I believe it was about a year ago when some online newspapers introduced an innovation that new visitors noticed online. Whenever a new user visited Washingtonpost.com for example, and clicked on a story link, they were taken to a screen that asked their year of birth, their gender, and their ZIP code.

Are you working in an advertising agency, for a publisher, a rep firm, or any other manifestation of a marketing business?

Last week I watched my first episode of "The Apprentice." I know, I know... where was I last year when the original "Apprentice" became a television smash?

In our quest to build relationships with consumers and potential consumers of our products and services, we often find ourselves having to deal with a highly opinionated segment of early adopters and opinion leaders who can help make or break a new product or brand.

Greetings. I'm back from the long weekend. I hope you had a good one. It does seem as if it were a long time ago though. I don't know about you, but this past week seemed to kick into high speed for me. A lot seems to be happening. The fall is upon us and conferences are popping up all over the place.

I received a great deal of feedback on last week's column regarding media addiction, and the topic is one that I've been thinking about a lot anyway.

I was just reading the other day on Editor & Publisher that newspapers are hoping they will finally get their fair share of political advertising this season after decades of broadcast's dominance has rendered political advertising in newspapers obsolete.

Now that search is fulfilling the inevitable promise of decreasing ROI effectiveness against increased demand and increased prices, what are we to do with search?

What do you do when another company publicizes the promotional material you use to sell your product, putting it in front of thousands of people in your target audience over the course of several years, helping to build your business at no cost to you? You sue them, of course.

Tom Hespos' piece this week got me to thinking. Many in our industry have been talking about what he termed 'media withdrawal,' which begs another question that others have addressed, i.e. media addiction.