Pudding Media Offers Ad-Based Phone Service

Posted on September 26, 2007

The New York Times reports that a company named Pudding Media is launching an ad-supported Internet phone service called ThePudding. The company will "listen in" with voice recognition software and run ads on its users' computers that are related to their phone conversations. The phone service will be free to customers. Think Skype with ads says the Times article.

Pudding Media, a start-up based in San Jose, Calif., is introducing an Internet phone service today that will be supported by advertising related to what people are talking about in their calls. The Web-based phone service is similar to Skype's online service - consumers plug a headset and a microphone into their computers, dial any phone number and chat away. But unlike Internet phone services that charge by the length of the calls, Pudding Media offers calling without any toll charges.
The trade-off is that Pudding Media is eavesdropping on phone calls in order to display ads on the screen that are related to the conversation. Voice recognition software monitors the calls, selects ads based on what it hears and pushes the ads to the subscriber's computer screen while he or she is still talking.
A conversation about movies, for example, will elicit movie reviews and ads for new films that the caller will see during the conversation. Pudding Media is working on a way to e-mail the ads and other content to the person on the other end of the call, or to show it on that person's cellphone screen.
"We saw that when people are speaking on the phone, typically they were doing something else," said Ariel Maislos, chief executive of Pudding Media. "They had a lot of other action, either doodling or surfing or something else like that. So we said, 'Let's use that' and actually present them with things that are relevant to the conversation while it's happening."

A lot of consumers are going to be turned off by the eavesdropping issue. Some bloggers are expressing disbelief that this concept is going to fly with consumers.

VoIP & Gadgets Blog says, "All of this just to save a buck? Heck, forget saving a buck, most calls these days are so cheap, you'd have to make a dozen calls just to equal 1 buck. And with flat-rate plans for both residential VoIP, regular landline service, and cellular, why would someone torture themselves with advertisements just to save a few pennies?"

John Paczkowski at AllThingsD lists four reasons why Pudding Media will flop. Lauren Weinstein blogs about Pudding Media and the idea that young people don't care about privacy. Pudding Media hopes they don't care too much, anyway.

Most of the posts about the ad-based phone model are pretty negative but the concept of "free phone calls" should not be completely tossed aside.

TECH