Mobile advergaming has that air of inevitability. It is not a matter of whether, so much as when... and how much.

I'll keep this appropriately short. Anyone contemplating in-stream mobile TV or radio advertising should go directly to iTunes' podcast library for his or her first lessons.

Stephen King gave me a call the other day. Well, we're not really on speaking terms, but his voice message was part of a novel and ambitious mobile marketing package put together for his new horror thriller Cell.

My real estate agent just sent me one of those cheesy grocery list pads for my refrigerator. It hangs from a magnetic business card with a picture of her and her big-haired-I-drive-a-bigger-Beemer-than-thou grin on her face, and by God I use it, because it really is just the right size for my Shop-Rite lists.

Word is abroad that the relatively few mobile ad campaigns now running on WAP pages enjoy click-through rates that Web banner ads haven't experienced since the days of insufferable IPO hype--and, well, equally insufferable sock puppet Super Bowl ads.

One word, just one word: CueCat. You interactive marketers with any memory left of the pre-bubble years are already cringing at the mention of this famously flawed attempt to marry print and interactive worlds with a hand scanner.

Let's inaugurate this column on mobile marketing with a real flyer, shall we? Sometime within the next year or so, I predict, we will see a fully ad-supported cell phone service.