Widgets are a hot commodity on the Web, showing up on blogs and pushing aside the tried-and-true (but static) banner ads. In an effort to help online advertisers track where those widgets go and who interacts with them, LinkShare today is announcing Flex Links. It’s a new kind of embedded link technology that allows advertisers and publishers to add a new level of tracking to the Web’s most popular advertising content, such as widgets and video.

Linkshare’s PR firm just sent me a Press Release and asked me to publish it. Here are the high points and a link to the full press release.

PRESS RELEASE: LinkShare Teams with ShopNBC and Tumri to Introduce Flex Links, Tracking for Video and Rich Media

NEW YORK – December 20, 2007 – LinkShare, a leading pay-per-action marketing network, announced the debut of Flex Links and its first customer testing the technology, ShopNBC, a multimedia retailer and one of the nation’s leading home shopping channels.

Flex Links is a new kind of embedded link technology that allows advertisers and publishers to add a new level of tracking to the Web’s most popular advertising content.

“ShopNBC is excited to partner with LinkShare in pioneering the use of Flex Links to enable us to syndicate our product merchandising through new and unique interactive means with our Affiliate partners,” said Geoff Smith, Vice President of ShopNBC.com. “Flex Links will enable us to syndicate our breadth of live and archived video sales presentations in a simple and easy to implement means, providing our Affiliates with an outstanding new sales tool.”

With Flex Links, LinkShare’s pay-per-action tracking can be embedded in an advertiser’s content and automatically converted to a tracking link by publishers who post that content. Flex Links allows advertisers and publishers to work together to boost commissions, repurpose content, and enrich the Web’s newest platforms, from video to widgets.

“LinkShare Flex Links provides Tumri with a great way to deliver one-to-one marketing with targeted, offer-driven ads,” said David Kim, Senior Vice President of Business Development at Tumri. “We are always looking for ways to help our advertisers reach all micro-segments of their audiences with our AdPods, and LinkShare makes that possible.”