A misleading, but very viral headline that is going to misinform a lot of people about the state of online advertising . . . Let's look at the data: a) "The c

A misleading, but very viral headline that is going to misinform a lot of people about the state of online advertising . . . Let's look at the data: a) "The collaborative studies focus on an understanding of how U.S. Internet users click on display ads." - so we're talking about "display" not contextual, search, mobile, or any of the other high-engagement / high-relevancy ads that are among the highest-growth areas fueling online advertising's growth? b) The inventory available for "display advertising" has SKYROCKETED - from 2007 to 2009 thanks to the popularity of social media sites which we all know has notoriously low CTRs. Facebook alone contributed hundreds of millions of users and showed them hundreds of billions (trillions? more?) of units of display advertising during that time period. If you want the real goods on online advertising trends I reccomend you read the PWC IAB Advertising Revenue report: http://www.iab.net/insights_research/947883/adrevenuereport http://www.iab.net/insights_research/947883/adrevenuereport The data reflects a much more solid foundation for sustained growth in the online advertising marketplace than you may conclude from this link-bait from Comscore.