21.   A Web-surfing soccer mom would then see banner ads for minivans, while an aging stockbroker would see sports-car pitches.

22.   According to a study that Statistical Research conducted earlier this year, about a third of Internet users said banner ads interfered with their reading a Web site.

23.   Ads disguised as games have become hot among online marketers who will try almost anything to get the attention of Internet surfers who have grown weary of banner ads.

24.   But a user can click through pages and pages of Lycos content without seeing anything more commercially adventurous than banner ads.

25.   But last year, with advertising spending declining as the year progressed, the idea of moving beyond banner ads suddenly sounded pretty good to publishers.

26.   But it caught government officials and privacy enforcement groups off guard with disclosures that confidential information was being disseminated through banner ads and third-party service providers.

27.   But it is easy to prove that practically nobody is clicking on a given banner ad, leading to a perception that most online ads do not work.

28.   But many personal Web sites, having almost no money behind them, try to offset costs with banner ads and other e-commerce.

29.   But new research demonstrates that even the most frenetic banner ads garner little real interest or sales.

30.   But the Internet advertising business sputtered after investors pulled the plug on hundreds of fledging dot-coms, who were among the heaviest spenders on banner ads.