Entrecard Launching a "Third-Party Ad Network" and a "Credit Cashout Service"

In a post today, the owner of Entrecard announced a few new ideas and this has enraged some members, who are stating that they are leaving the system.

When you look at the number of page views the network serves monthly, the move to monetization only makes sense - the service isn't free for the owners to run nor is it cheap. For the past year and a half, the service has only had capital and a little extra cash from sponsorships enter the system to pay for hosting. The moves today appear to have angered members who expected the service to remain completely ad free, even when it was stated in previous posts that there wasn't a way to monetize the system without placing ads within the widget.

New Rules - Having some consistency with the one page scroll rule makes sense, as some sites are dozens of pages long with the ad at the bottom. It will mean more people will be able to "drop" on your site and "advertisers" will see more rewards.

What Makes Sense

Cash Out Credits - Since the start, it was apparent that bloggers wanted more from the system than just the ability to draw in new traffic, visitors, and subscribers, who may have been using the network. People complained when there wasn't the ability to cash out their credits, especially when they were trying to do it through third-party services like eBay.

When you look at how people were selling credits in the past, everything was out of control. For one, the lowest rate for the most credits would always draw in the most bidders or buyers, resulting in deflation of the value of credits. In return, it cost more to advertise and you couldn't really sell credits anymore due to the rates they were being sold at.

For the people who want to sell credits, you need a controlled system, or everything spirals out of control. With the new system, should income be enough with the advertisers, it will likely result in the ability to earn cash. Now, this isn't something that everyone wanted to do, but from the look of things even when the site started, it was the way things were going to go.

Inflation Rates - Yes, the number of credits within the system is extremely high. It surprises me that more sites aren't worth more, and that more people aren't trying to get rid of their credits through advertising on other sites. There must be a way to reduce the number of credits without deflating the system too rapidly. I can't say that everyone will be selling their credits or using them to prevent ads from showing up on their widget [area], but we will just have to wait and see.

What Doesn't Make Sense

At this time, I can't say for certain what the new "ads on my site" will be like - how much control will you have and how much will you have to spend to reject to keep the ads off of your site. This could conflict with the Today Network or other sites that do not allow the exchange of cash for ads.

For the people looking to sell credits, will you get "face value" for them (approximately $6/1000 credits) or will it be an amount that is more realistic for Entrecard, in their favor?

Now these advertisers, whoever they are, hasn't been pointed out at this time. It makes more sense to have advertisers that the owner of the site can approve or deny - as in, you are given the choice of ten or so and you have to select at least one to appear on your site, even though this isn't in the best interests of blog owners either. It is a co-launch, so it might be with a well-respected advertising agency, but we will just have to wait and see.

Your Comments

What do you think of the new changes? I will just hang in to see what happens and how it affects the general network, which was based (on the most part) on freedom of how you run your site and getting free rewards for work that you put in. Maybe this move will change all that?