Harding, who is seen dancing in famous spots around the world in the clip "Where the Hell is Matt?" hadn't viewed the ads until CNET News.com sent him a link to a video featuring one of YouTube's mini-commercials, which the company started testing today against a handful of videos (but not Harding's).

"As a viewer, I don't like this at all," said Harding, whose video has been viewed more than 7 million times since it was posted a year ago. "As someone who makes videos, I would object to allowing them to put an ad on the screen. Put it on the margins, above the player but not on the screen itself."

"As a viewer, I don't like this at all," said Harding, whose video has been viewed more than 7 million times since it was posted a year ago. "As someone who makes videos, I would object to allowing them to put an ad on the screen. Put it on the margins, above the player but not on the screen itself."

Fans of Google's YouTube are starting to react to overlay advertisements the company began testing on Wednesday. Some find them jarring, some in international quarters wish they could see them, and still others are wondering if they can make money off their own videos with these ads. While there's hardly a unanimous opinion, one thing is for certain Google is finally looking to cash in on its $1.65 billion YouTube acquisition.

"If YouTube starts with accessory advertising while the video is playing, I leave YouTube," said one poster on YouTube's blog with the screen name "Amgervinus."

Another viewer who refers to himself on YouTube as "quepasakoolj18" put it more succinctly in his post "Yuck."

The ads appear at the bottom of a video shortly after the clip starts to play and disappear after 10 seconds. They resemble the TV-style ads that often feature the image of a celebrity walking onto the bottom of a TV screen for a few brief moments. YouTube executives said Tuesday that extensive testing showed that viewers rejected any format that forced them to sit through a commercial prior to a clip being played, a process known as a pre-roll.

Using overlays, executives said, was the least intrusive way to get a message in front of their audience, or so they believe.

Critics don't have to worry about the ads appearing on the iPhone or AppleTV--at least at this point. Google has said that the ads will appear only on the YouTube site "at this time." The ads only show up at YouTube in the United States, and some international users were upset when they couldn't check them out.

One British user responded, appropriately, in a video blog he posted to YouTube.

"Now, this idea will thrust the adverts in people's faces, which means the click-thru rate might be a bit higher," said the YouTube video creator who calls himself Nuodai. "In my estimation, if an advert comes up, people are going to be just as uninterested as, say, a banner ad at the top of the page.

"Eventually people are going to get used to these adverts popping up and their automatic reaction will be to click the close button or just letting it go away, which is why I don't think this is going to be as effective as they make it out to be," he said. "Personally I think this is a very disruptive way of advertising."

A smaller number of those who posted to YouTube's site were taking a wait-and-see approach. ThoughtScientist wrote that "as long as the situation doesn't evolve to the point where ads are forced on all videos, there should be no problems."

Others sympathized with YouTube's plight.

Copyright: news.com



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