I was just contacted by a reporter who is working on a story about Adjix, a new service that conceivably gives everyone on Twitter a way to make money for tweeting. It could be a smash hit, but it's got caveats.
Adjix, like TinyURL, is a URL shortener - but with at twist. It's also an advertising network that wraps your redirected links with a small ad frame. If you create an account with Ajix and people view or click on your links, you get a share of the revenue. You won't get rich, mind you. But you can collect $0.10 for every 1000 unique views and $0.20 for each valid, unique, click-through. That might be hard to scale for some people, but instantly it give the top dogs on Twitter a way to monetize. Here's a screenshot of the account management console.
According to the FAQ, advertisers can choose their ad category. Meanwhile linkers can also select a category that best matches the content the same when they shrink a link. Also noteworthy is that Adjix has an open API. However, the service is only available in the US.
From a user perspective, Adjix definitely a strong play. It's easy to see why bloggers and the Twitterati may skip using TinyURL or another URL-shortening service when they can make money by using Adjix. However, on the flip side, the ad frame is annoying and your readers/followers might feel the same way. Also, I don't see any way for the user to opt in or opt out of certain advertisers. So beware that you have almost no control here.
From an advertiser point of view - I would recommend watching and waiting. If Adjix takes off, then the service could be a great way to reach influencers who live on social networks. However, from what I can tell, as of now Adjix is lacking any kind of contextual algorithm right now that would make it a stronger sell for marketers who want to have their ad show against certain URLs or groups of URLs (and also to block others).
Finally, there's the publisher point of view. I think anyone who is running ads will be irked since any other placements around theirs could distract eyeballs, clicks, etc.
In sum, we need more innovative advertising business models out there like this. In a perfect world, Twitter, Friendfeed and other services should be coming up with ideas like these to make their users even happier. But as they focus on building their communities and scaling, an economy of service providers like Adjix and perhaps even Google may rush in and that's good for us, the users, though some will certainly complain given the issues here. (Note: I am not affiliated with this service nor am I using it since it's ridden with conflict for me.)
