Alta Vista to take money for ad placement.

Alta Vista is inviting advertisers to pay for the right to be listed above its search results. Even though advertising, both explicit and hidden, permeates most Web sites, the major search services have until now insisted that the search rankings themselves are produced objectively according to computer formulas and are not for sale. The move comes as more Internet services, struggling to increase revenue and justify their fantastic stock market valuations, are selling advertising in forms that could be confused for objective information. Alta Vista is owned by the Compaq, which wants to increase its revenue quickly in order to sell a portion of Alta Vista in an initial public stock offering later this year. In February, Alta Vista was the 13th most popular site on the Internet, according to Media Metrix, which measures Web traffic. Search engines are especially potent advertising vehicles because so many people use them when they are researching products to buy. But other than GoTo.com, none of the sites have sold positions in their search results. The search services argue that all this advertising actually benefits users, because it is often more likely to be relevant to users than their other search results.