What would such a system look like? I suggest that a good society should have a balance between what might be called society-making and segment-making media. Segment-making media are those that encourage small slices of society to talk to themselves, while society-making media are those that have the potential to get [...]]]> I’m flattered by Concurring Opinions’ request that I contribute to the blog this month. My expertise is not in the Law. It relates to the strategies and dynamics of media industries—particularly the processes at the intersection of marketing, digital media, and society. My aim in these contributions is to show how new, often hidden dynamics in the media system raise crucial issues for people concerned with the growth of an optimal media system for society.

What would such a system look like? I suggest that a good society should have a balance between what might be called society-making and segment-making media. Segment-making media are those that encourage small slices of society to talk to themselves, while society-making media are those that have the potential to get all those segments to talk to each other. So, for example, Latino Perspectives, a magazine for Latinos living in Phoenix and Tucson, may be considered segment-making; the same with the Univision television network. By contrast, People magazine and CBS television, with their interest in broad national audiences, can be called society-making.

A hallmark of the twentieth century was the growth of both types in the United States. A huge number of ad-supported vehicles—mostly newspapers and magazines—served as a way to reinforce, even create identities for an impressive array of segments that advertisers cared about, from groups of immigrants just establishing a presence in the country to the Jay Gatsby-esque luxury market, and more. At the same time, some ad-sponsored newspapers, radio networks and—especially—television networks were able to reach across these groups. For those who hope for a caring society, each level of media had, and continues to have, its problems. Segment-making media have sometimes offered their audiences narrow, prejudiced views of other social segments. Similarly, society-making media have marginalized certain groups, perpetuated stereotypes of many others, and generally presented an ideal vision of the world that reflects the corporate establishment sponsoring them at the expense of the competing visions that define actual publics. Nevertheless, the existence of both forms of media offers the potential for a healthy balance. In the ideal scenario segment-making media strengthen the identities of interest groups while society-making media allow those groups to move out of their parochial scenes to talk with, argue against, and entertain one another. The result is a rich and diverse sense of overarching connectedness: this is what a vibrant society is all about.

What are the core drivers that push the media toward or away from this development? I argue that in the U.S. and many other societies, the answer can be found in relationships between media and advertisers. To understand the key contemporary dynamics, I’ve focused a good deal of my recent research on the critical transformation taking place in the advertising system’s media-buying-and-planning business. The idea behind media buying and planning is basic: An agency helps its clients (the advertisers) decide where to place paid messages about their products. Thirty years ago the U.S. media plan for most national advertisers was a rather straightforward one negotiated by a few people and carried out by rather inexperienced clerks. The realistic possibilities involved the big three broadcast television networks, local radio stations, magazines, newspapers, and outdoor.

But with the rise of cable, satellite, game consoles, DVDs, and a panoply of internet-connected digital devices, media buying and planning has become a byzantine activity. The complexity of deciding how to think about and reach desired audiences has led agencies to a shift in personnel. Statisticians and computer engineers increasingly sit at the center of the process. They formulate complex computer programs, crunch numbers, and even create new advertising buying-and-selling technologies with the aim of identifying and reaching the best prospects in the best places.

The money used to purchase advertising is huge. Media buyers funnel hundreds of billions of dollars (allegedly close to $500 billion) to media firms in exchange for space and time worldwide.1 A substantial portion (one industry consultancy says 88%2) of the spending runs through a small number of organizations owned by a handful of agency conglomerates most people have never heard of: WPP, Omnicom, Publicis, Interpublic, Aegis, and Havas. And that money covers only the formal advertising. Activities such as product placement and “earned media” (an increasingly wide range of public-relations work that may well include coordinating Twitter feeds and Facebook fan pages) raises the total substantially.

Given the amount of cash involved and the fact that advertising provides such a high level of support for so many media industries, the decisions buyers and planners make influence whether media outlets live and how they live—for example, what audiences they should target and how much they can afford to invest in content. The past decade or so has seen the advertising business take a fundamental turn. The emerging media-planning-and-buying system is predicated on neither society-making nor segment-making advertising media channels. Rather, marketing executives along with their engineers and statisticians are building it increasingly around a belief in the primacy of the chosen consumer. The belief motivates them to sort audiences into targets and waste, focus on the individuals they deem valuable, track those people across as many platforms as possible, and serve them personalized ads and other content anywhere they show up.

They are creating a new marketing-and-media world, and the ramifications may well be profound for the individual, for media practitioners and their products, and for society at large. My hope with this month’s posts is that I can elucidate a few of these issues, tie them to current developments, and encourage policy discussions around them. I look forward to your comments.

References
1 See “Worldwide Ad Market Approaches $500 Billion,” eMarketer, June 13, 2011.
2 RECMA, “Global Overall Activity Billings 2010,” http://www.recma.com/files/RECMA_11103_1310117878200_FREE_EXTRACT_-_7_PAGES_-_July_08_A_.pdf , accessed February 1, 2012.

Personally identifiable information (PII) is one of the most central concepts in information privacy regulation. The scope of privacy laws typically turns on whether PII is involved. The basic assumption behind the applicable laws is that if PII is not involved, then there can be no privacy harm. At the same time, there is no uniform definition of PII in information privacy law. Moreover, computer science has shown that in many circumstances non-PII can be linked to individuals, and that de-identified data can be re-identified. PII and non-PII are thus not [...]]]> My article, The PII Problem: Privacy and a New Concept of Personally Identifiable Information (with Professor Paul Schwartz), is now out in print.   You can download the final published version from SSRN.  Here’s the abstract:

Personally identifiable information (PII) is one of the most central concepts in information privacy regulation. The scope of privacy laws typically turns on whether PII is involved. The basic assumption behind the applicable laws is that if PII is not involved, then there can be no privacy harm. At the same time, there is no uniform definition of PII in information privacy law. Moreover, computer science has shown that in many circumstances non-PII can be linked to individuals, and that de-identified data can be re-identified. PII and non-PII are thus not immutable categories, and there is a risk that information deemed non-PII at one time can be transformed into PII at a later juncture. Due to the malleable nature of what constitutes PII, some commentators have even suggested that PII be abandoned as the mechanism by which to define the boundaries of privacy law.

In this Article, we argue that although the current approaches to PII are flawed, the concept of PII should not be abandoned. We develop a new approach called “PII 2.0,” which accounts for PII’s malleability. Based upon a standard rather than a rule, PII 2.0 utilizes a continuum of risk of identification. PII 2.0 regulates information that relates to either an “identified” or “identifiable” individual, and it establishes different requirements for each category. To illustrate this theory, we use the example of regulating behavioral marketing to adults and children. We show how existing approaches to PII impede the effective regulation of behavioral marketing, and how PII 2.0 would resolve these problems.

As promised, I’m filing a report from the Sixth Annual Empirical Studies Conference, held 11/4-11/5 at Northwestern Law School.  Several of the attendees at the Conference approached me and remarked on my posts from CELS V, IV, and III. That added pressure, coupled with missing half of the conference due to an unavoidable conflict, has delayed this post substantially.  Apologies!  Next time, I promise to attend from the opening ceremonies until they burn the natural law figure in effigy.  Next year’s conference is at Stanford.  I’ll make a similar offer to the one I’ve made in the past: if the organizing committee pays my way, I promise not only to blog [...]]]>

Northwestern's Stained Glass Windows Made Me Wonder Whether Some Kind of Regression Was Being Proposed

As promised, I’m filing a report from the Sixth Annual Empirical Studies Conference, held 11/4-11/5 at Northwestern Law School.  Several of the attendees at the Conference approached me and remarked on my posts from CELS V, IV, and III. That added pressure, coupled with missing half of the conference due to an unavoidable conflict, has delayed this post substantially.  Apologies!  Next time, I promise to attend from the opening ceremonies until they burn the natural law figure in effigy.  Next year’s conference is at Stanford.  I’ll make a similar offer to the one I’ve made in the past: if the organizing committee pays my way, I promise not only to blog the whole thing, but to praise you unstintingly.  Here’s an example: I didn’t observe a single technical or organization snafu at Northwestern this year.  Kudos to the organizing committee: Bernie Black, Shari Diamond, and Emerson Tiller.

What I saw

I arrived Friday night in time for the poster session.  A few impressions.  Yun-chien Chang’s Tenancy in ‘Anticommons’? A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis of Co-Ownership won “best poster,” but I was drawn to David Lovis-McMahon & N.J. Schweitzer’s Substantive Justice: How the Substantive Law Shapes Perceived Fairness.  Overall, the trend toward professionalization in poster display continues unabated.  Even Ted Eisenberg’s poster was glossy & evidenced some post-production work — Ted’s posters at past sessions were, famously, not as civilized. Gone are the days where you could throw some powerpoint slides onto a board and talk about them over a glass of wine!  That said, I’m skeptical about poster sessions generally.  I would love to hear differently from folks who were there.

On Saturday, bright eyed and caffeinated, I went to a Juries panel, where I got to see three pretty cool papers.  The first, by Mercer/Kadous, was about how juries are likely to react to precise/imprecise legal standards.  (For a previous version, see here.) Though the work was nominally about auditing standards, it seemed generalizable to other kinds of legal rules.  The basic conclusion was that imprecise standards increase the likelihood of plaintiff verdicts, but only when the underlying conduct is conservative but deviates from industry norms.  By contrast, if the underlying conduct is aggressive, jurors return fewer pro-plaintiff verdicts.  Unlike most such projects, the authors permitted a large number of mock juries to deliberate, which added a degree of external validity.  Similarly worth reading was Lee/Waters’ work on jury verdict reporters (bottom line: reporters aren’t systematically pro-plaintiff, as the CW suggests, but they are awfully noise measures of what juries are actually doing).  Finally, Hans/Reyna presented some very interesting work on the “gist” model of jury decisionmaking.

At 11:00, I had to skip a great paper by Daniel Klerman whose title was worth the price of admission alone – the Selection of Thirteenth-Century Disputes for Litigation.  Instead, I went to Law and Psychology III.  There, Kenworthey Bilz presented Crime, Tort, Anger, and Insult, a paper which studies how attribution & perceptions of dignitary loss mark a psychological boundary between crime and tort cases.  Bilz presented several neat experiments in service of her thesis, among them a priming survey- – people primed to think about crimes complete the word “ins-” as “insult,” while people primed to think about torts complete it as “insurance.”  (I think I’ve got that right – - the paper isn’t available online, and I’m drawing on two week old memories.)

At noon, Andrew Gelman gave a fantastic presentation on the visualization of empirical data.  The bottom line: wordles are silly and convey no important information.  Actually, Andrew didn’t say that.  I just thought that coming in.  What Andrew said was something more like “can’t people who produce visually interesting graphs and people who produce graphs that convey information get along?”

Finally, I was the discussant at an Experimental Panel, responding to Brooks/Stremitzer/Tontrup’s Framing Contracts:Why Loss Framing Increases Effort.  Attendees witnessed my ill-fated attempt to reverse the order of my presentation on the fly, leading me to neglect the bread in the praise sandwich.  This was a good teaching moment about academic norms. My substantive reaction to Framing Contracts is that it was hard to know how much the paper connected to real-world contracting behavior, since the kinds of decision tasks that the experimental subjects were asked to perform were stripped of the relational & reciprocal norms that characterize actual deals.

CELS: What I missed

The entire first day!  One of my papers with the cultural cognition project, They Saw a Protest, apparently came off well.  Of course, there was also tons of great stuff not written from within the expanding cultural cognition empire.  Here’s a selection: on lawyer optimism; on public housing, enforcement and race; on probable cause and hindsight judging; and several papers on Iqbal, none of which appear to be online.

What did you see & like?

First, given that Domino’s only has a couple of seconds to get across its message, do most viewers really appreciate the reference to puffery?  To be sure, Domino’s loves it so much that they have dedicated a whole site to the “Stop the Puffery” idea and “calling out Papa John’s”.  Moreover, it seems to be garnering a lot of buzz on legal blogs, such as these thoughts on ContractsProf Blog and Above the  Law.  But as those posts reveal, the initial puffery reference stems from an old case between Papa John’s and Pizza Hut where Papa John’s essentially [...]]]> Like Nate, the Domino’s puffery commercial caught my eye.  In addition to his concerns, the commercial prompted me to think about at least two other issues related to the commercial’s effectiveness.

First, given that Domino’s only has a couple of seconds to get across its message, do most viewers really appreciate the reference to puffery?  To be sure, Domino’s loves it so much that they have dedicated a whole site to the “Stop the Puffery” idea and “calling out Papa John’s”.  Moreover, it seems to be garnering a lot of buzz on legal blogs, such as these thoughts on ContractsProf Blog and Above the  Law.  But as those posts reveal, the initial puffery reference stems from an old case between Papa John’s and Pizza Hut where Papa John’s essentially admits that its “Better Ingredients. Better Pizza” slogan is puffery in order to avoid Pizza Hut’s claim that ads using the slogan were false and misleading.   Interestingly, the Fifth Circuit case notes that “Pizza Hut does not appear to contest the truthfulness” of Papa John’s factual assertions that Pizza Hut used frozen dough, made its dough using “whatever comes out of the tap,” and made its sauce from remanufactured tomato paste.  Instead, Pizza Hut suggest that the ingredients make no difference in terms of taste.   In any event, the Fifth Circuit concludes that Papa John’s slogan is non-actionable puffery and thus did not really impact people’s buying decision.  From Domino’s perspective, calling Papa John’s slogan puffery is supposed to get across the idea that the slogan is “NOT FACT”–or in Papa’s John’s words, involves claims about “common sense choice.”  But it is not clear how much, if any, of that gets across in the ad. 

Second, wasn’t it just last month that Domino’s launched an ad strategy based on a mea culpa where company executives not only quoting comments likening Domino’s crust to cardboard and the sauce to ketchup, but also comments like “worst excuse for pizza I ever had,” and “totally devoid of flavor”?  The apology strategy seemed both bold and risky.  Though one could argue that it is only a few steps removed from ads that offer “new and improved” products, except those ads don’t explicitly admit that the old product was relatively worse.  Nevertheless, Domino’s apologetic strategy seems at odds with the attack strategy in these puffery commercials.   Indeed, the apology appears to be aimed at fostering good will and a positive outlook.  Moreover, the apology seems to be at the very least an implicit acknowledgement that Domino’s pizzas (and ingredients) were worse than their competitors.  So the puffery attack seems a bit hard to swallow. 

But in the interest of being honest, I will admit that I have not yet tasted the new and improved Domino’s pizza, and hence can’t really say anything about the pizza. . .just the pizza ad.

(And don’t forget to read “The Best Puffery Article Ever”)

As a trademark point, one might wonder whether an infringement action or maybe a dilution one would work. One might think cigarette makers have entered the cigarette entry market (Anyone remember Joe Camel?). Dilution by blurring may [...]]]> Although I tend to prefer less regulation in many cases, the pictures below seem to call for a little more discussion about how products are marketed to kids. Candy in that mimics many of the attributes of adult products such as cigarettes probably makes it easier for a kid to think they ought to try the real thing and maybe soon. As I have noted before, the warning labels on cigarettes in other countries are quite a bit more stark (some simply state in large font “Smoking kills”.

As a trademark point, one might wonder whether an infringement action or maybe a dilution one would work. One might think cigarette makers have entered the cigarette entry market (Anyone remember Joe Camel?). Dilution by blurring may apply too, but a tarnishment claim may be more difficult as I think candy (absent those pesky four out of five dentists) is still seen as a step up from tobacco. All kidding aside, even if one argues that adults can make informed decisions, it seems to me that packaging candy to look quite similar to major cigarette brand packaging is an error. You make the call about these images and what, if anything, should be done.

The ones with cellophane wrapping look even more like a training kit to me.

In this vein, I couldn’t resist posting an ad I came across last night that squarely raises these legal issues.  A company that appears to be [...]]]> President Obama is likely the first true “celebrity president”, at least the first in our time, in the sense that people see opportunities for making money from his persona and likeness.  Early on in the presidency, his office made some remarks to the extent that they were working on a policy asking people to be respectful of the president and his family in restraining some of these commercial impulses.  Of course, all of this raises the fine line between free speech and personality rights – a topic much debated on the cyberprof listserve in the early days of this presidency.

In this vein, I couldn’t resist posting an ad I came across last night that squarely raises these legal issues.  A company that appears to be in Michigan (although they do not give their postal address, but do require Michigan residents to pay sales tax on purchases from their website) has set up an “Obama shoes” website.  On this website, you can purchase Obama sneakers, backpacks, and basketballs.

The website uses video clips from one of Obama’s speeches and refers to itself as selling merchandise that is inspirational to young folks and that is intended to commemorate Obama’s inauguration. Thus, it obviously intends to juxtapose free speech interests in the inauguration against the commercial use of Obama’s name and likeness.

There are some other interesting little sidenotes about this business venture that suggest the people who set it up sought at least some legal advice before doing so.

1. They used the domain name “obamashoes.tv” presumably either because they couldn’t get a “better” domain name or because they wanted to avoid claims under the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy. They could argue that even if Obama’s name operates as a TM, they have not used his actual name in the domain name, but have added “shoes” to the end of it so no one will think it’s an authorized Obama website.

2. They include a disclaimer on their webpage to the effect that: “Obamashoes.tv is a private entity and makes no claim of affiliation or endorsement by President Barack Obama or his campaign for office.”

3. Interestingly, there is also a disclaimer on their FAQ page about the design of the sneakers themselves. “Q. Why does [sic] the shoes look like Nike Air Force Ones (AF1) and the Jordan Brand?
A. These design is [sic] been proven to be commonly preferred by most Adults & Children (black or white).” Now, I personally don’t know anything about sneaker designs, but I assume this is intended as a preemptive strike to ward of claims in trademark, trade dress, and/or design patent with respect to the actual design of the shoes.

So, interesting business model…
Legitimate free speech? Or intellectual property law infringement as far as they eye can see?

My guess is that the disclaimers are required by law and the multi-pack box cannot be otherwise offered. Still the size of the display and the choice of putting the boxes next to the sign with the sale information rather than just a sign is interesting. Maybe they had to do so or maybe folks are inured to the warnings. Either way it startled me and made me think this display is free market meets information.

I was struck (pardon the pun) by these new safety ads by the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments’s (MWCOG) Street Smart program. In addition to the vivid ads (above), there’s also a radio spot that begins with the sound of a screaming pedestrian getting hit by a car. You can download the ads at the Street Smart website.

According to the Washington Post:

[O]n average more than 80 people die and 2,000 people are injured a year in pedestrian accidents in the Washington region. . . .

“The idea of the campaign is to get to the core of the issue. It’s a life-and-death situation,” said Jim McAndrew, vice president of Design House, the firm responsible for producing the ads.

D.C. Assistant Police Chief Patrick A. Burke [...]]]>

I was struck (pardon the pun) by these new safety ads by the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments’s (MWCOG) Street Smart program. In addition to the vivid ads (above), there’s also a radio spot that begins with the sound of a screaming pedestrian getting hit by a car. You can download the ads at the Street Smart website.

According to the Washington Post:

[O]n average more than 80 people die and 2,000 people are injured a year in pedestrian accidents in the Washington region. . . .

“The idea of the campaign is to get to the core of the issue. It’s a life-and-death situation,” said Jim McAndrew, vice president of Design House, the firm responsible for producing the ads.

D.C. Assistant Police Chief Patrick A. Burke said risks have increased in recent years because pedestrians and drivers are often distracted by cellphones and text-messaging. “We’ve got to get people’s attention back on the road and the street,” he said.

The ads are put up on bus and transit shelters. The poster at the top of this post is a version of the ad that goes on the side of buses. The purpose of the ad is to shock people into being more careful. Effective? Or too vivid?

Hat tip: DCist blog

students would create a campaign against counterfeiting in which they would create a fake Web site to tell the story of a fictional student experiencing trauma because of fake consumer goods. One goal of the effort was to mislead students not in the course into thinking that they were reading about someone real.

The article raises some good questions: Why have students perform free labor for the fashion industry (and really pay for the privilege?)? What about the underlying lies? These issues remind me [...]]]> Inside Higher Ed details that Hunter College offered a course that was sponsored by an industry group called International Anticounterfeiting Coalition (known as the IACC). The group represents major fashion industry companies. The class well that is where the fun begins. Apparently the

students would create a campaign against counterfeiting in which they would create a fake Web site to tell the story of a fictional student experiencing trauma because of fake consumer goods. One goal of the effort was to mislead students not in the course into thinking that they were reading about someone real.

The article raises some good questions: Why have students perform free labor for the fashion industry (and really pay for the privilege?)? What about the underlying lies? These issues remind me of the LonleyGirl issues (there a fake videoblog lured people into what appeared to be a true personal site but was a front for a group launching a film company. Eric Goldman has a set of quick links that highlight the problems of user-generated content, ads, and quality. In general the school’s willingness to offer a class that propagates a shall we say less than authentic Web site is an example of the marketer’s will. Not that this point should exonerate the school. (Note that apparently Iowa turned down money when it was unsure about naming a school after the donor).

Still according to the article “other colleges do work with IACC” including Ohio State University but at least Ohio State does not operate in the same way as Hunter allegedly did. Ohio State seems to set up the projects as out of class activities. Hunter’s class according to some was directed by the IACC such “that the professor was required to teach only one side of the issue, had to accept industry officials watching him teach, and had little clout to fight back since he didn’t (and still doesn’t) have tenure.”

So it goes. Schools need cash and corporations have it. Would a school bow to its donors? Are schools market immune? Of course they aspire to be but the reality is different. Further as public schools lose the endowment race, they will be more and more beholden to outside funding. I am not, repeat not, saying that schools should operate so that they bow to corporate requests. I am saying that the issue is alive and well and not so easy to combat. If the allegations are true, Hunter seems to be the easy case, don’t do it. The harder ones will be the subtle questions of hiring, curriculum, and building funds which can easily look like a decision based on lack of funds when perhaps other interests scuttled the project.

Hat Tip: Slashdot

Image: Manuel Dohmen WikiCommons

License: GNU Free Documentation license, Version 1.2

“This is really a continuation of how the Web in general has enabled smaller businesses and individuals to compete if not at a level playing field, at least a more equitable level,” said David Hallerman, a senior analyst with the research group eMarketer.

AdSense is an automated program that places targeted advertising on sites big and small. Other programs such as PayPerPost are just as user friendly; bloggers sign up and [...]]]> It’s a grim season for Americans who own homes (or, shopping malls). Luckily, casual blogging for mediocre stakes is quickly filling the gap as the ultimate backstop for the American economy. Well, sort of:

[W]ith the right mix of compelling content and exposure, a blog can draw a dedicated following, making advertising a low-hanging fruit.

“This is really a continuation of how the Web in general has enabled smaller businesses and individuals to compete if not at a level playing field, at least a more equitable level,” said David Hallerman, a senior analyst with the research group eMarketer.

AdSense is an automated program that places targeted advertising on sites big and small. Other programs such as PayPerPost are just as user friendly; bloggers sign up and advertisers cherry pick where they want to place ads based on categories and the number of impressions a site captures.

Getting paid might even help validate what may otherwise seem like a silly or obscure obsession.

For Samuel Chi, BCSGuru.com started as a way to demystify the convoluted universe of college football rankings.

Chi, a former sports journalist with training in statistics, posts his calculations every Saturday night during the season before official results are released Sunday. From Saturday night to Monday, about 4,000 sports fans log on daily to check out the “guru’s” forecast.

This season, Chi made about $8,000 from the blog; ticket brokers contacted him directly after word about his site got out. AdSense brought in another couple hundred dollars for Chi, the owner of a bed-and-breakfast in Amelia Island, Fla.

A few things. First, it is very hard to imagine that $8,000 is going to validate what is, let’s be frank, a silly and obscure obsession with college football rankings. But putting that aside, it strikes me as odd that the article paid so little attention to the potentially pernicious consequences of running targeted ads on a niche website. With evidence growing that online advertising works, even when it isn’t clicked on, there are, I think, two sets of issues to think about.

First, privacy law. As a commentator to Dan’s earlier post noted, even Concurring Opinions, which has relatively few ads, runs lots of javascript hosted by third-parties. Obviously, sophisticated readers can opt out of this collection regime, but the percentage of readers with this level of know-how is small. I’m not in the group.

Second, total persuasion. As I argued here and more extensively here, we should be troubled by a world in which it is impossible to walk, or surf, “without feeling like a targeted consumer.” In a world where ads are generalized, like T.V., you can a) feel confident in your ordinary defenses to advertising – skepticism, caution, disbelief – will work; and therefore b) you will feel the freedom of being unpersuaded, and in making consumer choices that maximize your well-being, broadly defined. This is not true with targeted advertising. Thus, although it is nice that small blogs like ours can monetize themselves – indeed, I pushed and continue to support the decision to take on advertising – we should acknowledge the cost paid by our readers. Targeted advertising on a blog means that readers become consumers, subject to the most persuasive speech money can buy. Ultimately, I imagine that almost every blog with non-negligible traffic streams will take on advertising, if only to defray hosting fees. And folks can be persuaded from cradle to grave. Even during lunch!

(Image Source: Wikicommons.)

(ht Marc Bohn)