison to keep things "sticky."

Affiliates need solutions that can help them build value -- not so much those that help shuttle traffic. No doubt that the multi-million (if not billion globally) "domain industry" is thriving based on Google and Yahoo Search affiliates sending traffic from "parked" (not actively used) domains on to advertisers (a practice that is under fire by Ben Edleman among others). But is this the future? Likely not.

What is the future for affiliates? The answer seems clear: owning the customer relationship and playing an active role in providing value. In fact value should reside with the affiliate just as it resides with super affiliates FatWallet, FlamingoWorld and Smarter.com (sister site CouponMountain.com). Why do these affiliates (dare I call them businesses!?) have in common? They have advertisers by the hoo-haas because they have active relationships with customers.

Are stores that provide links pointed at advertisers the future for affiliates or are stores like those facilitated by Shopster.com that point inward -- at the affiliate -- the future?

Although the recording quality of the podcast made nearly 40% of the event unintelligible I strained to listen. Why? Bold statements and, in fact, arguments were put forward by powerful voices including executives from:

Advertising.com
TradeDoubler
Net Imperative
Buy.at
iPoints
Leadpoint

TradeDoubler on the Defensive
At one point TradeDoubler was put on the defensive as the company was pressed for answers with regard to the accountability of affiliate networks -- from a legal perspective. Case in point, European giant (and TradeDoubler client) Tesco successfully won a summary judgement against one of its largest affiliates for ALL commissions earned over the course of YEARS (of visitor referrals to Tesco.com). The affiliate was using mis-spells of the Tesco brand name as its tool of choice... a popular affiliate strategy and a legitimate one, argued one gentleman in the group.

Legitimate considering:

A) Tesco knew of the practice and did nothing (to stop the affiliate)
B) TradeDoubler knew of the practice and kept facilitating the relationship

Rogue Affiliates or Rogue Merchants?
What's more it was suggested that the affiliate could have (if it wanted to) waged a serious, costly legal battle against the affiliate network. The affiliate network also could have been targeted by Tesco based on gross negligence -- given TradeDoubler's claims (like all networks) of constant vigilance against deceptive or illegal affiliate practices.

The topic of "rogue affiliates" was quickly turned around and aimed at "rogue merchants" who act without regard for serious legal considerations.

Network Quality: Entry Fee for Affiliates
Many topics were discussed including AffiliateWindow's move to start charging affiliates a small entry fee to participate in the network (refundable as a credit in their account and available upon racking up a minimum earnings threshold).

Blacklisting affiliates, cookie deletion, the diminishing reputation of affiliates were also discussed with TradeDoubler (I believe... it was difficult to hear) suggesting that affiliates need to move from infancy to adolencnce... and soon.

"You wouldn't show up for a job interview in sweats, so why are you applying for programs with an empty domain?"

Karen Garcia
PartnerCentric

"Commission Junction's Link Management Initiative will inevitably alienate a large number of affiliates in the network. Is anyone still fighting for the little guy?" (small affiliates)

Griffin suggests that this question raises a number of interesting issues, especially for affiliate managers that work dilligently at building niche vertical partnerships in their affiliate programs.

He asks, "Does CJ need the little people? Or is it the little people that need CJ?"

To Griffin, integrating new technology (CJ's in this case) is a natural cost of doing business that all online businesses need to accommodate on occasion.

He goes on to point out that CJ is part of a publicly traded company (Valueclick, NASDAQ: VCLK) and suggests he's confident that a change of this size is part of a larger strategy that their finance team believes will boost stock value.

Griffin astutely points out that affiliates and affiliate managers are just "along for the ride" and will simply need to buck up and do whatever work needs to be done to transition into the new link formats. He believes that any platform switching costs (assuming advertisers might reject CJ's new scheme) are too scary for advertisers.

Griffin gives pause when considering some AM's/advertisers may consider jumping ship since CJ is, in effect, irritating (if not telling "go away!") a certain flavor of affiliates. He suggests CJ leads the affiliate marketing industry due to some amount of internal savvy. Although affiliate managers may not understand the full reasoning behind this change there is one. He questions if this change is a good reason to jump ship.

Griffin plainly states that affiliates will likely follow the money and that affiliates threats to leave will be "empty and/or meaningless" given that in ditching advertisers they forfeit the ability to generate cash.

He wonders how valuable (to the advertiser) an affiliate may be who is unwilling to invest time and effort in the relationship.

"The fact that 'Affiliate Manager' is even a job title is a testament to the power of networks," he says.

Griffen believes that affiliates and publishers who have the most to lose will do whatever it takes to stay a part of the network in which they are most deeply entrenched.

Oddly enough, it's about affiliate marketing's original promise -- the right product being hyped by loyal customers. No... not coupon, incentive or comparison shopping sites. This is affiliate marketing Amazon style. Remember?

The Old Guard
Commission Junction remembers but, today, they clearly understand affiliate marketing Circa 1999 can get out of control and require fixing. Today the company is scrambling to clean up its mess.

Google remembers. They're not going to be coy about things either -- when it comes to affiliate marketing pollution and cleaning things up. Today, Google gets to define 'valuable affiliate' however it sees fit.

A Return to the Original Promise
Wayne Porter remembers... his experience in affiliate marketing goes way back to the late 1990's and is now paired with expertise in the Dark Side of the Web -- malware, spyware and adware which, lately, is shifting away from fun-loving hackers and toward a criminal element that seeks financial gain -- gain brought to them through affiliate programs.

Porter, the folks at Converseon, Brian Clark and others in our industry see a brighter future. They see, as Porter points out this week, a future where affiliate and word-of-mouth (aka viral) marketing and "citizen journalism" collide in a much more harmonious and beneficial way.

Do you?

What is precipitating all of this buzz is that CJ is taking back control of its links. With the implementation of their java links, they don't have to rely on site owners to update or remove html from their sites - the sites instead call the java code which serves up whatever CJ feels like serving.

I have to say that I've been waiting for this day to come. I have secretly always been a fan of ABW's infamous Webmaster Mike's signature quote - and I'll paraphrase here because I think I'm banned from ABW - "What value have you put into a click, from a SHOPPER'S perspective?" The short answer for most affiliates has been NOT MUCH.