I think the bigger news is that he managed to get someone listen to the painful truth about online advertising: that it's ignored or grudgingly endured with lit

I think the bigger news is that he managed to get someone listen to the painful truth about online advertising: that it's ignored or grudgingly endured with little actual chance of conversion. Moreover, people are actually learning to avoid looking at areas with ads (Banner Blindness: http://www.useit.com/alertbox/fancy-formatting.html http://www.useit.com/alertbox/fancy-formatting.html). This is not new to web app creators, who long ago discovered that simply adding Adwords to a non-monetize-able service was not the key to vast internet riches. But as soon as the marketing departments who buy online ads come to grips with this, it's going to be a(n even greater) shock to older content creators (e.g. newspapers) that have placed their hopes on online advertising as the easiest transition to a web-based business. Of course, I don't have any better ideas, and solving that is indeed the million dollar question.