Verizon sacrifices customer satisfaction for mobile ads

Just because Sprint started it doesn’t make it right! Do you think you two are children? If Cingular told you to jump off a bridge would you? That’ what I thought…

Verizon is going to do the unthinkable, allow advertisers to drop their shiny banner ads and text ads right onto your phone. Yup, that phone in your pocket (or the one you are using to read Gadgetell) that you pay a hefty monthly service fee for, not to mention the rather high hardware costs. You can expect to see ads early in 2007 on news, weather, sports and other Internet sites. Verizon officials said their initial foray would be a cautious one, they will limit where ads can appear, and exclude certain kinds of video clips — thank god.

In October, Sprint became the first major carrier to allow advertisements to appear with content that is listed on its menus, or as they are known in the industry, their official content “decks.” Cingular thus far would not comment on if they will follow the other to ‘boys’ and jump customer ship. In 2005, advertisers spent $45 million on such messages, and should spend around $150 million this year, according to Ovum Research, which projects that such spending will reach $1.3 billion by 2010.

I don’t question how important the mobile arena is for marketers/advertising but why the hell do I have to pay $100+ per month for a calling and data plan plus $100+ for a handset if Verizon is just going to make more money per each subscriber by selling ads on my handset?!?!

Read [NYTimes] Via [GigaOm]