I’m sure Kaiser Permanente, Ford and Oral-B will be very happy to see their ads showing up all next to each other, having a great time there not only together but also at the very bottom of the page on 50 Cent’s website, Thisis50.com.

Now of course it’s probably not a big deal since there are already two 160×600’s and a 728×90 ad above this one in better view. They’re not actually paying a lot for the ads at the bottom of the page, are they?

Oh did I mention the ads also rotate every 60 seconds? Right now things have changed I’m looking at three Palm Pre Plus ads and another two Oral-B ads (I guess that’s what they mean by showing “3 ads per 24 hours per person”). A small example that illustrates a lot of what is wrong with display advertising — it would be like billboards along the highway if anyone who owned any property could put up as many as they liked.

Ooops by the time I wrote this, I saw ANOTHER two Oral-B ads, a Scion ad, an eBay ad, and a Bestbuy/Windows 7 ad. Thanks Traffic Marketplace, Specific Media and Advertising.com! What a great way to make money and offer incredible consumer value at the same time (not). It’s one thing to ferret out bad sites and fake impressions, but here is a problem that is less about the publisher in my opinion than it is about the ad networks’ incompetence.

And their CPM number seems very high. See release here.

Based on my estimates, I’d guess they came in about 50% on the impressions numbers and about doubled the CPM. But then what do I know?

My guess is around 24.1 billion impressions a day whereas theirs comes in around 12.2 billion a day (or around a trillion in the US for the first quarter). $2.48 as a CPM is high; the true number is quite probably in the $1.00 to $1.50 range. Especially when you look at Facebook - the CPMs there for an ad unit are in the $0.20 range on the higher end and if you look at three ads or max four ads per page, that’s $0.60-$0.80 or so.

Would love other people’s thoughts on this, back of the envelope or not.

It seems that Hilary Clinton needs to update her profile on LinkedIn - it still says she is “Candidate for President” and Senator from New York.

http://www.linkedin.com/profile?viewProfile=&key=15890911

By the way, looks like Hilary (or her people) signed (her) up a good deal later than Barack Obama, whose ID number is lower:

http://www.linkedin.com/profile?viewProfile=&key=11932467

Unsurprisingly, his profile actually indicates that he IS the President. And 14 people I know, are connected to him (which seems too high… only 2 people I know are connected to Hilary).

I was standing in line recently at the off-airport car park. We had just gotten off the shuttle, for which a few of us had had to wait an extra bit for because the previous one was full. I had noticed a man who had arrived after me and wanted to get on the earlier shuttle be turned away, and he had done that little hesitation thing that indicates displeasure, but didn’t say anything, accepting the situation,

I have seldom been accused of patience, and didn’t think too much of it. But when standing in line, this gentleman (early 40s, 6 foot 4 of moderate build) shuffled to the front of the line to see if they had opened a second window. I mentioned to him there was just one line (the line was clearly marked with yellow chevron paint on the floor) and he smiled and went back to the end of the line.

Several people were in line in front of and behind me. A minute went by and the second window did open up. The person at the front of the single line went to the new window to offer up their ticket and pay, and of course mister patience went to the front and stood behind the person at the second window.

I said to him in a nice, even manner that there was only one line and that he should get back into it. He was peeved but said he didn’t mind in that way that indicates he really does mind. The young lady in front of me thanked me.

My point in this story is not to appear like some kind of hero of the people- anything but- but to share that in a lot of situations, we have to stand up for ourselves, or have someone on our team who can be that person. The person to ask the uncomfortable question, to risk pissing off people by disturbing the herd - it can be done in a nice and a not-nice way.

As the CEO of a startup company, this role of bad cop or ‘meanie’ as I think of it, falls to me quite often. And I have done it in both ways but (I hope) usually in a very rational way. There is a danger in it too, though - if others always look to a single person to play this role they may not learn that they can and should be able to do it too.

To be effective in work and life I think we all need to be able to play that part some of the time. I suggest taking advantage of trivial situations like the annoying line jumper guy to try out and hone these skills. Because you, your family, friends, company or self will need them sometime.