Martha Stewart's Christine Cook and Forbes' Jim Spanfeller agreed they don't feel the need to own the properties in their respective networks as long as they screen the sites or blogs for quality to provide a "clean well lighted environment" for audiences. "We don't own the sites in Martha's Circle and we dont think we ahve to," said Cook. "They want to be associated with us and our excited to put our logo on their sites."

At least that's the take I got from listening to Forbes.com chief Jim Spanfeller’s explanation kicking off the "Can Big Media Wag the Long Tail? Content as Ad Networks" panel during the afternoon session of OMMA Ad Nets.

What’s Forbes.com doing to take advantage of the long tail? It’s developed a network of 1,000 blogs to extend the reach of its advertisers, according to CEO Jim Spanfeller. And, while he says it’s still a little early to determine, Spanfeller assumes the network will generate 12-15 million unique visitors a month.

What can vertical and horizontal networks do to gain more trust from the agency community? That's the question John Gray, VP Interactive Media, Enlighten, had for a panel of mostly ad agency representatives at the OMMA AdNets show in New York.

What's the biggest hurdle for ad exchanges and networks to overcome? Performance and value, according to Will Margiloff, CEO/Founder, agency Innovation Interactive. No, it’s about size and branding, says Paul DeBraccio, CEO of consulting and sale rep firm Interevco. No, it’s all about standards and “change management,” argues Ramsey McGrory, VP, Yahoo U.S. Partnerships.

How big does a publisher have to be to participate in an ad network or exchange? Doesn’t matter, says Michael Rubenstein, Director, DoubleClick Ad Exchange. The important thing to consider is whether the vast majority of their inventory is sold or not. Size does make some difference, argues Paul DeBraccio, CEO of consulting and sale rep firm Interevco. You can, in effect, segment the market down to nothing, DeBraccio says.

To prime the discussion for this afternoon's "Roll Your Own Network: Enter the Ad Exchange" panel at OMMA Ad Nets, moderator and Revenue Science, VP-Marketing Marla Schimke, got things going by, what else, citing some research. She polled some people in the industry to find out how many knew the difference between an ad network and an ad exchange. The result: "Over 58% did not know the difference," she said.

Most industry people don’t know the difference between ad exchanges and ad networks, according a recent informal study conducted by Marla Schimke, VP, Marketing, Revenue Science, and moderator of OMMA Ad Nets noon panel, “Roll Your Own Network: Enter the Ad Exchange.” (By a show of hands, few if any conference attendees can tell the difference, either.) What’s the distinction? Media vs. technology, according to Ramsey McGrory, VP, Yahoo U.S. Partnerships. Along with the tech platform, it’s about “how we interact with the buying community,” according to Michael Rubenstein, Director, DoubleClick Ad Exchange. A true ad …

Shane Kay, negotiations director for Ford Motor Media, said the auto maker has increased the proportion of ad networks in digital spend to 25% because of the effectiveness of overlaying behavioral targeting on ad network buys in driving kpis, key peformance indicators, such as actions someone takes after clicking on a Ford ad.