Skyrider ads to be hosted
on sharing apps like LimeWire

Peer-to-peer (P2P) ad firm Skyrider is expanding the ad service it launched in October to include dynamic advertising built into audio and video files, reports ClickZ. If a P2P user downloads a sponsored music video, for example, "events" placed within the video files trigger ads served at particular spots while the video plays.

Using Apple QuickTime, those events might launch "bug overlays" on the videos or serve ads that appear as part of the video and link to a Web page featuring a targeted message. Because the video ads are served dynamically, once a campaign is completed the events embedded in the videos can prompt ads from different advertisers. Skyrider has not yet determined how much of the ad revenue it will split with content owners.

The P2P ad experience has been dominated by pop-up-launching files and decoy files featuring songs or snippets of songs - leaving a sour taste in the mouths of some P2P users who say the ad files are often disguised as regular files. Skyrider's sponsored text ads and new video files are marked with the phrase "sponsored results" when appearing in query results.

Web media measurement firm Big Champagne estimates P2P networks attracted over nine million users worldwide in September 2006.