Google's new Ad Manager technology will soon enable premium ad banners to be sold directly to advertisers by publishers and when the clicks are used up on the premium ads it will revert automatically to use Google Adsense. This is a brilliant move and will further accelerate the gap between premium content and generic publishers who don't provide any unique content value. I have always felt that quality advertisers will find quality content and now there is one single platform to consummate these relationships. Today premium content publishers sell clicks direct at a huge premium using 3rd party billing and click tracking systems. Clicks are usually sold via banners and text ads at a 2x to 4x premium cutting out Google. I think this bad news for most ad networks who will soon need to specialize and/or be selling remnant inventory only. However, this theory assumes that most quality publishers want and know how to sell ads directly. I think hard working publishers and agencies will be rewarded and we will soon see lots of companies like the Rubicon Project and Gorilla Nation. Los Angeles
