Verizon Brings Web Ads to Mobile Phones

Advertising fits just about anywhere these days. Verizon Wireless has announced that it will start placing banner ads on top of web pages accessed from its handsets.

The New York Times has the story:

The development is a substantive and symbolic advance toward the widespread appearance of marketing messages on the smallest of screens... Verizon officials said their initial foray would be a cautious one ??? they will limit where ads can appear, and exclude certain kinds of video clips ??? and thus may invite greater demand to place ads then they can accommodate.

This is big news if you actually use Verizon's data service to access
web pages on a mobile. I have a Verizon phone, but just the voice and
text/pix service. I feel like I pay through the nose for the mobile
service as it is. I thought about the data plan, but I decided that it
isn't attractive enough for me to purchase it at the current price.
Now, I'd have to say that this new and improved service isn't doing
much to win me over.

Expect the banner advertisements to start appearing in early 2007.