one of the big reasons why online advertising has done so well is simply the negative one: online micropayments were a disaster, and never took off.

I’ve been looking at ads online for over 15 years now, and I’ve never wanted to click on one

It’s a known fact in advertising circles that only idiots click on ads — and yet advertisers still think that click-through rates mean something, and that a higher click-through rate means a better ad. It’s the measurement fallacy: people tend to think that what they can measure is what they want, just because they can measure it.

its quite astonishing, the degree to which we’ve collectively trained ourselves to ignore ads when we bring up a web page.

3. Flite – A cloud-based ad platform

[link] Flite provides a ad platform that allows the brand to use different media formats, including social media. The content can be changed in real-time. Click here to see an example.

My Take: This ad platform makes a lot of sense to me. Instead of paying someone do develop a static rich media ad you can buy a branded ad container where you can put in whitepapers, video, social media, etc. You can change the content as you need to and it allows you to integrate your online properties. Sounds pretty smart.

4. Square is tackling payment, publishing and loyalty

[link] Founded by twitter founder Jack Dorsey, Square started as a peer to peer payment app. From there Square is looking to move into other segments of the payment value chain. Square also has “Card Case” which is a payment system between merchants and customers [see video]

My Take: A cardless, cashless payment system seems great. I welcome the innovation, however, to start it looks like it will only be sensible in urban areas with lots of merchants and customers who find value in this disruption.  I’m expecting this will take a long while to take hold.

5. How Ebook Lending Could Open Up New Marketing Opportunities

[link] You may have read that Amazon is providing new Kindle Fire owners with a trial subscription to Amazon Prime – a value add service that provides free two-day shipping, movie streaming and now a lending library.

My Take: This looks like Amazon is following the Apple playbook of hardware and software integration. [ipod + itunes] [kindle + Amazon store]. With so many options for online reading, I’m wondering how B2B players can best publish their materials to devices like the iPad, Android tablets and kindles.