Google AdSense Rich Media Ads (Beta, Obviously)
JenSense has the scoop about Google going by way of Doubleclick:
Google AdSense is moving beyond the traditional text and graphical advertising to rich media, including interstitials, expanding ads and floating ads. AdSense began contacting publishers last week to be involved in the rich media limited beta test.
If AdSense did offer rich media to all publishers, they could easily add a new clause that would mean companies such as Fastclick and PointRoll would suddenly be competitive ads and not be permitted on the same pages as AdSense.
Google doesn't like any text links, contextual ads or spyware not served by Google. Will Google make rich media a Google only product?
It is pretty clear that Google is going to be the default ad platform on the web. Will they also be able to become the default platform off it? Large advertisers are already telling TV watchers to Google their brand.
Fom subtle to annoying
I only saw this today. While any reader here will know that if you want to maximize the clickrate you should annoy the user, making it as hard as possible to escape the ad, this is a new direction for Google.
As several of the comments on Jen's blog say, this is something else entirely, as the G ads have always been subtle in nature. Now we get all that truly annoying stuff that covers the content and moves around on the screen.
And the phrase "rich media" bugs me as well. I mean, if "rich" is an option, who would want the standard ads? Bloody misnomer.