The banner ad that’s widely described as the first ever was a little rectangle purchased by AT&T on HotWired.com in 1994. About 44 percent of the people who saw it actually clicked on it.

1994: Wired.com, then known as HotWired, invents the web banner ad. Go ahead, blame us. The Mosaic browser was just morphing into Netscape in 1994. And if you think ads slow down page loads now ...

The odds of clicking a banner ad are lower than surviving a plane crash or winning the lottery, highlighting ad effectiveness issues.

Robert S. Moore, Claire Allison Stammerjohan, Robin A. Coulter, Banner Advertiser-Web Site Context Congruity and Color Effects on Attention and Attitudes, Journal of Advertising, Vol. 34, No. 2 ...