Publishers Will Love Off the Wall by Google
June 27, 2025
![Dino 5 18 25_thumb[3]_thumb](https://www.arnoldit.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Dino-5-18-25_thumb3_thumb-2.gif "Dino 5 18 25_thumb[3]_thumb")
No smart software involved just an addled dinobaby.
Ooops. Typo. I meant “offerwall.” My bad.
Google has thrown in the towel on the old-school, Backrub, Clever, and PageRank-type of search. A comment made to me by a Xoogler in 2006 was accurate. My recollection is that this wizard said, “We know it will end. We just don’t know when.” I really wish I could reveal this person, but I signed a never-talk document. Because I am a dinobaby, I stick to the rules of the information highway as defined by a high-fee but annoying attorney.
How do I know the end has arrived? Is it the endless parade of litigation? Is it the on-going revolts of the Googlers? Is it the weird disembodied management better suited to general consulting than running a company anchored in zeros and ones?
No.
I read “As AI Kills Search Traffic, Google Launches Offerwall to Boost Publisher Revenue.” My mind interpreted the neologism “offerwall” as “off the wall.” The write up reports as actual factual:
Offerwall lets publishers give their sites’ readers a variety of ways to access their content, including through options like micro payments, taking surveys, watching ads, and more. In addition, Google says that publishers can add their own options to the Offerwall, like signing up for newsletters.
Let’s go with “off the wall.” If search does not work, how will those looking for “special offers” find them. Groupon? Nextdoor? Craigslist? A billboard on Highway 101? A door knob hanger? Bulk direct mail at about $2 a mail shot? Dr. Spock mind melds?
The world of the newspaper and magazine publishing world I knew has been vaporized. If I try, I can locate a newsstand in the local Kroger, but with the rodent problems, I think the magazine display was in a blocked aisle last week. I am not sure about newspapers. Where I live a former chef delivers the New York Times and Wall Street Journal. “Deliver” is generous because the actual newspaper in the tube averages about 40 percent success rate.
Did Google cause this? No, it was not a lone actor set on eliminating the newspaper and magazine business. Craig Newmark’s Craigslist zapped classified advertising. Other services eliminated the need for weird local newspapers. Once in the small town in Illinois in which I went to high school, a local newscaster created a local newspaper. In Louisville, we have something called Coffeetime or Coffeetalk. It’s a very thing, stunted newspaper paper printed on brown paper in black ink. Memorable but almost unreadable.
Google did what it wanted for a couple of decades, and now the old-school Web search is a dead duck. Publishers are like a couple of snow leopards trying to remain alive as tourist-filled Land Rovers roar down slushy mountain roads in Nepal.
The write up says:
Google notes that publishers can also configure Offerwall to include their own logo and introductory text, then customize the choices it presents. One option that’s enabled by default has visitors watch a short ad to earn access to the publisher’s content. This is the only option that has a revenue share… However, early reports during the testing period said that publishers saw an average revenue lift of 9% after 1 million messages on AdSense, for viewing rewarded ads. Google Ad Manager customers saw a 5-15% lift when using Offerwall as well. Google also confirmed to TechCrunch via email that publishers with Offerwall saw an average revenue uplift of 9% during its over a year in testing.
Yep, off the wall. Old-school search is dead. Google is into becoming Hollywood and cable TV. Super Bowl advertising: Yes, yes, yes. Search. Eh, not so much. Publishers, hey, we have an off the wall deal for you. Thanks, Google.
Stephen E Arnold, June 27, 2025
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