europeforvisitors - 1:49 pm on Jan 21, 2004 (gmt 0)

One issue that hasn't been discussed is whether contextual ads would even work in newsletters. Let's say I'm the publisher of a site about travel in the American Midwest. Issue #124 of my weekly newsletter highlights articles on my site about Milwaukee, Des Moines, and the historic town of Galena, Illinois, which are also featured on the home page of my site this week.

What ads does Google display in my newsletter? Ads related to Milwaukee, Des Moines, or Galena? If so, those ads may be throwaways compared to the same ads in articles about Milwaukee, Des Moines, or Galena, because there's no reason to assume that my newsletter's readers are interested in going to those cities (as they presumably would be if they'd selected those articles on a SERP or via my own navigation links).

Of course, Google could just display the default ads that appear when it can't find targeted ads for my site ("Midwestern Bus Tours" or "Amtrak Discounts" or "Cheap Air Fares to the Midwest" or whatever). But if it did that, what advantage would its ads have over conventional ads that have been matched to the newsletter publisher's overall topic by a human being with a brain?