Advertising on NYTimes.com

I am all for advertising to support a free press, including The New York Times. But I wish advertisers and the Times could work out an alternative to the jarring banner ads that now appear in the two "ears" at the top of the NYTimes.com home page. There has to be a way to sell that space and not include content that looks like it could have been copied from a highway billboard somewhere. How about figuring out a message that really works with New York Times readers and including that? Design it better and I bet more of the people visiting this site will wind up responding to it, the Times will earn more revenue, and the world will be a better place for it!