Harbinger for U.S. ad spending? UK online ads eclipse TV

For the first time, Internet advertising sales in the United Kingdom during the first half of 2009 eclipsed those of television ad sales, according to a new study from the Internet Advertising Bureau and PricewaterhouseCoopers. Internet ad sales increased by 4.6 percent to £1.75 billion, or $2.78 billion, compared with a 16.1 percent plunge in television ad spending, which resulted in ad sales for the segment of £1.64 billion.

Could this be a harbinger of ad spending in the U.S.? Might the turbo-engine of online advertising demand similarly roar past the seemingly poky steam engine of U.S. television advertising? The short answer is that it won't happen anytime soon, although that's not to say it won't occur at some point.