Action Settlement May Lead to Lower Domain Parking Earnings — Yahoo Class
Fresh advertising option excludes parked domain names.
The settlement of a class action lawsuit against Yahoo may result in lower pay-per-click revenue for parked domain names.
The lawsuit was brought against Yahoo for allegedly misleading advertisers as to the sites where their ads would appear:
This class action was brought in 2006 by a number of Yahoo! pay-per-click search advertising clients. They allege that clients contracted for targeted ad placements through two products, “Sponsored Search” and “Content Match” (and predecessor products provided by Overture Services, Inc. and GoTo.com, Inc.) and that Yahoo! breached its contract with its clients by allowing Yahoo! ads to be displayed in spyware, domain name parking sites (also known as bulk registration sites), pop-ups, pop-unders, and typosquatting sites. Plaintiffs brought claims for breach of contract, unjust enrichment, misrepresentation, civil conspiracy, and unfair business practices.
As part of the settlement, Yahoo must create a fresh “Premium” ad placement option that will only show ads on Yahoo-owned web sites and other select parts of the content distribution network. This specifically excludes parked domain names:
“Premium Providers†means: (a) all web sites and web pages (counting any microsite), software applications and other properties on the Internet that are owned or operated by Yahoo!; and, at Yahoo!’s option, (b) all parts of the Distribution Network other than: (i) domain name parking sites; (ii) bulk registration sites; (iii) “pop-up†or “pop-under†windows; (iv) typosquatting sites; (v) “slidersâ€; (vi)
“sidebarsâ€; (vii) “injected adsâ€; or (viii) unsolicited spam email.
(See paragraph 22 of this settlement agreement)
It’s painful to see parked domain names being lumped together with spam emails.
Smart pay-per-click advertisers know how to manage the content network to get a high ROI. But lazy ones — and those that don’t have much knowledge of the network — will likely opt in to only showing their ads on Premium Providers.
