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NYT Starts Serving Up Intrusive Ads in Its iPhone App

The New York Times (NYSE: NYT) has thrown down the gauntlet when it comes to ads on mobile apps, specifically its iPhone app. Over the weekend, it has started running roadblock interactive ads on its iPhone app, possibly the first such by a big publisher. See the attached image: that was an ad for, well, I forgot in the rush to take the screenshot, but assuming some water-related company. Dan over at SAI saw the first such run of an ad, for Visa. These interactive ads use a format by NYC-based mobile ad startup Medialets, which previously did the Dockers shakable ad earlier this year that got much press attention. Still early days on the ad, but since NYT’s one of the bigger media apps, would be interesting to get the data on interaction later down the line. The upside is this is as good a captive audience you can get in a digital medium, but risk of course is that these ads are pretty intrusive and risk irritating off some users.

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Rafat Ali
@rafatali Aug 23, 2009 9:44 PM ET

NYT iPhone Ad

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Posted In: Advertising, Companies, Apple, iPhone, New York Times, medialets

  • uri

    deleted. nothing against ads but don't want to spend my time clicking them away. the embedded ones are (sort of) tolerable, but this is way over the top.  the app slow and tends to crush too often to have engaging ads on top of that.

  • Rafat Ali

    Thanks for your pitch Tamara. Can you name one major publisher app?

  • Tamara Gruber

    Not quite the first, Crisp Wireless has a few roadblock ads running with major publishers including the recently announced GI Joe campaign on Fandango's iPhone optimized site.

  • michael kremin

    I just checked out the ad. Yes, it takes us back to the pop-up ad days, but is quickly dismissed by touching the lower corner. I'd rather deal with that than pay for access directly.

  • gregorylent

    yes, but a micro payment .. would also pay a few bucks a month to a smorgasbord of blogs and news sites .. but not a lot .. i hate ads, they are intrusive, deadening, usually of a low consciousness, and cost me time .. nyt is good, but not that good

  • Staci D. Kramer

    @ gregorylent—seems like an excessive response. Would you pay for an ad-free version?

  • gregorylent

    thanks for the warning, just deleted the nyt app from my iphone

  • twitter.com/iphoneadvert

    I made some screeshots of the VISA campaign available on my twitter account : http://twitter.com/iphoneadvert

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