And most planners are smart enough to avoid getting charged for multiple ad views on the same page. However, there's more to the controversy. As an agency media planner, one of my goals is to make sure that I measure ad views as accurately as possible. Unless I decide to be ultra-anal and write tiny Java applets to tell my ad server that my ads were actually displayed in a browser, the closest I can get to actually determining whether my ads were displayed is to count the completed transfer of an ad graphic from my ad management system. While this seems fair to me, it wouldn't seem fair to many publishers.
Publishers like to count ad requests the simple request by a browser for an ad graphic.
Of course, the number of ad requests invariably ends up being quite a bit more than the number of completed transfers. While the difference may not end up being all that much on your average media buy, it would certainly be significant with respect to a portal deal or other large buy. When I wrote the initial column in early '98, there were already several discussions going full steam on the various online advertising discussion lists on the same topic. I'm not sure these issues ever got fully resolved. Maybe we should get a handle on this sometime soon To refer back to Jim's Tuesday article, I don't think media planners and ad sales reps have a problem distinguishing between page views and ad views.