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February 16, 2006
Turin Plays Host To Spyware Controversy
Freestyle skier Dale Begg-Smith won the men's freestyle skiing moguls to give Australia their third ever Winter Olympics gold medal.
We learned during the telecast that Begg-Smith and his brother were so passionate about skiing that they started an Internet advertising business - when Dale was just 13 - to finance their expensive ski lifestyle. They moved from Canada to Australia when given an ultimatum by the Canadian ski team to give up the business or leave the team.
Today, Begg-Smith's Internet business interests are reportedly worth $40M and Begg-Smith shows off the fruits of his labor tooling a Lamborghini around Italy. Commentators note that he never stops working - he's either skiing or running his business.
Begg-Smith Pops-Up From the Jump
Alas, Begg-Smith's business pertains to mal-ware. The two main companies, AdsCPM Network and CPM Media, manage and track the success of ads placed on the Internet through pop-ups, spam, spyware and adware technology. So while they may not be running spyware, they are enabling spyware.
While Begg-Smith was still basking in the glory of his medal win yesterday, he was questioned by US journalists whether he had made his money from annoying "spam advertising". To which Begg-Smith responded - "I make technology for companies to monitor their online ads. I don't do ad-pops. I make software so companies can do whatever they want. But I don't know what we are doing talking about my business when I've just won Olympic gold."
The Ausi media was peeved at the American press for mixing spyware with Olympic gold.
Read - Begg-Smith delivers gold for Australia (AFP)
Posted on February 16, 2006 09:41 PM | Posted to Advertising | Permalink
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