Hi May Lee,
I felt strongly enough against the PPC industry that I set out to come up with something better and more fair to the webmaster and site owner. I'm not sure if I have made it yet but please check out
www.BungeeBones.com.
You install a script (like Adsense) but instead of a few links it produces an entire, populated, human edited web directory (custom to each of your websites). You can offer free links but you get paid in two ways:
1) Sell paid link sales from those directories
2) Get others to install a directory and get overrides on their sales
I think your term "monetize" is key. "Selling" what might be a life long customer for a click to Adsense for a few cents does not seem like a path for the webmaster's benefit. This system deals in web traffic and sells to webmasters, but the webmasters themselves become the producers and the users of the advertising. On many levels, it is like a link exchange. But there are a portion of websites that would never add one of these directories to their site ( a mortuary site would be a perfect example). But the combined advertising effect of the ever increasing number of installed directories of BungeeBones delivers an ever increasing amount of traffic. So instead of charging "per click" we charge "per time slot" (i.e. they pre-pay for 1 - 20 months).
Anyway, check it out, especially the faq (
www.bungeebones.com/articles/faq.php)