IAB launches MRAID version 1.0

This morning, the IAB released version 1.0 of the MRAID standard ad creation API for mobile rich media ads. Details on MRAID can be found here on the IAB website.

Because MRAID is based on ORMMA, this set of APIs and principles closely resembles the original ORMMA API. The ORMMA developers have since edited the ORMMA API to provide full integration of MRAID into ORMMA.

Each API method that exists in MRAID is documented as part of the ORMMA spec and behaves in identical fashion.

This allows publishers and ad servers who support ORMMA specifications going forward to stay compliant with MRAID 1.0 at the same time. ORMMA will continue to propose new methods to the IAB group for consideration in future MRAID versions with the goal of keeping ORMMA and MRAID on the path to total convergence.

With the IAB release of MRAID 1.0, the ORMMA group members, many of whom also collaborated on the writing and ratifying of MRAID version 1.0 should see this as a victory for open standards. 

We thank the IAB for galvanizing our efforts over the past year and thank the MMA for their important endorsement of this project.

ORMMA gains support in Asia

While ORMMA has been around for a year, primarily in the United States, this week ORMMA finally broadens its coverage to Asia after MobDis announces its support of ORMMA. MobDis, a product of venture capital funded Singapore based start-up 2359 Media Pte Ltd, is leading ORMMA support in Asia and also pledging to educate the Asian community about ORMMA. Mobile Marketing Associate APAC is working with MobDis in this industry adoption.

The Co-founder of MobDis, Zhou Wenhan, commented that, "We (MobDis) wanted to adopt ORMMA as it is currently the most popular standard in the industry. The standard is supported by respected organizations like Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) and Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is using ORMMA as the starting point of its own MRAID standard. We are glad that we have achieved ORMMA compliance and will look forward to support MRAID as well."

With that, MobDis have released an infographic to explain and educate on the importance on mobile rich media advertising standard. The infographic shows the what, why, when, who and how of ORMMA.

Here is a link to the full press release

IAB’s Mobile Marketing Center of Excellence asks for comments on MRAID

In April of this year, several ORMMA members started work with an IAB Working group to define a common API for mobile rich media advertisements based on the ORMMA project, establishing a framework of principles and guidelines to help the mobile marketplace reach new levels of consistency, efficiency and effectiveness.

 

The ORMMA thought leaders from The Weather Channel, Pointroll, Crisp Media, AdMarvel, Goldspot Media, Yahoo and Google were closely involved. There were also 20 other companies involved, such as 24/7, Accuweather, Mediamind, NY Times, Medialets and Microsoft to name a few. The discussions resulted in simplifications and adjustments to the scope of the proposed APIs, solving problems for various constituencies.

 

Now, this process has produced MRAID (Mobile Rich Media Ad Interface Definition) which is still based on the ORMMA API and is similar enough that it is practical for ORMMA to share the basic API. However, there are a good number of important functions that are supported by ORMMA that won’t make it in a 1.0 version of MRAID. So, what is next?

1. A public comment period for the MRAID spec will run through September 30, 2011. After that, in the first week of October, the MRAID working group will meet again to evaluate comments received, make changes if necessary and release the final version 1.0.
2. By that time, the ORMMA members will make all the small changes necessary to the documentation and the open source code to ensure that the final MRAID v.1.0 and ORMMA share the same API wherever functions overlap. The ORMMA group wants adoption of this standard and will support vendors of commercial MRAID implementations with reference implementations for various platforms, sample ad units and clear direction for how that standard can evolve in the future.

You can download the 40-page MRAID specification here.

 

Here is a link to the full press release from the IAB.

Nexage Brings ORMMA Support to its Real-Time Bidding Ad Platform

This item is also posted on ReadWriteWeb.  Nexage also put out a press release for this announcement.

Mobile advertising company Nexage announced today that will support rich media ad units using the ORMMA standard. Nexage is adding ORMMA (open rich media mobile advertising) compliance to both iOS and Android software developer kits to deliver rich media ads across its revenue platform that includes a robust real-time bidding (RTB) service.

Nexage now supports both ORMMA and VAST (video ad serving template) rich media standards, which gives it a head up in the availability of ads that the platform can support. The Nexage ORMMA support will give developers and advertisers another major avenue to monetize mobile content outside of the major channels provided by Google and Apple.

"We are excited to offer ORMMA-based rich media, and thrilled to be the first provider of ORMMA-standards over both mediation and RTB," said Ernie Cormier, CEO and president of Nexage in a press release. "Nexage now supports both ORMMA and VAST standards which we believe are critical capabilities to further drive market liquidity, enabling buyers and sellers to benefit at scale."

Google supports both ORMMA and VAST and its AdMob vertical is the de facto leader in mobile advertising, especially for Android. AdMarvel started supporting ORMMA in July, though it is not a direct competitor with Nexage's RTB platform.

From an advertisers perspective, ORMMA is supported by a variety of rich media providers, including Celtra, EyeWonder, MediaMind, PointRoll and Crisp Media. Nexage and those that use it to monetize content now have a larger stable of ads to drive to mobile devices.

Earlier this month, Nexage announced it had hit the 8 billion impressions served per month plateau. With ORMMA support, that figure should start to increase dramatically.

AdMarvel Collaborates with ORMMA to Launch New SDKs that Leverage Open Standards for Rich Media Mobile Advertising

AdMarvel Enables Advertisers to Run Campaigns Across Multiple Publishers and Applications

NEW YORK – July 8^th, 2011 –  ORMMA, the Open Rich Media for Mobile Advertising initiative, today announced that AdMarvel, an Opera Software company, will support open standards in its new developer Software Development Kit (SDK). By incorporating the ad creative Application Programming Interface (API) shared among rich media providers, AdMarvel has augmented its ad serving capabilities to not only deliver ads to a wide distribution of mobile applications but to also deliver rich media advertising from any ad platform that can deliver ads with HTML5. 

AdMarvel’s new SDK lets publishers and agencies use HTML5 to deliver highly interactive display ad formats. AdMarvel now exposes the many ad capabilities supported via the ORMMA API, thus extending a broad range of industry-leading applications to run standards-compliant ad creative.  This further enables a sophisticated and standard approach for apps to communicate information related to state, position, events, resizing, orientation, network availability, device capabilities, and more.  This information makes it possible for rich media ad creative to modify their behavior when a specific device model, network condition, or application calls for it.  It vastly simplifies ad operations for large-scale mobile campaigns.

“AdMarvel’s work with ORMMA demonstrates that open APIs can be supported alongside very innovative, proprietary features. By adding open APIs to their existing SDKs, AdMarvel creates an important advantage over competing platforms right now,” said Xavier Facon, CTO of Crisp Media, one of the founders of ORMMA. “AdMarvel’s new ad SDKs are a sign that the days when ad creators needed to use native code and undertake a high level of customization to develop and deploy rich media campaigns are over.”

“Our publishers have been asking for standards over the past year, and we have now been able to deliver on that promise,” said Manoj Malhotra, SVP Engineering and Support Services at AdMarvel. “By implementing the ORMMA specifications in our SDKs we can now support all of the leading mobile and desktop rich media platforms, in a scalable and reliable manner.  In our support for ORMMA, we avoid having to make changes to our SDKs to fit editorial requirements such as different ad sizes, and more importantly, we can now support any rich media provider that can deliver ads according to ORMMA’s specifications.”

The goal of ORMMA is to allow ad developers to create one campaign that can run across a universe of mobile applications and sites, without sacrificing a rich user experience. 

“The challenge in the industry for in-app mobile and tablet advertising has been the fragmentation of SDKs and not having a standard way for ad creative to communicate with the device,” says Todd Pasternack, Director, Creative Technology at PointRoll. “ORMMA provides a solution so the same engaging, interactive ad experience can run across apps. And with a big SDK player like AdMarvel adopting ORMMA it clearly shows that open standards create scale and opportunity for everyone.” 

The ORMMA group is supported by a growing list of rich media providers including Celtra, Crisp Media, EyeWonder, GoldSpot, MediaMind, and PointRoll. Since its founding, ORMMA has developed a specification for an open API that unlocks many native capabilities and currently supports iOS and Android through JavaScript, allowing advertisers to create better ads using HTML5, and deliver them across iOS and Android. ORMMA is also developing capabilities that ORMMA-compliant developers can include in their advertising SDKs, including support for ad caching, polite loading, and increased privacy controls. 

With support from the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) and the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), the goals defined by the ORMMA consortium of companies is quickly becoming reality.  AdMarvel and ORMMA also support the working group at the IAB to define the initially more limited MRAID API, which is estimated to be ready later this summer.  With ORMMA determined to stay compatible with MRAID, AdMarvel is poised to support it when it becomes available.

Companies interested in joining ORMMA should visit the ORMMA blog, join the Discussion Group, or visit the Google Code Project.

About ORMMA

ORMMA, or the Open Rich Media Mobile Advertising initiative, was founded in November 2010 to simplify the serving of rich media ads into mobile applications by creating an open standard and set of industry best practices.  Founded by leading mobile advertising companies Crisp Media, The Weather Channel, Jumptap, and PointRoll, the open initiative has grown to include over 20 member companies.  Through an open source forum, ORMMA has released three-levels of standards and best practices for adoption by publishers, developers, and vendors. For more information visit http://blog.ormma.org.

About AdMarvel

AdMarvel Inc., an Opera Software Company, is the premier ad serving and inventory management platform in the mobile  industry.  Providing services to the world’s largest media companies, mobile operators, publishers, application developers, ad networks and agencies, AdMarvel provides dynamic SDK(s) and single platform to enable and manage the most engaging ad units available from the leading ad networks, rich media vendors and video ad providers in mobile today.   As a “trusted and open” solution, AdMarvel leads the industry in working with 3^rd parties to certify on the AdMarvel SDK(s) and ad platform for execution to ensure the intended user experience, audience measurement and analytics.  AdMarvel Inc., is a wholly owned subsidiary of Opera Software ASA.

For more information, visit www.admarvel.com 

# # #

Media Contact Information:

ORMMA:

Tamara Gruber (tamara@redgiantconsulting.com)

AdMarvel/Opera Software:

Falguni Bhuta (falgunib@opera.com)

MMA Announces Support for ORMMA; Kicks off the Mobile Marketing Forum in NYC

It is a big week for the MMA.  The Mobile Marketing Forum kicks off in NYC today and the Mobile Marketing Association also announced support for ORMMA, the Open Rich Media Mobile Advertising initiative. By showing its support for ORMMA, the MMA extends the reach of open standards internationally and lends its weight to overcoming the fragmentation plaguing mobile advertisers.

Since ORMMA was founded in 2010 by Crisp Media and The Weather Channel; the initiative has grown to more than 20 member companies from across the mobile advertising ecosystem, including AdMarvel, Admeld, Celtra, Gannett, Goldspot Media, mOcean, Nexage, PointRoll, Ringleader Digital, Rhythm NewMedia and others.  ORMMA has been working with both the IAB and the MMA to push forward open standards for building, serving, and measuring rich media mobile ads.  Just as ORMMA contributed its ad creative API to the IAB to make it the basis of their MRAID standard, ORMMA will work with the MMA to contribute ideas and experience to help build an open and scalable mobile rich media landscape.  

The goal of ORMMA is to allow ad developers to create one campaign that can run across a universe of mobile applications and sites, without sacrificing a rich user experience.  Since its founding, ORMMA has developed a specification for an open API that unlocks all native capabilities for iOS and Android devices, allowing advertisers to create ads using HTML5 standards that can access all the native features of the device, such as location, shaking, and more. ORMMA is also developing capabilities that ORMMA-compliant developers can include in their advertising SDKs, including support for ad caching, polite loading, and increased privacy controls.  

Companies interested in joining ORMMA should visit the ORMMA blog, join the Discussion Group, or visit the Google Code Project.  Read the press release to learn more about MMA’s support of ORMMA.  

IAB Working Group starts work on MRAID with full support of ORMMA.org

This week, an IAB working group started discussing the ORMMA API in depth as part of an initiative to define an IAB standard. The name for IAB’s standardized API is MRAID. Many of the ORMMA member companies are also IAB members and welcome this activity.

It came to my attention that there is plenty of confusion about different names for this mobile in-app standardization initiative.  ORMMA is the name of the consortium that defined the API and also provides a reference implementation of it.  MRAID is the IAB naming of the API.

The IAB, who has defined standards such as VAST and VPAID, is now looking at MRAID as an API to improve interoperability for ad serving in mobile applications. MRAID stands for Mobile Rich media Ad Interface Definition. This MRAID API is based initially on the ORMMA definition and ORMMA.org is committed to remaining compatible with the MRAID specification.

ORMMA has implemented this API in an open source manner for iOS and Android to help various ad serving vendors and publishers see a working example of a compliant SDK. ORMMA will continue to maintain and build on this reference code to keep it up to date with the MRAID standard. Likewise, the ORMMA members will continue to contribute to the IAB to ensure the MRAID API remains a viable, rich feature set for all major mobile platforms.

The ORMMA.org authors are encouraged by how their initial work is smoothly and quickly evolving towards an IAB supported standard. For companies who now are using ORMMA code, their continuity is ensured. If you have questions about how ORMMA relates to IAB and MRAID, feel free to contact us.

Update: IAB updated its web site with a frequently asked questions page on MRAID

Crisp Engage, a new ORMMA compatible initiative

ORMMA, the first standard for mobile rich media advertising, is gaining broad adoption by major publishers, industry associations, and ad technology companies.  We are pleased to announce that Crisp, a rich media technology company, now fully supports ORMMA’s in-app ad creative API (Level 1&2) via its Crisp Engage web-based tools.

The Crisp Engage platform, currently in limited beta, provides partners with self-service access to its HTML5 based ad unit technology and the accompanying online management tools and dashboard.  While it is common for rich media vendors to provide various productivity enhancing online tools to agencies or creative designers, Crisp is now doing so while also supporting this standard.  An ORMMA web tester is integrated in the tool to give the users the ability to verify that the ad units are compatible with the in-app ad creative API - standardized by ORMMA.  This gives the charter program members of the Crisp Engage program the ability to create, manage and share rich media ad tags, which are compatible with both web sites and mobile applications.

So can an ad designer now achieve the following?:

1. use HTML5 and CSS3 to create really great iAd style ads,
2. upload it to a rich media platform and generate an ad tag,
3. serve this as an external tag via any ad server into multiple media properties,
4. see the ad run in Android apps, iOS apps, tablet web and mobile web ?

Yes. Without ORMMA this would not have been possible. Due to the incompatibilities between proprietary ad SDKs and the rich media ad units created by various tools, a standard API for ad creators was necessary.  Crisp hopes that the Crisp Engage system will be just one of many to support the ORMMA standard.

An Experience with Real-world ORMMA Usage

The Weather Channel's mobile applications for both iOS, including iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad, as well as Android phones are some of the most downloaded and used applications for these devices today. One of our biggest concerns is delivering quality and robust applications to our users, however we've found this has been increasingly more and more difficult to accomplish-- not because of increased functionality, but because we've found ourselves integrating more and more third party ad systems into our application. Not only have we experienced severe impacts to our release schedule because each third party product has its own release schedule, but we've seen a significant increase in our internal Q/A time just because we have to vet fully the ad system with each update.

Over the past several months, The Weather Channel has been working to implement the ORMMA Reference Implementations into our applications. We are please to announce that as of February of this year both our iPhone and Android applications are now fully capable of rendering ORMMA creatives.

During this process we learned a number of things.

1. Our creative development group discovered the wonders and joy that is HTML5 as delivered through ORMMA. Because of this, we have shifted all of our internal efforts away from our proprietary legacy format to one that can be rendered by an ORMMA capable system. This opens up the door to using industry standard tools for creation of ad creatives, such as Adobe Fireworks and Dreamweaver as well as Javascript and CSS.
2. Because we are now using ORMMA, our internally developed creatives are able to take advantage of a more rich user experience instead of having to rely on overly simplistic "lowest common denominator" code. This makes for a better experience for the user, which seems to lead to better engagement, which we believe will lead to a higher click through rate.
3. ORMMA has greatly simplified our lives with regard to third party tracking. Previously we had attempted several different methods trying to get some level of third party tracking, now ORMMA just works.
4. We've been able to run the same campaign across multiple platforms without changes or platform specific creatives, thus potentially reducing the creative development effort.
5. We've begun talking to our advertisers about the capabilities of ORMMA and of using it instead of other third party whenever possible.
6. We've been able to reduce the number of ad rendering systems in our apps, which has improved the overall quality of applications and made our ad rendering system much, much easier to understand and to maintain.
7. Because the ORMMA specification is well defined, we have been able to create a series of "test" creatives that verify the functionality of the ORMMA implementation. We are using these to help our Q/A staff vet each release of our applications which allows for a repeatable methodology for testing which, in turn, reduces the overall engagement time of our Q/A resources.

In short, so far we've seen a number of "wins" with ORMMA, some of them very big "wins", with very few negatives. Our creative development group has begin looking at creatives from a rich media perspective and our application developers enjoy the reduction in complexity of our application code.

We here at The Weather Channel see this as a good beginning for ORMMA and encourage others to take a look at what it brings to the table and find out how implementing ORMMA in their applications can be beneficial both to themselves as well as their advertisers and users.

Start Testing Your ORMMA-Compliant Ad Tags Now

The ORMMA group recently released their web-based testing harness online for your ORMMA-ads: http://ormma-tester.appspot.com/

Just pick a device, the level of ORMMA-compliance (currently Level 1 and 2), and the device capabilities you want to test. Capabilities include:

• Screen Orientation
• Compass Heading
• Device Location
• Shake
• Tilt
• Network Status
• SMS
• Phone
• Email
• Calendar
• Camera

You then paste in your HTML ad, JavaScript Tag or point to a page where your ad lives. Clicking "Test" brings up the testing environment with an output window and options to simulate all of the device capabilities.

This is a super easy and fast way to make sure your ad is ready to be served into an ORMMA-compliant SDK.

For more details on how to set-up your ad go here: http://code.google.com/p/ormma/wiki/Webtester

Join Us for a Webinar: Building ORMMA Compliant Mobile Apps, SDKs, and Ads

Since the launch of ORMMA last fall, many vendors and publishers have joined the discussion group and gotten started creating ORMMA compliant apps and SDKs. We want to share these learnings to help others become ORMMA compliant and spread the adoption of open standards to serving mobile rich media advertising.

Please join us on Monday, January 31, 2011 from 1-2pm ET for a webinar featuring technology leads from Crisp Media, The Weather Channel, PointRoll, Jumptap, and TringApps to learn how to create ORMMA compliant mobile applications and SDKs, and design ORMMA compliant ads.

Register today at https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/361106550

The session will cover:
1:00 Welcome and ORMMA update
1:10 Demo of ORMMA web testing client (Nathan Carver, Crisp Media)
1:25 Discussion on developing the ORMMA SDK (Casey Dement and Robert Hedin, The Weather Chanel)
1:45 Code Group Panelists, Q&A
2:00 Call ends

Panelists for Q&A
Todd Pasternack, PointRoll
Neal Karasic, Jumptap
Nathan Carver, Crisp Media
Casey Dement, The Weather Chanel
Robert Hedin, The Weather Chanel
Tarun Gaur, TringApps

We hope you can join us! Don’t forget to register to reserve your spot at https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/361106550