Today the Silicon Alley Insider backtracked on its analysis of the impact the sub-prime mortgage crisis will have on online advertising.  While the text of their post is less positive than its title, they generally conclude that the latest Nielsen/NetRatings numbers give no indication that there is a slowdown in spending among the major mortgage advertisers.

I stand by my assertion that the Nielsen numbers are flawed in turning measured impressions into ad spend due to the huge variance in CPM across advertisers. But, this is a great example of flawed data being useful as a relative measure over time.  Though I question the absolute numbers, I believe the data clearly show that the major mortgage advertisers are still heavily engaged in the onine channel.  At the least, the advertisers are clearly not abandoning the channel as some had previously speculated.