FOOA: Henry Copeland Doesn’t Get PayPerPost

I plan to post more about the Future of Online Advertising conference over the weekend, but here’s a nice little observation for you.

Henry Copeland, the creator of Blogads, was asked what he thought of PayPerPost. He responded by saying it’s sad that they have no disclosure, or something to that effect. The problem is that PayPerPost does indeed require a disclosure policy and Ted Murphy, of PayPerPost, even said in his earlier speech that many advertisers require an additional graphical bar that goes in a post saying it is sponsored by said company.

In Copeland’s speech he even recommended making ads intentionally vague and “mysterious” because they perform better. Where is the disclosure in that, when the viewer has little to no idea what the ad is for? Where is the transparency? He also said that sites using Blogads are generally political sites, and that the ad network was used by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign. George W. Bush got a second term thanks in part to Blogads. So how again is his ad network more honest than others, when they clearly have no problem deceiving others with politically motivated ads?