Tech View John Agsalud

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Group offers $1 for each referral to Firefox

Ever notice how good things come out of shady precedents? For example, countless technical innovations were, and continue to be driven by the "adult services" market. After all, multi-camera interactive television was not developed so that you can see all the angles at Aloha Stadium during Warrior football games.

In another interesting twist, a group of open-source activists has begun a controversial campaign to encourage Web surfers to switch from Microsoft's Internet Explorer to the open-source based Firefox browser. The plan? Pay Web site owners $1 for each user they convert to Firefox, according to the group's Web site at www.explorerdestroyer.com.

While this approach is highly reminiscent of the e-mail chain-letter hoaxes of yesteryear, it actually appears to be founded in reality. The tactic takes advantage of Google's AdSense Referral program, which was announced late last year. Under this program, Web site publishers get paid for referring their users to specific products like Firefox with the Google Toolbar, AdWords and the complete AdSense suite.

The complete Google AdSense program includes AdSense Referral, AdSense for Content, and AdSense for Search.

AdSense for Content allows Web site publishers to easily include targeted advertising on their sites, with very little maintenance. It's free for Web site publishers. Advertisers pay for the privilege of placing their ads.

Ad selection is based on the content of the site, so if the site changes -- say a new product line is added to inventory -- so will the type of ads that are displayed.

Alternatively, the Web site publisher can determine what ads should appear, but, of course, this requires additional effort on the part of the publisher. Competitors' ads can also be blocked from appearing.

AdSense for Search allows Web site publishers to include a Google search window on their sites. Such a search can be tailored to search your own site, or the entire Web. It keeps users on your site, and, if they happen to click on one your targeted ads that results from a search, bingo, you get paid again.

AdSense has been around for about three years now, but its competitors are limited. The Yahoo Publisher Network is still in beta. Both Amazon and MSN are rumored to have a product in the works, but no official word as to release dates. There are numerous competitors out there, but no one with the depth and resources of Google. Such competition can easily be found by Googling up "adsense competitors."

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