NetNeut for Real (Sort of)! Will Ad Blockers Stop Mobile Ad Growth?

Lots of questions need to be answered like:

            (1) What will rules for ISPs without phone service be? 

            (2) What sort of consumer privacy plans will be acceptable?  Just what does “Customer Proprietary Network Information” consist of?

            (3) When will the FCC’s Consumer and Governmental Affairs bureau actually provide rules to follow?

            (4) Can an ISP be fined now for not following the rules?

            (5) How long before some attorneys round up some folks to complain about pricing and collectively file protests with the FCC … which would allow the FCC to “investigate”?

There’s sure to be more uncertainty, but that’ll do for today.

Apple is now allowing mobile ad blockers on iOS 9, reports BI Intelligence.  Cue panic.  Ad blocker extensions mean no click through revenue for publishers and advertisers.  Some 160 million ad blockers are deployed worldwide today.  Almost all are for desktop systems.  But with projections of a future based around mobile, well, worry has set in.

Long time media exec Jarl Mohn (once known as Lee Masters) is the fifth acting or semi-permanent CEO of National Public Radio (NPR) in the past six years … and he’s marking the end of his first of five years in the job reporting to AP writers that NPR is “…on great financial footing now.  It gives us flexibility to kind of spread our wings a little bit and try some innovative and creative ideas."  Among the creative ideas is asking you for money.  Expect a call because, as Jarl says, many wealthy folks haven’t been asked.  But, "We want to change that.  So I'm wildly optimistic that we can do that."

In Other Items of Interest:

Will DISH and T-Mobile really cut a deal?  Probably not.  DISH CEO Charles Ergen notes that Deutsche Telecom may not be ready to sell.  And T-Mobile is adding subs.

The economics of paying superstars got some support from Sports Business Journal.  John Ourand’s report from Cleveland reports the Cavaliers, driven on and off the court by LeBron James, chalked up a 45% revenue jump this season.

Busy on Sunday, June 26?  If you’ve got $2,700 for a plate for Hillary, perhaps Comcast’s David Cohen will invite you to his fundraiser that day.

My new book The Revolutionary Evolution of the Media continues! Go here to read the latest chapter or here to start from the beginning.