To take one prominent example, Time Inc. (which owns Fortune<\/em> magazine), signed a deal<\/a> with Outbrain in 2014 that was worth an estimated $100-million to the magazine publisher over three years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Note<\/strong>: This was\u00a0originally published\u00a0at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n In a recent piece, the New York Times<\/em> outlined the downside<\/a> of these kinds of links. One of the most long-lasting effects is also the hardest to measure, and that is the impact on a company\u2019s reputation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you just published a long investigative piece of journalism on an important topic like immigration or the U.S. political landscape, what message does it send when the reader gets to the bottom of that story and sees links to cheesy sites using photos of scantily-clad women and other gimmicks?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Slate is among the media outlets that have decided to stop using such links because of the potential damage to the site\u2019s reputation, according to president Keith Hernandez. \u201cIt is not the right look if you\u2019re trying to say you\u2019re a high-quality, upper-tier website,\u201d he told the Times<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Looking bad isn\u2019t the only downside. Many of the sites included in the links are also dodgy publishers of the worst kind of viral clickbait, and in some cases fake news and hoaxes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Media companies aren\u2019t the only ones struggling with this problem. Even Facebook is having a hard time keeping fake news reports<\/a> and spammy websites out of its Trending Topics section, and there are experts who are skeptical of Facebook\u2019s ability to ever stamp them out with its algorithms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But those are sites that make their way into Facebook\u2019s listings organically. Taboola and Outbrain links on many sites are there because those outlets host them voluntarily in return for payment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The nonprofit group behind ChangeAdvertising.org found that 41 of the top 50<\/a> news sites, including The Guardian and CNN, use widgets from \u201ccontent recommendation\u201d companies. Although some of those links are ads (including ads from other publishers), more than 25% comes from shady clickbait sites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In effect, these sites are playing a vast game of advertising arbitrage. They pay for their appearance inside the Taboola or Outbrain widget, and then they hope to make enough money from the ads on their own sites to justify that expense. Many reputable media outlets are effectively making a similar bet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s the same kind of ethical arbitrage that takes place on many media sites when it comes to other forms of advertising. They hope that they can make enough money from low-quality banner ads to justify the irritation and potential loss<\/a> of traffic from users who hate them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If that feels like an unsustainable situation to you, that\u2019s probably because it is. Media companies that make these bargains are chasing page views and clicks that are worth less and less every day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, Facebook is generating billions of dollars in revenue from its advertising, and that makes revenue-sharing partnerships like the ones it has struck with a number of media companies (for its Instant Articles mobile platform and its Facebook Live video feature) even more appealing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n By using questionable ad strategies like Outbrain and Taboola, in other words, you could argue that some media outlets are hastening their own demise. But for some\u2014particularly those that are publicly traded\u2014revenue from questionable content is better than no revenue at all.<\/p>\n![\"Outbrain](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/images-production.authory.com\/MathewIngram\/Theres-a-Simple-Reason-For-All-Those-Taboola-and-Outbrain-Links\/978ad4b0-7fce-11ea-b8bd-75f37bac5250.png?w=525&ssl=1\")
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