A recent blog raised some very thoughtful questions about the differences between the ad network and ad exchange business models, and we’re always happy to oblige with answers.

Here at TRAFFIQ, we see an enormous difference between blind networks and open exchanges such as ours. The very fact of being open can (and in our opinion does) make a world of difference for publishers and advertisers alike.

We don’t go to every industry event—but ad:tech is special, whether it’s New York, as it was this fall, or San Francisco, as it will be next week.

The conversations that spring up at ad:tech panels, talks, and ad hoc gatherings are the sort that often as not, break new ground. Create real rather than faux insight. There are moments where you see a person’s eyes open up and you get a sense of the paradigm beginning to shift in their head.

As when a buyer or a seller begins to suspect the truth: blind networks are a dead end, ad exchanges are the path to the future.

The hostile takeover bid by Microsoft to buy Yahoo! is a clear sign that Microsoft is now ready to take Google’s place in the internet advertising and search race. With this offer, Microsoft is clearly saying, “times have changed”. Microsoft has been the undisputed leader in the PC business and, like IBM before it, has found itself competing with a once unknown, but now a dominant player in Google. Although Microsoft’s operating principle was never to buy its way into a market, the 62 percent premium it is willing to pay for Yahoo's shares clearly signals it means business.

At ad:tech New York this week, I had the distinct pleasure of co-leading a one-hour panel titled “Analyzing Online Ad Exchanges,” along with Imran Khan, Managing Director of JP Morgan Research.

Despite the obvious temptation on my part to talk about nothing but TRAFFIQ, I made every effort to avoid an enthusiastic sales pitch.

Although Imran and I opened the panel with brief presentations of the current happenings in the online ad exchange market, the most interesting part was, without a doubt, the Q&A session. Some takeaway thoughts:

As TRAFFIQ continues to evolve and reach important development milestones, we will be regularly updating both our existing participants as well as those who are new to the exchange with our recent progress and our future plans. Because TRAFFIQ is a user-driven platform, our goal is always to respond in earnest to your questions, comments & complaints.

Somewhere in the world, I don't know where and I don't know when, there was a mayor or city planner out there who pounded the first parking meter into the ground on Main Street and declared, "From now on, you have to pay to park here". Imagine the outrage—you can almost hear the people in the village complaining: "Nobody has ever done that before”, or “It was fine the way it was". Chances are, these complaints went on for months, and the mayor was labeled as greedy or out of touch.

The buzzword of the year in the online advertising industry is transparency, which has been promoted to a great degree by both ad network incumbents and new ad exchanges alike. Google/DoubleClick, Yahoo!/Right Media and some newcomers, claim their platforms provide buyers with degrees of transparency previously unknown in the search and display markets, allowing them to know where their ads appear after these ads have been served. As anyone who has purchased online media knows, visibility into a campaign's constituent publisher-base is a significant milestone.

An old and very dear friend and mentor of mine was often quoted as saying "you learn a lot more out there than you do in here." His meaning, as I took it, was that getting in front of your potential customers to determine their wants and needs was always better than holing up in a conference room and making a good guess at it. I have never forgotten that bit of wisdom.

There's been a good amount of talk in the market about the need for Transparency. Advertisers are begging for it. Ad Networks claim they have it. Yet, has anybody actually defined Transparency, to determine what it truly means?

All of us read the same articles in our industry, and for the most part, we all do a pretty good job of staying current with hot industry trends and recent announcements. It's actually very impressive. In my early days in the CPG world (before this fad called the Internet came around), our only real propaganda came from the voicemails we received from our District Sales Manager each night, telling us all the day's news from our company, with an occasional newsflash from our industry.