fifthmonkee wrote:
The banner ads bother me because they represent bad news on the business end of Neopets. Neopets, as a business concepts, is a web page offering imbedded advertising. If they can't make enough money from imbedded advertising and licensing fees, then the entire concept is flawed, and Neopets has no real reason to exist.
Or, more precisely, investors and advertisers will see no real reason for the site to exist. The experiment has failed, Neopets won't endure, and eventually, in 5, 10, or 20 years, my tiny virtual pets will cease to exist, and that idea makes me sad
Very sad
I don't see how that makes sense. Neopets earns the majority of their income from, like you said, embedded advertising and marketing real-life merchandise. It seems to be working quite well for them. And, as Adam said above, we're talking 3% of all banners (for now), and the number will probably grow. Alot of large companies (i.e. General Mills, whatever movie companies are advertising their movies) are jumping at the chance to be a part of it. I don't see this as the "downfall" of the company per se, but perhaps the "depersonalization" of it.
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