The adware king, Gator, has settled one of its many lawsuits with the parent companies of The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and the digital arms of Knight Ridder and Conde Nast.
The terms of the settlement were not disclosed but let’s hope it included a big collective kick in the balls.
Gator, if you’ve been living under rock the past year, is the company that serves pop up advertising software when they install a separate product for filling out online forms and remembering passwords. Gator also comes hitched with free software from other companies, including games and file-sharing programs.
Gator has the ability to pop up ads over other publishers sites and in particular, their own ads. Publishers don’t like to have their ads covered by other ads. Gator just doesn’t play nice that way.
While some hate it, Gator is very popular with advertisers (500 to date) because of the targeting abilities it can offer allowing advertisers to reach well defined demographic targets.
Gator still faces similar lawsuits from United Parcel Service, which said unauthorized pop-ups have included ads for rival FedEx Corp., and from Six Continents Hotels, which operates Holiday Inn and Crowne Plaza and complains that Gator directed visitors to deals from Marriott and other competitors.
Other lawsuits, including one filed Jan. 27 by MetroGuide.com travel service, have targeted Gator’s advertisers, without naming the company as a defendant.
