Google AdWords. Hmm...
 

If you are not an IPS monitor owner, do some simple search in Goggle. E.g.: http://www.google.com/search?q=antivirus, but do it standing at least about 10 inches above the screen (yes, just stand up!) And look at the SEPR.

Do all the links there look organic? Personally to me - yes, they do. But if you sit into a chair and look straight, you'll see that the 3 top links are paid ads.

Who do they choose such a strange background color? A designer's mistake?

Looks totally normal here.

So you can see the AdWords block when you are looking at your LCD panel from about 10+ inches above? What type of LCD panel do you have?

all lcd screens do this when you look from above or below? laptops are same...

as someone who uses colors everyday, you can always see variations in colors if you look from heights.

google chose that color because its hard to see nothing more and so ppl click ads.

yeah the top three links have pink behind them.... PAID ADS. Those are the spots you want to be in. :)

I think IPS ones don't, but they are not cheap and so they are not so widespread.

It's normal but they do keep making it a lighter and lighter shade of pink.

They also increased the space between results and made the (useless for every day user) number of searches box huge, it pushes down results leaving almost only paid ads above the fold :2 cents:

they made it so similar, that must bust their CPC % to skyrocket, hard times :D