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The Internet runs on ad billions

April 15, 2008 | Internet Marketing

Consumers enjoy a vast range of Web services, from e-mail to e-commerce, all funded by advertisers. Tinkering with this powerful economic engine - particularly in the guise of government regulation of interactive media - could render the Internet both less efficient and less effective.

Consumers today enjoy an extraordinary amount of cost-free content and services on the Internet. Search engines, e-mail, social networking sites, video and photo storage, product-comparison tools, news, entertainment, maps, job banks, and résumé services and e-commerce marketplaces are available at the click of a mouse - and free of charge. But none of these services are actually free. Advertising is funding them. And without this advertising subsidy, consumers would be forced to pay for many of these services, assuming they were available at all.

BusinessWeek profiles some small companies which are proof that the ad-supported Internet has become the great equalizer, allowing anyone, anywhere with a better idea for a product or service to reach a national marketplace. Tinkering with this powerful economic engine - particularly in the guise of government regulation of interactive media and their core advertising technologies, as some are now recommending - could render the Internet both less efficient and less effective.

Get the full story at BusinessWeek

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