advertising platform

The controversy around digital-media piracy could become a thing of the past if a new partnership between MySpace, MTV Networks, and Auditude bears fruit.

Instead of filing lawsuits to stop piracy, the trio is looking to help copyright holders cash in on pirated content by embedding advertising into audience-uploaded videos across MySpace.

Just because your band doesn't have the bucks for a six-figure advertising campaign doesn't mean you wouldn't be interested in promoting it on MySpace.

At least, that's what the Internet social network is banking on with a new self-service graphical "display" advertising platform that lets small businesses and individuals target their pitches to site users by characteristics like gender, geography and musical preferences.

Google announced enhancements to its network Thursday that the search giant hopes will offer enhanced experiences for users and better value for advertisers and publishers. The changes include partner sites for which Google provides advertising.

According to Rajas Moonka, Google senior business product manager, the additions reflect the integration of DoubleClick, which Google bought last year. DoubleClick specializes in managing online advertising for Web publishers.

Microsoft's aggressive campaign to increase its position in digital advertising took another step this week as it announced the acquisition of Navic Networks, a television advertising provider. Terms were not disclosed.

The deal, announced Tuesday, will give the software giant ownership of Navic's sophisticated campaign-management tools for digital advertising. Those tools optimize where and when interactive television ads are placed. One tool, called Admira, offers a unified ad network so that selected audiences can be targeted across all ads in a campaign.

Google posted revenues of $5.19 billion for the year's first quarter -- an increase of 42 percent compared to one year earlier and a seven percent rise from the prior quarter. By contrast, the company's traffic-acquisition costs amounted to only $1.49 billion, or 29 percent of advertising revenues, company executives said.

The search giant's ongoing innovation in search, ads and apps helped drive healthy growth globally across its product lines, noted Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt.