The Dark Side of the Web: Traffic Inflation

[mikellini]

I agree, and you should avoid prosecution. But, as a business, aren't there other ways to give yourself a comparative advantage? (Other than pricing and traffic) For example, if a company went 'green' and showed a commitment to preserving the environment, they would be more likely to receive advertising dollars from other 'green' companies, no? And the ads could even play this angle up... Or if a website offered advertisers a perk, such as a lottery entry for ad space on the front page, just for placing an ad? Innovation can put you ahead of the curve. These are just a couple of ideas that popped into my head, but if you got together and did a brainstorming session to come up with ways to make money, I'm sure you'd find many better ones. I guess my point is that there are ways of developing confidence in readers and advertisers, aside from saying that you don't do what the other guy does. Maybe this struck a chord with me at first because I recognized a little passive mud-slinging, without mentioning any names of course.

[r0bc]

I would have thought advertisers were well aware of this kind of thing and would insist on using unique visits rather then page hits.