NONE: ONLINE-ADS>> Proposal: AD-INFO.TXT file (Ad Registries)
ONLINE-ADS>> Proposal: AD-INFO.TXT file (Ad Registries)
Mark J. Welch, Esq. (markwelch_at_ca-probate.com)
Wed, 26 Mar 1997 13:58:14 -0800
I have a very preliminary suggestion to run past the Online-Ads
group for comment and discussion.
There are now a number of companies out there that provide
"web site advertising registries" or tracking services, including
FocalLink MarketMatch and now SRDS. (See my list at
http://www.ca-probate.com/comm_net.htm#_reg).
I have input my information into several of these services,
but not all. I recently sifted through the long, overly complex
MANUAL (not automated or online) forms provided by SRDS
and after about 10 minutes, I realized that it would take
several HOURS to complete their forms, which then would
take 20-30 minutes to fax to them (alternatively, I could mail
the forms).
Likewise, I have been hesitant to spend the time to update
the information at FocalLink and the other companies, even
the companies that provide relatively simple on-line data
entry. And in all honesty, I have yet to sell an ad based on a
listing with one of these services, so I have some doubts
about whether this is a proper use of my time.
I would like to make a humble suggestion: why doesn't
someone create a standard list of data and file descriptor
for a file of "advertising information" to be maintained at
each web site? Thus, when I update the advertising
information at my site, I could simply do so by updating the
file and then 'robots' from each company operating an
advertising directory could check my site for that update.
One keyword-based web-index (ALIWEB) already does this,
asking each site to maintain a text file called SITE.IDX in the
root directory of the web site (e.g. http://www.ca-probate.com/site.idx);
see http://www.nexor.co.uk/public/aliweb/search/doc/form.html
I'd certainly take more interest in providing updates about
advertising on my web pages if I could simply update a single
file at my site and have a number of services automatically
gather that data. I'm sure that hundreds, and perhaps thousands,
of web publishers would feel the same way.
The file format should be flexible, so that each vendor could
specify optional or required fields for its service (but with no
'secret' data available only to one service) -- kind of like HTML
with meta tags, or SGML.
Of course, if the format were useful, someone would write
nifty software utilities to automate many update tasks (such as
automatically posting current statistics into the file from a
stats program). Indeed, I would expect that the next generation
of "web site design" software would automatically generate
this file and update it as web publishers add new content to
their sites.
-- Mark J. Welch (510) 847-2026 http://www.ca-probate.com/
-- Web Site Banner Ads (Networks, Brokers, Exchanges, Software, PSAs):
-- http://www.ca-probate.com/comm_net.htm
-- Web Counters: http://www.ca-probate.com/counter.htm
