Firm offers way to cut out middleman between advertiser, consumer

BERKELEY, Calif. -- In an effort to use the Internet to cut out the middleman between advertiser and consumer, a new company, Cybergold Inc., plans an on-line approach to marketing and advertising that will permit advertisers to pay potential customers for reading their ads.

A start-up venture founded by the veteran Silicon Valley entrepreneur Nat Goldhaber, Cybergold is creating a World Wide Web site that will permit companies to pay for "attention."

Users will be sought to join the no-fee service, fill out a questionnaire and then receive fees that are a cross between currency and coupons that can be spent on services and merchandise, on-line connection time to subscriptions or merchandise purchased directly from some other Internet sites.

Goldhaber, who was the president of the Kaleida joint venture between Apple Computer Inc. and IBM, said he believed that advertisers would be attracted by the ability to reach a precisely targeted audience and the assurance that their message was being received.

"We've created the first marketplace for attention," Goldhaber said. "When an automaker wants to target 20- to 40-year-olds who are in a particular income bracket, they will be able to do that."

The Cybergold system will create a medium for exchange that Goldhaber refers to as "coins." They are actually on-screen buttons.

When users click on one, they will create links to ads on the Net and offer payment in cash, merchandise or credit.

Users who connect to the Cybergold Web page will be presented with a list of advertisers. Next to each advertisement will be the image of a gold coin with a corresponding cash or coupon value.

Goldhaber said he had come up with the idea when he began to think about the problems that digital networks pose for protecting intellectual property.

Reaction from the publishing community has been mixed so far, Goldhaber said, with some publishers viewing Cybergold as a mechanism for selling high-value information, but others said they see little value in the service.

Cybergold's directors include two high-profile advertising and marketing executives: Regis Mckenna, the Silicon Valley publicist and venture capitalist, and Jay Chiat, co-founder of Chiat/Day advertising.

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