SF Gate: Recovery for sleeping advertising industry now in full swing

Portraying the rapid recovery of ad dollars in the online world as less of a fad than it appeared in 1999, SF Gate interviewed a variety of online sellers to ask why it's different this time around. The consensus: many of the consumer brands spending tens of millions last time around were seen as sucker money, signing inefficient deals that locked them in for years. Those wounds aren't forgotten, and the money coming in nowadays is seen as smarter. Today, the online offers tend to be more efficient than those in traditional media. eMarketer is predicting at least another two years of double-digit growth, with online spending coming close to $10 billion in 2005.