I hesitate to make some grandiose statement about how behavioral will absitively, posolutely, thrive in '06 and beyond. The reality is that the very thing behavioral targeting needs to gain acceptance in the long-run could topple it if the industry isn't careful. That's transparency.

Isaac Scarborough believes that if advertisers are straightforward and forthcoming about what information they're collecting and why, consumers will be more comfortable with providing better and more current data.

Online behavioral marketing is an increasingly important, fast-evolving arena that can serve consumers' best interests, and 2006 is shaping up to be a watershed year for the industry.

Like most of his marketing industry brethren, Bill Harvey has long considered contextual advertising to be the holy grail of effective ad targeting. But a number of recent case studies has Harvey, the president of research and consulting firm Next Century Media, reconsidering this commonly held belief.

What if consumers had control over the data that site publishers and advertisers collect for behavioral targeting and countless other purposes?

Behavioral targeting (BT) has been riding the marketing buzzword wave for quite some time now. More people want to know about this behavioral thing, and more advertisers appear to be putting some stock in it. But a few weeks ago, a Mediapost column by regular Publisher Insider commentator Ari Rosenberg got the goat of many a BT proselytizer.

Anna Papadopoulos sees a future in behavioral targeting for advertisers she works with in the financial and auto sectors. However, as Behavioral Insider learned in a discussion with the interactive media director at Euro RSCG 4D, Papadopoulos believes behavioral targeting deserves special attention such as unique metrics, planning parameters and creative.

The automotive market is revved up for behavioral targeting. Mitch Lowe, CEO of automotive interactive ad network Jumpstart Automotive Media, predicts the big-spending auto advertisers he works with will allocate 10 percent of their online ad budgets to behaviorally targeted ads next year.

Cyber-lawyer Eric Goldman says that by trying to distance themselves from lawsuits affecting adware, behavioral marketers could be missing the big picture. We continue with the second of our two-part Q&A with Goldman.

Cyber-lawyer Eric Goldman says there's a hornet's nest of laws that could be brought to bear on the practice of behavioral targeting if marketers don't take action. For this two-part Q&A, Behavioral Insider talked at length with Goldman about privacy issues, the implications of recent legislation for behavioral targeting, and how marketers can better cope with the sometimes long arm of the law.