Shades of UGO deciding to simply pay less to their affliates, IGN has apparently decided to serve blank ad banners to defray the amount of money they're obligated to pay affliates. The contract calls for the premier affliates like Gone Gold to be paid for all ad banners shown, both paid and "house" ads. However, IGN is apparently going to argue that blank ad banners are no ad banners at all, so they do not have to pay for those pageviews.

Gamespydaily has a nice article about it here.

...one affiliate we talked to said that Snowball must at least provide their site with some type of banner, whether paid or unpaid because a provision in their contract. If this is true, then serving blank banners could be construed as a breach of this contract. Many of the affiliates we talked to feel that this is an elaborate scheme by Snowball to get out of paying the fees that were originally agreed to when they inked contracts with them.

Well yes, this obviously falls into the realm of scheming, even if it does have a bit of a Wile E. Coyote feel about it. Now we'll have to wait and see if any affiliates decide to test this in court. IGN is part of Snowball, and while their stock price has been under $1 for some time now, it's rumored that they still have about $40 MIL in the bank left from their IPO. This is a bit different than going after UGO, for example, which has some gumdrops and pocket lint in the bank.

Comments? We really don't know what to say anymore, but whenever we work on the site OSHA requires that we wear a helmet now to protect us from falling ad rates.

Speaking as a lawyer myself (yes, I know, I know), it looks like IGN's lawyer saw some wiggle room in the contract's definition of "banner ad," or maybe the contract doesn't define it at all? Although I don't see how they can, on one hand, argue that they're fulfilling their contact by serving the blank ad, and, on the other, argue that it's not an ad at all.

What they're probably really banking on is that the affiliate sites simply don't have the wherewithal to fight it out in court.

"What they're probably really banking on is that the affiliate sites simply don't have the wherewithal to fight it out in court."

Yeah, that's my guess too. Unlike UGO which doesn't really have anything to go after, IGN does have money in the bank. UGO was clearly in breach when they lowered payouts from $3 to $1 per CPM, but it was that or fold anyway, apparently.

The whole market is just in tatters right now. I know that CNET should survive, but the rest are just a guess at this point. I don't know if the ad rates will increase dramatically anytime soon.

"What they're probably really banking on is that the affiliate sites simply don't have the wherewithal to fight it out in court."


That's it exactly. Many of them have already said that they won't bother because it will cost more than its worth in the long run. It's a real shame...

Looks like the online magazine industry as a whole is having some troubles - and to think that Snowball sent me email wanting me to join them a year ago (good thing I didn't bite...)

I'm going through the whole "keep the site running on bubble gum profits"(shameless plug to www.gamerspress.com). The only thing I can figure right now is to ride the wave, keep it running, and hope that enough of the competitors die off to make it worthwhile.

"I'm going through the whole "keep the site running on bubble gum profits"(shameless plug to www.gamerspress.com). The only thing I can figure right now is to ride the wave, keep it running, and hope that enough of the competitors die off to make it worthwhile."

That's kind of how I feel about this site. I enjoy working on it, so I'd like to continue it.

My biggest concern is that the ad rates won't ever bounce back to their former rates. The ad banners are going to have to change to be worth higher CPMs.

"My biggest concern is that the ad rates won't ever bounce back to their former rates. The ad banners are going to have to change to be worth higher CPMs."

What, like http://www.news.com (click on any article)?

I hate 'em, but god damn if I can't avoid reading 'em. They're right in the middle of the article!!

wumpus http://www.gamebasement.com

Yeah, I've seen those. I don't mind the size and placement, but the animation is extremely distracting. I'll visit other sites that have similar information first if they persist in animating an ad right in the middle of my page.

I'd guess they are getting a higher CPM for those ads, though.

"Yeah, I've seen those. I don't mind the size and placement, but the animation is extremely distracting. I'll visit other sites that have similar information first if they persist in animating an ad right in the middle of my page."

Check the Internet Options of your Internet Explorer -- if you have a recent enough version you can selectively disable animations but not graphics. Keeps your blood pressure down while browsing the web...

Btw, I was just going to check out news.com but in two different articles I didn't even get an ad, just a bit empty frame. IE kept telling me that "one object" was left to load -- not sure if it's because their server died or because I had disabled animations.