Is Pop Under PPV Advertising Really Unethical?
One of the many charges leveled at PPV advertising is that it's usage of pop under advertisements is unethical. Many people seem to feel that eventually this kind of so called 'unethical' behavior will be disallowed, and so they declare that the days of PPV advertising are truly numbered. Despite this kind of 'doomsday' predictions, the question that you should be asking is: Is pop under advertising really unethical?
Essentially, pop under advertising simply consists of advertisements that appear below the website that the viewer is looking at. That means that instead of popping up and interfering with what a viewer is going over, a pop under advertisement simply hangs around in the background until the viewer is done and is ready to look at it.
No one is arguing that pop under advertisements aren't annoying. Chances are, you've probably gotten annoyed at time a number of times in the past as well. However when it comes to PPV advertising, the scenario is not the same. In your scenario, you probably had an advertisement pop under your browser without your permission or authorization.
However, when it comes to PPV networks, each and every person who has signed up for them has expressly agreed to have that advertising appear. As such, they're not 'unwitting victims', but rather they're 'willing participants'.
Basically, PPV networks draw from a different crowd entirely. The crowd that PPV networks manages to pull into its ranks consist of internet users who are willing to trade for what they want. In the case of joining the PPV network itself, they traded that to get access to some piece of software or service that the PPV network provides.
In short -- they knew exactly what they were doing, and were willing to have pop under advertisements appear.
Truth be told, with that to consider it should be plain as day that PPV advertising really isn't unethical at all. In fact, ethics don't really even enter the picture considering these people agreed to receive the advertisements in the first place. Coupled with the fact that PPV advertisements seem to be really effective, this in turn implies that a lot of these people actually found something in the advertisements that they received which they liked.
As such, PPV advertising should definitely not be regarded as being unethical, or even frowned upon. Sure, in general pop under advertisements can be viewed as annoying behavior, but in this particular circumstance there really doesn't seem to be very much wrong with it at all!
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