In brane world models our universe is considered as a brane embedded into a
higher-dimensional space. We discuss the behavior of geodesics in the Rand
all-Sundrum background and point out that free massive particles cannot sta
bly move along the brane. The brane is repulsive, and matter will be expell
ed from the brane into the extra dimension. This is undesirable, and hence
we study a simple alternative model with a noncompact extra dimension, but
with an attractive brane embedded into the higher-dimensional space. We stu
dy the linearized gravity equations and show that Newton's gravitational la
w is valid on the brans also in the alternative background.