Well, it still is really cool. And it's making some companies a ton of money while driving some of the best campaigns on the Web.

A few weeks ago I wrote in this space a column titled "Content Control and the Rise of the Insular Man." In that column, I argued that with the rising tide of media and the technology driving it, the individual's control over the choice he or she makes of what format and flavor of content to consume, might not be as "free" as media companies and the pundit class would have us believe.

Day in and day out we sit back and hypothesize about the effect of advertising on the general public. We develop concepts and ideas on how to best reach our target audience and convince them to act in a manner we so desire. One thing that each and every one of you should do is take a few moments every day and just "Be." Be the audience. Be the client. Be the consumer you are speaking to. Be the person who sees these ads and react as you would if you were them.

Americans are growing frustrated in trying to corroborate facts presented in news coverage with emerging new truths. Think for a second about how you, as a citizen who uses the Internet, gather information to answer questions like these. How does that compare to your news consumption habits of 10 or 15 years ago? If you're like me, you consult more sources of news and your newsgathering is more active than passive.

A while back, I wrote an about the diminishing audiences of young men toward TV viewing habits. Several young men wrote that programming wasn't what it used to be. Many complained that everything was either, "reality or gay." It made me think about content. As a real time medium, our industry is taxed with the daunting task of continuously coming up with new and fresh ideas. If content looks or sounds old, we are as good as dead.

No. Google does not - in the humble opinion of this onetime privacy officer and industry gadfly. Surprised? Those of you who have heard me rant about online privacy invasions probably are surprised. But, there are two key elements to this and any privacy debate, and Google has clearly addressed both of them way, way up front - like six months before their hard launch.

Sometimes it is a delicate and dangerous dance we do together, the buyers of media and those that sell it.

Training is extremely important. Last week, I discussed my ideas on integration and I came to the conclusion that training is the fundamental means by which this will occur. Unfortunately I didn't go into detail on what type of training I think is appropriate, so let's take a moment to do so this week.

The ad serving customer support reps don't want to say it, because it will offend their clients. But if you were to take your customer support rep out after work for a few drinks and he loosened up a bit, he'd tell you to quit putting it off and come in for a training class.

On April first I was sitting at a board meeting with folks from a bunch of agencies and top sites. One guy came in and teased the AOL guy saying Google was introducing a free email service. We all laughed thinking it was an April fool's joke right away.