A collection of 100 beautifully-designed frames or 'backdrops' which surround a standard-sized (468 by 60) banner ad. With their subtle 3D appearance, these borders cause viewers to pay attention to ads in a new way, and the right combination of banner and border can have a stunning artistic effect.

The border designs are the work of graphic artist Torey Holmquist, and they are dispensed by a set of web pages programmed by AIP founder Tod Foley. The team used JASC Inc.'s 'PaintShop Pro' to create the art, and the system was written in PHP, a new open-source scripting language that's fast becoming a rival for Microsoft's ASP ('Active Server Pages'). A major design goal was making sure that the program would transparently handle HTML code-based affiliate links, such as those supplied by Commission Junction and the LinkShare Referral Program. These ads are the lifeblood of many small and large websites, and their pulse has been dwindling as of late.

'Like many webmasters, we've witnessed a serious drop in the clickthrough rate on banner ads over the last couple years,' says Foley, 'but we refused to take that as a given. Instead, we looked at it as a creative challenge. BANNERBORDERS are designed to give webmasters more creative control over the impressions created by their sponsor's ads.' The initial collection covers a broad range of webpage themes. A webmaster focusing on sports, for instance, could select different border designs than one focusing on kitchen appliances, local news, or kids. The system quickly assembles a short piece of code for insertion into any web page, supporting both Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator. With a simple copy/paste and a few clicks of the mouse, anyone can assemble a banner/border combination in seconds.