That's not really important anyway. What IS important is that Ed, talking horse, was quite a phenomenon back in 60's. Ed talked, reasoned and displayed traits unlike any of his animal brethren.

There is a lesson here, of course. Millions of people watched Mr. Ed every week just because he WAS different. And that leads us right smack-dab into a discussion about your banner advertising campaigns.

Those poor maligned banners. Once darlings of Internet advertisers, they've really been getting bad-rapped lately due to their failure to lure web surfers into clicking-thru and creating sales. But is it fault of banners or have they become so ubiquitous that surfer hardly notices them? Why don't we make those banners so inviting and entertaining that users won't be able to click fast enough?

I think that content providers are too focused on consumers as "sets of eyeballs." We need to look at these people first as users and, secondly, as members of our online audience. And audiences have come to expect advertising wrapped in a very entertaining package. An essential part of that package is streaming audio.

Streaming audio has become a whole new industry for Web. As more and more people listen to music online and web-based radio, advertisers are taking notice. These listeners, fondly called "streamies," are devoted Internet users and active online shoppers. They are a valuable audience as they're 70 percent more likely to have made an online purchase than a non-streamie. Arbitron Internet Information Services says that streamies are quite ready to accept web advertising in exchange for free programming, and they're more receptive and influential targets.

How can we begin to use these statistics to leverage effectiveness of banner ads?

The theory behind this security model is user knows what's best for his system. In my humble opinion, this is pure hogwash (a stronger expletive came to mind but this is a family site). Is your average web surfer really knowledgeable enough to make a decision like this? Look at it this way, by installing an ActiveX control you are assuming it is secure, won't damage your system and is bug-free. You are basically trusting completely company which created control, developers and people distributing image.

Yes there are security certificates involved, but those are relatively easy to get. Also remember how many security problems have been reported involving ActiveX controls.