”But you know I learned something today.  We thought we could make money on the internet.  But, while the internet is new and exciting for creative people, it hasn’t matured as a distribution mechanism to the extent that once you trade real and immediate opportunities for income, for the promise of future online revenue.  It will be a few years before digital distribution of media on the internet can be monetized to an extent that necessitates content producers to forego their fair value in more traditional media.” (Kyle Broflovski, South Park)

Believe it, this excerpt from a recent South Park episode called “Canada On Strike” jabbed at the user generated content community (primarily YouTube).  It was a hilarious show if you go for the South Park humor.

Aside from the fact that this was clearly a commentary on the recent writers strike, it got me to thinking about why things are not as rosy as they could otherwise be on the online monetization front.  The downloadable media community is experiencing a piece-part of a larger phenomenon, that revenues for advertising with online media progresses slowly.

Kyle’s prediction that “it will be a few years”  is shorthand for “lots of things have to happen before we can expect huge gains in monetization.”  Such as education in the marketplace.  And tools that help all parties better navigate through the variety of these new distribution mechanisms.  And ways of measuring success that reflect the integrity of the medium and deliver on outcomes.

ADM was formed to do precisely this for consumer downloaded media.   Time is not the obstacle, we believe the lack of information and rapid deployment of orders, is.  We don’t profess to have all the answers, or an unlimited resource pool to execute on every initiative (yet).   But with the upcoming ad:tech announcements regarding Advertising Units and Measurement guidelines, we believe we can offer our community new agreed-on tools to expedite the largest possible amount of purchase orders.  We can help get advertisers to richer and more attentive audiences, that continue to migrate away from traditional media outlets.

Change is exciting.  It also is daunting and encourages resistance, especially when parties walk into strange places or feel forced into defensive positions.  One of our jobs is to help our fellow buyers navigate through this new world, so that they can purchase wisely and meet their communication objectives.  Another very important job is to offer our members access to the same ad buying community in ways that advance their own best interests.

We hope you will continue to watch, support, and encourage this conversation.  In doing so we can help trim down Kyle’s prediction from a few years to a mere couple.