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Originally posted by Jas
ASE is the daddy - only piece of shareware I have ever brought (apart from Doom I think)
From: Will Lowman <wlowman@exchange.gamespy.com>
To: "hosted-all" <hosted-all@lyris.gamespy.com>
Subject: [hosted-all] Hosting Update: Upcoming Changes To The Hosted Site Ad Requirements
Date: Mon, 13 May 2002 18:00:04 -0700
Hey there!
This is a big mail, so take your time with it!
GameSpy is making the first significant change to its standard hosting policy, a change that will have several implications for you as the owners/operators of sites hosted on the GameSpy Network. These changes will be rolled out over the next two weeks.
In brief, GameSpy will be adding to its hosted site advertising requirements. Currently, when hosted sites agree to hosting on the GameSpy Network, they are required only to run a standard banner advertisement on all pages of their site. Moving ahead, in addition to the banner, GameSpy will also begin serving two select classes of rich-media ads to hosted sites. This change will affect both new and existing sites.
Some Backstory...
[blatent bullshitting]
For the past seven years, GameSpy has provided the best hosting service for game-related sites on the Internet. We've offered virtually unlimited storage space; virtually unlimited bandwidth and file-serving; great, personalized customer service and much more. Thousands of people have hosted sites on the network. It's the largest gaming network on the Internet, attracting more than 16 million visitors each month. Not only is it the largest now, it's the largest gaming network that has EVER existed.
Along the way, we've tried to stay ahead of the pack by not only offering great services, but also by trying to think differently than everyone else, by offering combinations of software and services that simply work better than the other guys'. We've also relied greatly on getting our products and services into the advertising market, and we've been fairly successful.
Now, the online ad market has gone through many, many changes -- you've seen it first-hand on our resident Planet sites like PlanetQuake and RPGPlanet, for example. Banners and buttons have been followed by skyscrapers and "boxillas."
We have to stay ahead of this advertising market. We have to continue offering the types of products that advertisers are buying.
[/blatent bullshitting]
The New Advertising Policies
In addition to the standard banner, in about two weeks, GameSpy will begin serving two types of advertising units on hosted sites.
1) Network-Wide Prestitial: You may have already seen this advertisement on some of the Planet sites or on GameSpy.com. In a nutshell, the Network-Wide Prestitial provides the user with full-page advertising message before hitting any page of the site. For the user, the effect is a momentary delay (which can be clicked past) before seeing the site in full. The ad is then cookied, so a user sees it only at certain intervals (e.g. once in 24 hours).
No matter where you get the Network-Wide Prestitial when you enter the Network, it should only appear once during that period. For example, if I go to PlanetQuake first and see it, and then go to GameSpy.com, I shouldn't see it there. And if I go to PlanetQuake/<hostedsitename>, and then go to PlanetQuake's front page, I should also only see it once.
2) Streaming Video Prestitial: Similar to the Network-Wide Prestitial, the Streaming Video version is a small pop-up window that plays (you guessed it) a small, streaming video. You may have seen the Streaming Video ads played on FilePlanet's front page, for example. The site loads normally behind the pop-up, which the user can elect to watch or close the window. Just like the Network-Wide Prestitial, the Streaming Video version is cookied, playing only once per session, according to the frequency cap that is set for the advertisement.
Both types of advertising will actually be served by the webserver itself, instead of being called by page code. This means that hosted sites will NOT need to make any changes to their actual pages.
For the advertiser, the effect is an extremely compelling advertisement that hits every single person in the audience. For the user, it's a momentary delay for their surfing experience and perhaps the chance to check out a cool new project.
Originally posted by Shovel
/me strokes All Seeing Eye
Originally posted by FuROf knight
Im back from the never world.....ahem
Yeah same, ASE rules.
Well that slightly changed my view of gamespy, all we need now is for M$ to properly invest itself in the online community.
The horror..the horror
Originally posted by Johny Wishbone
gayspy