RhinoFish - 2:51 pm on Dec 15, 2006 (gmt 0)

"As an advertiser I buy search ads - they show on Google and other search engines. That's fine.

If I wanted to (generally I don't) I could buy content ads. They would show on non-search websites. I wouldn't pay as much for them. That's fine too. (Although I don't choose to use them much, you pays your money and you takes your choice)."

While I concur with everything you said, the separation between search and content is not as black and white as your post seems to indicate.

Parked domains (google.com/domainpark/), for instance, show ads and they are part of the search network. It's not so much "search engines" in the search network, but those who have applied to G as search partners, put adsense ads on their sites and generally have a G search box or search results or something that looks like search results as well.

"In the search network, your ads may appear alongside or above search results, as part of a results page as a user navigates through a site's directory, or on other relevant search pages."