• The Wall Street Journal, Tuesday, January 23, 2007 11:18 AM

Project Panama is out now, and while many advertisers are excited by a more efficient way to buy search advertising with Web giant Yahoo, smaller advertisers are already reporting trouble making the leap from the old to the new system.

Indeed, Yahoo had repeatedly delayed Panama's launch due to the mammoth task of porting hundreds of thousands of advertisers over to the new system. National advertisers are more familiar with it, as Yahoo debriefed major ad and search-marketing agencies on the new system long ago.

Many are excited about the prospect of a system that in practice works more like Google AdWords, and claim they'll likely spend more with Yahoo as a result. Tonight, when Yahoo announces its fourth-quarter earnings, the company is expected to issue an update on the Panama situation; reporters and analysts will no doubt have several questions.

Read the whole story at The Wall Street Journal »