The fight for the Mobile Ad Dollar has now come home to us here in the Caribbean, with Digicel throwing down the gauntlet, first. Digicel which has 13.6 million subscribers across 31 markets, mostly in the Caribbean, says it will use an ad blocking technology from a company called Shine, to block display and video ads in both mobile browsers and apps. They are starting with Jamaica first.
The BusinessInsider.com reported todat that “Perhaps controversially, ad blocking for Digicel customers will roll out as standard. It won’t be an optional add-on, although the company says it may offer customers the ability to switch off the facility. The only sites that won’t see their ads blocked will be “certain local news sites,” a Digicel spokeswoman told Business Insider.
In a press release sent to SiliconCaribe today Digicel peddles the argument that this controversial move is ” Improve Customer Experience and help drive broadband access.” The real reason it seems is made clear as they stated in their release. They are “calling for ad networks like Google, Yahoo and Facebook to enter into revenue sharing agreements to bridge the digital divide.” So the real issue- It’s about money!
Lots of Questions Arise From this move.
1. Will Digicel give the customers the CHOICE to view or not the Mobile Ads? If customers buy their data, aren’t they free to use that data as they please, which includes blocking ads or not as they go about their mobile viewing experience? So why is Digicel seemingly overstepping its boundaries and making that decision on behalf of their customers?
2. In Trinidad and Tobago we have the OUR, Telecommunications Authority of Trinidad and Tobago – which regulates the Mobile/Telecom Sector. Recently, Digicel’s blocking VOIP apps on their customers a while back, but that has been kept hush hush – what will OUR say about this issue?
3. What does the Government has to say about this?
4. Why only a few local news sites been spared from the Adblocking decision?
5. How does this hurt our help Mobile App development and Entrepreneurship in the Caribbean ?
6. What implications there are to Net Neutrality issue?
7. How does Ad Blocking Technology Work and doesn’t this flout the data privacy issues of Caribbean Mobile consumers? Further, Where is the Caribbean when it comes to covering the rights of consumers in this and other data privacy issues?