Tech & Biz

MySpace and MTV Bring Ads to Piracy

by Jarrett Martineau | November 3, 2008 at 10:05 am

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Why go after the pirates directly when you can advertise on their copyright infringements?

Instead of asking users to take down copyrighted content that's been posted to MySpace, MTV is proposing to overlay ads on their posts.

Smart idea, really. Leave the pirated material up -- but turn it into revenue-generating advertising.

And that kind of takes the anti-corporate punch out of posting pirated material, doesn't it?

MTV and MySpace believe they have found a novel way of making money from piracy, and will test out a new advert-serving mechanism this month.
Instead of being served with take-down notices when MySpace users post up MTV copyrighted content, they will instead be served adverts that earn the station money.

This is apparently possible due to video-fingerprinting and ad-serving technology from a company called Audite.

The ads served through Audite will be a 'semi-transparent' overlay over the lower third of the video player, although the final look and feel is apparently still part of the trial.