Free Republic

The internet has witnessed the conversion of analog advertising dollars into digital advertising pennies (credit due to Jeff Zucker at NBC (GE) for “coining” that metaphor). Despite the fact that a viewer is always just a “click away” on the internet, online advertisements command only a fraction of the cost of far less measurable media – like print, radio, and television. Consider this: an advertisement on MySpace (NWS) might cost $.25 to show to 1,000 people ($.25 CPM), versus $25 for 1,000 readers of Time (TWX) magazine ($25 CPM). In the good old days of performance-less advertising, engagement didn’t really...