Summary: Freewebs' president and COO writes that Web Widget Marketing will help advertisers keep up with consumers, or at least stay ahead of competitors. For a term that is brand new to the interactive advertising vernacular, "widget" has already started to confuse the industry because it represents two very distinct formats. (I suppose we should be thankful it's at least not an acronym.) First, what all widgets have in common is that they are small applets that provide a single utility or service to the user. Where the formats differ is in their placement. Some widgets reside locally on a computer, such as in the operating system veneer on a Mac called the Dashboard, or in a Windows environment using a tool like the Yahoo! Widget Engine. The second format are widgets that live in HTML, such as those provided by Typepad for its bloggers. To distinguish, let's call them Web Widgets. The main distinction that marketers need to contend with between the two formats is not a function of technology or development; it's in who is the widget's intended user. Widgets that reside locally are useful only to the person who downloaded and installed them. Ten thousand installs means an engaged audience of ten thousand. But widgets that adorn a personal site or blog are seen and potentially used by all of that site's visitors. Here, ten thousand installs could mean an active community of hundreds of thousands. Engagement and reach are not mutually exclusive after all. I'll offer further that Web Widget Marketing is not merely an exciting new format because of the possibilities; it (and other formats designed expressly for citizen publisher content) is soon to be the cost of doing brand-building business online. Why? Because the people advertisers are trying to influence have become enamored with sites and networks and platforms that at best are cool to marketing messages, and at worst are downright hostile. Yet audiences at these sites are growing exponentially, and advertisers have to find a way to join the conversation. Web Widget Marketing isn't an end-game in itself. But developing the know-how to successfully market in this environment will help advertisers keep up with consumers, or at least stay ahead of competitors. As you think about how Web Widget Marketing might boost your brand, here are a few considerations to get the gears turning: To thine ownself be true: Your widget cannot simply deliver a brand message, like other ad formats. Instead, it must be a practical extension of your brand-- a microcosm that delivers the same brand promise. For example, Acura is commonly regarded among the autorati as having the best navigation systems on the market. So they've developed the Acura RDX Traffic widget that delivers real-time traffic flow (and ebb) to a user's computer. It's a highly useful application, and because of Acura's positioning they reap more benefits from this widget than their competitors would. Create for your audience. No, your other audience: With Web Widgets, you're creating for two distinct groups. Certainly you want your widget to have utility or functionality that underscores your brand positioning, like the Acura example above. But first you have to get it downloaded and placed onto someone's site, which means that it also has to meet a website owner's objectives. Now it's true there's a website out there for everything, and I could probably find several hundred traffic blogs that the Acura widget would be suitable for. But the distribution opportunity is small, making that particular application is best suited for the desktop. Case Study 1-- Sony Pictures: My company, Freewebs, recently collaborated with Sony Pictures on a Web Widget campaign to promote the film Zathura. Sony had already had some games developed that tied into the movie's plot and imagery. Instead of running a banner campaign across Freewebs sites driving traffic to the games, we came up with the idea of creating a Web Widget so any of the 11 million site owners on Freewebs could integrate the games directly into their sites. This idea met the site owners' objectives of delivering fresh content and increasing stickiness, and the games were well-received and very heavily used by their visitors. The results: within six weeks the widget was embedded in more than 11,000 websites, and had been viewed nearly 600,000 times-with minimal outreach to begin the campaign. Nearly nine months after the kickoff, there are still over 15,000 widgets embedded and delivering content across Freewebs sites. Case Study 2 (Almost)-- Rijksmuseum: Another strong example of widget marketing comes all the way from Amsterdam. The Rijksmuseum has developed a widget that is updated daily with a new picture from the world-famous museum's impressive collection. An icon on the picture spins it around when clicked, revealing the piece's title, artist, date, some historical background, and of course a link back to the museum's website. Currently the widget is just a desktop widget, but the fresh content it delivers each day would make it very appealing to site owners and citizen publishers if it is ever available in that format. Unlike almost all other online ads, a Web Widget's function is less to drive traffic than it is to engage a group already aggregated somewhere. It is closer to branded entertainment (or branded utility) than a sponsorship model, but the barriers to entry are much much higher. Any company can buy its way into branded entertainment. Web Widgets have to be invited in, a privilege that no amount of media budget will afford them. I expect that most at first will be kept behind the velvet rope. But those who do get in will enjoy VIP status and profitable conversation. Shervin Pishevar is president and COO of Freewebs, Inc. Read full bio.

Summary: Contacts: For Widgetbox: Julie McHenry Communication Insight, LLC jmchenry@sbcglobal.net 650-504-6655 OR Tracy Pizzo Widgetbox, Inc. tracy.pizzo@widgetbox.com 415.992.6542 JULY 11, 2007 Widgetbox Announces In-Widget Advertising Solution Ads Are Seamlessly Inserted into Sponsored Content Widgets and Broadcast to the Widgetbox Network; Forbes.com First to Use New Solution Forbes.com New Content Widgets Sponsored by Visa Small Business San Francisco — July 11, 2007 — Widgetbox™, the world’s largest marketplace for web widgets, today announced a unique solution designed to automatically insert third-party paid advertising into sponsored-content widgets. The sponsored-content widgets, typically from publishers, then use the Widgetbox Network™ to broadcast these widgets, with advertising, to thousands of registered domains. Because the widgets can easily spread virally across the web, in-widget advertising can be widely propagated beyond the boundaries of both the original publisher’s site and the network domains. “What we are seeing here is the emergence of a new, powerful Internet advertising media with the same defined characteristics as traditional media: editorial and advertising combined together in a format that can be easily broadcast to a wide network of targeted recipients,” said Ed Anuff, co-founder and CEO of Widgetbox. “This is the first step in the emergence of a potentially very large in-widget advertising market.” New Forbes.com Widgets Feature In-Widget Advertising from Visa Small Business In a related announcement made yesterday, Forbes.com unveiled a set of new content widgets sponsored by Visa Small Business. These widgets, featuring topical editorial content from Forbes.com, can be placed on placed on any blog, website or social network profile with one-click. “Widgets clearly embody the Forbes.com philosophy that our users should be able to choose where, when and how they consume our content,” said Jim Spanfeller, President and CEO, Forbes.com. “Visa Small Business is the perfect launch sponsor, as small business owners are especially time constrained and can benefit from being able to designate their own access points to critical news and information every day.” Widgetbox In-Widget Advertising Solution The new Widgetbox In-Widget Advertising solution is designed for easy delivery of advertising across the web. In addition the solution features: * Full integration with remote ad servers allowing seamless in-widget ad delivery while the publisher controls the widget content. * A unique to Widgetbox ad-friendly detection system ensuring that in-widget ads never show up where they are not allowed. * Widgetbox managed distribution, promotion and seamless ad integration with the Widgetbox Network. * And, powerful widget tracking, analytics, reports and management from the Widgetbox Syndication Platform™. About Widgetbox Widgetbox is the leading managed syndication network for web widgets. Widgetbox’s mission is to create a thriving web widget economy by becoming the trusted resource for creating, distributing, promoting, tracking and monetizing widgets. The Widgetbox gallery is the world’s largest marketplace for widgets and the Widgetbox Syndication Platform™ is Widgetbox’s exclusive backend infrastructure that provides the most comprehensive set of tools for the management of your web widget strategy. Widgetbox serves both the producers of widgets, including the largest, online distributors as well as individual developers, and the consumers of widgets. For more information, please see www.widgetbox.com. #####

Summary: Not to be outdone by other mobile platforms, Cingular is toying with the idea of widget advertising. The mobile provider is teaming up with Freewebs, a multimedia advertising and publishing platform, for a new multi-faceted ad campaign. by Kristina Knight With a combination of ringtones, widgets and content, the campaign promising to connect users with their favorite musical artists, allowing them to include artist songs, lyrics and their own content on other webpages through widgets. Freewebs users can link to the Cingular Sounds landing page, download ringtones and even rewrite their favorite lyrics. They can also post personal videos to be hosted on the Freewebs home page. Users can also take the widgets they create with them. Both companies use banner ads to drive traffic to the websites. This type of non-advertising advertising campaign is growing in popularity. Freewebs has completed similar campaigns with Adidas, Reebok and Sony. Widgets have been around for years on the web, but using them for advertising purposes is a fairly new endeavor. Many advertisers have been reluctant to try to the embedded content generators because users can use and remove as they want. However, with content being the latest craze, widgets are the obvious choice for advertisers. Tags: Cingular, widget advertising

Summary: Online giant Google has begun testing a new advertising program that is expected to launch later this summer. According to reports, the new gadget ads will be available for site owners to embed within their websites pages. by Kristina Knight The so-called gadget ads will be available for every advertising category. The ads act like widgets, giving the advertiser the ability, through HTML, to create flash, real-time content feeds and video. The ads can also be more traditional display ads if wanted. Google will place the ads through an auction-based server with marketers able to bid according to publisher's sites or content themes. User-generated content has changed the way advertisers look at online marketing. Blog advertising has become an increasingly popular form of advertising, with companies like PayPerPost and ReviewMe connecting marketers to bloggers for a price. In addition to blogs, advertisers are also finding that marketing on video and picture sharing sites are a good option. Google is also rolling out a new set of advertising metrics to help marketers track how the gadgets are being used on their websites. The analytics tools include the ability to track which areas of a website are getting the most attention from users. Once this is known, a publisher will know what tools bring users back the most. Marketers can also track user engagement. Knowing how long users stay on-site and being able to capitalize on that engagement is crucial to ROI. Tags: online advertising, widget advertising

Summary: If you've thought about adding widget or video advertising but weren't sure the new tools were worth the cost, Quantcast might have the answer. The online ratings company has added metrics for widgets and video ads. by Kristina Knight The solution is currently being offered, free of charge, in beta testing for advertisers. Measurement tools are available for desktop widgets, flash-based media, online games and video ads. Publishers can measure how widgets and video are being used, who is watching the ads and what the response rate is. In 2006, online video grew by more than 55% and by 2011, according to some reports, the online video spend will reach more than $4 billion. At the same time the use of widgets for online content and ads has exploded, too. Konrad Feldman, co-founder and CEO, Quantcast Corporation said, "If (publishers) want to attract more advertising dollars, (they) must measure and understand their video and widget audiences. We look forward to providing them with the accurate, third-party metrics and the easy-to-use graphical reports they need." While still in beta, the platform offers reports on the reach, play and category of video and widget ads and how much/how often the ads are consumers. When it is out of beta, the platform will also include reports on demographics and lifestyle assessments as well as the frequency and distribution of ads.

Summary: NEW YORK, July 11 /PRNewswire/ -- Freewebs, the company that offers the web's most open personal publishing platform and helps people unleash their creativity online (http://www.freewebs.com), announced today from WidgetCon 2007 in NYC, it is launching a creative new widgetized advertising campaign for Universal Studio's summer hit, 'Knocked Up'. The new widget campaign on Freewebs encourages people to interact with the movie and its characters, as well as enjoy playing with a fun 'Baby Maker' photo page which allows people to upload a photo themselves and someone else to see an automatically generated funny baby picture showing an amusing mix of features from both photos. http://www.knockedupbabymaker.com "Today's users are speaking for the brand through their own voices by tagging their sites with widgets, and we make sure that all of these widgets are easily shareable and publishable," said Shervin Pishevar, President, Freewebs. "We're basically tapping into a whole new form of contextual advertising, which is based on mutual, shared interests rather than an automated algorithm in the background. The algorithm is people's hearts, their souls, their passions, their feelings, and that's meaningful," said Pishevar. Freewebs, has been a trail blazer in running successful widget marketing and advertising campaigns in 2007, reinforcing what some industry experts have referred to as the 'year of the widget' in advertising. Recent campaigns include: -- Cingular -- Freewebs created a cutting-edge ring tone advertising campaign which featured multi-media, viral video widgets to spotlight new and emerging artists. -- Paramount Pictures/Freedom Writers -- Freewebs built a highly engaging campaign called "Be Heard" which was sponsored by Paramount. The campaign involved a community on the homepage which encouraged people to start a meaningful exchange with one another, and to share personal and inspirational stories -- just as they do in the movie. -- Reebok -- Freewebs created a customized a campaign that allows users to create and show-off their RBK creations via a virtual Shoe Fight contest. Freewebs aligned with RBK to increase awareness of their "Run Easy" brand and to drive traffic to the http://www.rbkcustom.com -- Ghost Rider/Sony Pictures -- To help promote the Ghost Rider movie, Freewebs created a campaign utilizing media and creative elements via templates, shout-box, games and cursor effects. -- Adidas -- Adidas launched a "Impossible Is Nothing" brand message to consumers. The objective of the campaign on Freewebs was to encourage consumers to adopt "Impossible Is Nothing" as their own personal mantra. Freewebs created a widget campaign to showcase this message via a user generated widget platform. This widget let users submit a story/brief account or videos demonstrating their 'Impossible Is Nothing' experiences, aspirations and achievements. These stories were then added to the Adidas stars' video stories as a form of inspiration. -- Number 23 Movie Campaign-- Freewebs compelled users to see the Number 23 movie by creating a viral widget to ignite interest in the mystery of The Number 23. Freewebs developed a unique Widget Game that manipulated bits of the User's personal information to show them the ubiquity of the number 23 in their own lives. "Engaging with widgets is a consumer's personal choice," said Chris Cunningham, Vice President, Freewebs Advertising. "The second a person takes a widget to their individual page, what was once an ad, becomes content." Freewebs has been leading the way in more effective advertising campaigns with widgets, and to date, 17 million people and counting have built websites on Freewebs.com. To create a quality, free easy-to-use Freewebs Forum, website or blog, please visit http://www.freewebs.com today. About Freewebs.com Freewebs is the company that offers the web's most open personal publishing platform, dedicated to ensuring everyone in the world can create a quality multimedia website. For anyone with an Internet connection and something to share, Freewebs provides the toolkit to express their voice on the Web through its versatile publishing platform. To date, Freewebs members have created more than 17 million comprehensive websites including blogs, photos, videos, music, e-commerce and more. Founded in 2001, Freewebs is privately held and based in Silver Spring, MD. CONTACTS: Jo McKenna Freewebs 646-382-4291 jo@freewebs.com Lane Buschel / Chris Macowski The Morris + King Company for Freewebs 212-561-7454 / 212-561-7459 lane.buschel@morris-king.com chris.macowski@morris-king.com

Summary: It’s Widget Madness! They’ve proliferated the social media landscape like a wild batch of mushrooms in a country field. And the marketers are scrambling to get on the widget bandwagon. So far though, there have been few, if any wildly successful widget monetizing strategies, most likely because of the yet-to-be-solved issues associated with Widget marketing. Before we get into that, let’s take a step back and discuss what exactly widgets are, why they’re growing in popularity on social media sites, and social networking sites, and what marketers envision with the use of these new marketing channels. You can look at a widget as a mini web-page that is located within another web-page. Widgets are software tools, typically created from a Widget software developer, that allow users to quickly, and more efficiently share user content. Widgets are essentially pre-made bits of web code (html or otherwise) that are embedded within the code of other web pages. Widgets have paved the path for distributed media and have become vital outlets which content producers use to spread their web-based information, messages, and and other pitches. Viewers of a web page with an embedded widget can many times grab the code for the widget to embed into their own web spaces. This viral form of widget dispersion is a strategy that content producers and widget manufacturers embrace, as the free advertising is seldom rejected. The most prominent example of a widget to date is the YouTube widget, that enabled the millions of YouTube users to share their favorite videos on the even more prominent social network, MySpace. Other notable widgets are the Photobucket widget, Twitter widget, game widgets, RSS feed widgets, music player widgets, etc. These widgets allow users (people that embed the widget code into their personal websites) to share information that they think might be interesting to the people in their social networks, blog-rolls, or random viewers. The common widget user or enabler views widgets as something that enables them to show other people what they’re into - that bit of personalization and customization ability is the reason why widgets have become so popular. Used by marketers, widgets are social media tools that can help in consumer feedback for service/product improvement, customer service efforts, branding initiatives, drive qualified traffic to targeted websites, and extend their web presence and reach virally. From the consumer standpoint, widgets can show the consumers brand loyalty thereby contributing to the effectiveness of the overall marketing campaign. With all of the opportunity that widgets present to the savvy social marketer, problems with effectiveness as marketing tools still exist. My concerns with widgets are as follows: 1. Relevancy of advertising to viewers. I would bet Google and Yahoo! are hashing this one out now. 2. ROI of the widget considering all costs (hosting, bandwidth, development, marketing, etc.) 3. Conflicting associations (your company widget spreading virally across every porn site) 4. User’s and viewers might be turned off by blatant advertising in or on widgets. 5. Monetizing strategies are evolving but not proven. Even with the current issues with widget marketing and advertising, I believe that widgets will continue to gain traction as valuable marketing tools to not overlook. Rick Garcia’s favorite Widget

Summary: Widgetbox, the marketplace for web widgets, today announced a unique solution designed to automatically insert third-party paid advertising into sponsored-content widgets. The sponsored-content widgets, typically from publishers, then use the Widgetbox Network to broadcast these widgets, with advertising, to thousands of registered domains. Because the widgets can easily spread virally across the web, in-widget advertising can be widely propagated beyond the boundaries of both the original publisher’s site and the network domains. “What we are seeing here is the emergence of a new, powerful Internet advertising media with the same defined characteristics as traditional media: editorial and advertising combined together in a format that can be easily broadcast to a wide network of targeted recipients,” said Ed Anuff, co-founder and CEO of Widgetbox. “This is the first step in the emergence of a potentially very large in-widget advertising market.” In a related announcement, Forbes.com unveiled a set of new content widgets sponsored by Visa Small Business. These widgets, featuring topical editorial content from Forbes.com, can be placed on any blog, website or social network profile with one click. “Widgets clearly embody the Forbes.com philosophy that our users should be able to choose where, when and how they consume our content,” said Jim Spanfeller, President and CEO, Forbes.com. “Visa Small Business is the perfect launch sponsor, as small business owners are especially time constrained and can benefit from being able to designate their own access points to critical news and information every day.”

Summary: Brands that are truly embracing todays world of social media are experimenting with widgets because they know that people will evangelize and spread their love of a brand if given the tools to do so. One good example is the Purina Pet Weather Widget. The one thing that I am seeing very little of is actual advertising in widgets. With the popularity of widgets growing like wildfire, I suspect that media companies who are creating these widgets will start selling a portion of the space to advertisers. Here is the first example that I have found: [SEE NBA PLAYOFFS WIDGET GRAPHIC] Notice the Lenovo Sponsorship at the top. They also produce some video highlight widgets with ads from Sprite in their Video Blog, but the code didn't work right. Here is an image of it on the left. I think that there will be a few challenges for this type of advertising. First of all is size. Widgets are small to begin with, so adding advertisements runs the risk of seriously hurting the experience. The second challenge will be my Theory of Widget Advertising Elasticity and its affect on widget adoption. As the % of space allocated to advertising increases, it will decrease the willingness of publishers to place that widget on their site. This is a very important thing for media properties to consider and I believe it is the main reason we aren't seeing much of it yet. Due to the fact that the NBA is a very premium content owner and you cannot get this content any other way, I think they have a very high widget ad elasticity. Therefore, these ads are probably not impacting their adoption by bloggers and other publishers. If you notice any other widgets with ads like this, let me know. I want to keep a close eye on this topic. More to come... Jul 02, 2007 in Online Advertising, Viral Campaigns, Web 2.0, advertising

Summary: The WeatherBug general manager predicts that in the mobile world, internet applications will turn the tide on the browser. A decade ago, website-embedded browsers became the de facto delivery engine for internet advertising. That will change with the next phase of the internet revolution. Internet applications, not a web browser, will drive the bulk of the advertising-supported mobile experience. In my last column, I talked about the increasing popularity of widgets and gadgets. With the advent of the next generation of Windows scheduled for release in a matter of months, you'll soon see how such tiny desktop applications will become more common. In fact, if Microsoft and its OEM partners have their way you'll skip past your browser often and opt to use widgets and gadgets instead. From a size perspective, these mini-apps would fit quite conveniently on a mobile device. So you might say that they are the missing link between the full-size computer screen and the mobile interface. These small but handy and powerful engines represent the convergence of desktop and the mobile screen. As advertisers, we will covet the mobile space because too many of our target consumers will be there to ignore it. But we have some code to crack before we figure out how to do it. To start unraveling the puzzle we should ask two questions: Why would advertising be powered most commonly by widget-like internet applications instead of phone-sized web browsers, and why should we as marketers care? To answer the first part, I recently caught some commentary by Ajit Jaokar, who runs futuretext. He concisely describes the inherent environment surrounding mobile devices, which leads us to conclude why internet apps will win on mobile. According to Ajit… "To understand the differences between browsing on the web and on a mobile device, we have to consider factors such as: 1. Intermittent connections-- unlike on the web, the wireless network connection is relatively unstable and is affected by factors such as coverage (e.g. you lose your connection in a tunnel); 2. Bandwidth limitations-- for example even when 3G coverage is available, the actual bandwidth is far less; 3. The need for data storage on the client-- if the device has no (or little) local storage, all data has to be downloaded every time. This is not optimal given intermittent and expensive bandwidth; 4. Finally, and most importantly, a local application provides a richer user experience-- especially for applications such as games." The bottom line: When advertisers crack the code with mobile devices, they will find their solution through the auspices of the desktop application. As a result, they will find they've quite a bit more power under the hood to help them engage people with advertising. Already, a massive amount of mobile internet access happens through the mobile world's Brew, Java and Smartphone applications. They handle the problems that are inherent in trying to work on a relatively tiny device with connectivity, storage and power limitations. What does that mean to you? The same things that make internet applications a more powerful interface -- whether on PCs, Macs or mobile phones -- will make your ability to advertise greater. You'll have far more creativity than otherwise possible, with more onboard computing power to manage your campaigns and how they appear to phone users on their interface. And we'll need the extra power and convenience. Few people agree on how to make advertising on mobile devices work without it irritating and inconveniencing people. No brand wants their image hurt by getting sloppy-- especially early in the game. The industry doesn't want to blow it and walk into a revolt from people who demand advertising-free phones. Mobile carriers would gladly oblige, for a fee, and we'll be cut off from our market. Fortunately the same onboard power that makes apps the solution to the challenges of mobile internet connectivity will give us effective and powerful tools to engage people successfully, cleverly and acceptably with advertising on their phones. That's my prediction for the week. Let me know what you think. Andy Jedynak is SVP & general manager, consumer division for WeatherBug. Read full bio.

Summary: Widgets are in the news this week. Not only did comScore release audience measurement numbers for widgets yesterday — which showed that many tens of millions of U.S. browsers each month view pages where widget content has been embedded — but there were also major stories in both The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times on widgets and their explosive growth. What is a widget? Here is Wikipedia’s definition: “A web widget is a portable chunk of code that can be installed and executed within any separate HTML-based Web page by an end user without requiring additional compilation. They are akin to plugins or extensions in desktop applications. Other terms used to describe a Web widget include gadget, badge, module, capsule, snippet, mini and flake. Web widgets often but not always use Adobe Flash or JavaScript programming languages.” Why should you care about widgets? Simply put, widgets are the most recent embodiment of highly distributable Web media. Widgets permit users to separate the content from the Web page, permitting users to implant them on all types of pages, from personalized portal home pages to blogs to personal pages on social sites like MySpace or Facebook. I believe that over the next three years, widgets will change online advertising as we know it today. Why am I so bullish on widget advertising? Here’s why: * Personal media. Widgets are all about people — content creators, content modifiers, content critics, critics of content critics, content distributors, content trackers, content viewers, and content engagers. Widgets are to media what Transformers were to children’s toys. Widgets puts content — and ultimately advertising — in the control of people that use them. * Lots of “widgetable” content. Widgets are just ways to display or distribute digital content. We have a massive World Wide Web of digital content. There is no shortage of content out there for everyone and anyone — from professional publishers to content creators to archivists to users — to put into widgets. * Lots of distributors and lots of places to distribute. Everyone is getting into the distribution of widgets. The television companies, from NBC/U and Fox to CBS, are doing it. Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL are doing it. Almost 2 million folks have downloaded WeatherBug’s various widgets and gadgets, including those built for Vista, Google, Yahoo and Apple. Widget enablers like Brightcove are doing it. MySpace and Facebook are doing it, and so are millions and millions of their users. Millions and millions of blog writers are doing it. The Web is already awash with widgets, and they’re all just getting started. * Desktops are valuable pieces of marketing real estate.On the desktop your brand is constantly displayed, whether it’s a permanent home for your logo in the system tray, the toolbar, the start menu, etc. For every minute customers are using their computers, they’re viewing your brand in some fashion. And as Eluma’s Joe Lichtenberg noted, “a desktop community provides you with a constant connection through which you can stream relevant information, messages, alerts, and offers.” * Sight, sound and motion. Most of the widgets out there today are Flash-based, which means that they can carry video. Video means sight, sound and motion, which is music to the ears of advertisers. Mix that with lots of highly attractive consumers who are deeply engaged in viewing, distributing, modifying and interacting with widgets, and you have a recipe for a robust ad-supported media platform. * Highly measurable. Where consumers go, advertisers follow with their money, if they can track and measure it. Of critical importance here is that widgets and user interactions with them are highly trackable and measurable. * Portable to mobile. Finally. While widgets are just starting to explode on the Web, lots of folks are already porting widgets for mobile usage, and Apple’s iPhone introduction certainly won’t slow that down. Are widgets the next search? I don’t think so. However, I do think that the concept of highly portable, object-oriented content that is personally and virally distributed will redefine how we think about Web pages, and how advertisers think about using the Web to communicate and interact with consumers. What do you think?