Link roundup

VC Fred Wilson mentions blogads. Thank you for the plug Fred. In the words of Clayton Christensen, too many VCs are patient for profit and impatient for growth, whereas most huge (fun!) businesses usually grow out of the opposite mentality. Poor VCs.

Online ad sales were up 21% in 2003. Given that these buyers are a lot savvier than the $33,333 a second super bowl advertisers of 1999 and 2000, the $7.3 billion figure is especially impressive. (Thank you Taegan!)

Robert Cox gives an exhaustive analysis of the problems with figuring out what kind of traffic bloggers generate. (Thanks Hylton!)

Funnily enough, traffic can be a distraction for advertisers — community spirit seems to be the essential metric. Do your readers identify with each other? Do they share a passion? If not, you probably won’t make money selling ads than the average vendor of the trillion other page impressions currently flooding the web. If web analysis tools like Webalizer and Webtrends and can’t come up with the right answer for traffic, imagine the challenge the “community spirit” will bring. I was reading the kids The little prince the other night and chuckled at this:

Grown-ups like numbers. When you tell them about a new friend, they never ask questions about what really matters. They never ask: “What does his voice sound like?” What games does he like best?” “Does he collect butterflies?” They ask: “How old is he?” “How many brotheres does he have?” How much does he weigh?” “How much money does his father make?” Only then do they think they know him. If you tell grown-ups, “I saw a beautiful red brick house, with geraniums at the windoes and doves on the roof…,” they won’t be able to imagine such a house. You have to tell them, “I saw a house worth a hundred thousand francs.” They they exclaim, “What a pretty house!”