What will newspapers look like in 2020? That's the burning question these days. But whatever erosion takes place -- be it the physical paper, classified ads, editors or equity of old news brands -- I believe the importance of the individual reporter, or voice, will inversely rise. And it all comes down to trust and accessibility.

As one comes to expect, when things get hot in a market, a number of analysts and observers start to look for signs of a slowdown. It's quite natural and, I think, a good thing. However, I don't think that we are -- by any means -- on the verge of an online ad recession. Quite the opposite; in fact, I think that we are on the verge of an explosive growth phase in online advertising. Why do I think that? Here are my reasons.

If you ever read about the music industry in Rolling Stone or Billboard, you hear all about the ways that digital media is killing the record industry -- but when you surf around the Web, all the cool stuff you see is being embraced and taken advantage of by fans of music and the musicians themselves. This sounds like a pickle if I've ever heard one!

Last week's Metrics Insider, by ComScore Chief Research Officer Josh Chasin, does an excellent job of laying out one of the major issues facing online advertising: the lack of measurement standardization. Time and again it has been a topic discussed in this Spin: you can't build a sustainable, advertising-supported marketplace if you can't establish a meaningful unified currency for exchange.

Ever see a campaign or a single ad that has stayed with you because it is "bad"? Just sit around and watch TV with your out-of-the-industry friends. Some of them will cringe when they see ads they don't like. Most will just downright say they hate the ad and grab the remote control. The same goes for online as well as any other media platform.

One year ago, I asserted that companies were addicted to advertising. Too many were hooked on a perpetual hunt to imperialize every bit of white space possible. It was a quest to continue a rapid firing of impressions at our psyches. What has changed is that consumers are gaining more control over which messages they receive and which they don't.

Vacations are over. Labor Day is just behind us. School has started across the country. The U.S. Open tennis tournament will be wrapping up this coming weekend. And most of us in the online advertising business are getting ready for our Stretch Run.

I knew that title would get your attention! The best way to get rich in advertising is to develop some technology and build your business on that technology -- but since most of us are not coders or programmers, the only thing we have left is to sell our intellectual capital. The question is, when is intellectual capital defensible?

For nearly a decade, I've been answering paid search questions. In the early days the questions were all about "What is it?" and "Is there a market?" The questions then evolved to "How can we test it?" and "Can we make money?" Today, the questions evolve around ROI expectations, if search can impact brand perception, and what the proper media mix allocations is for search. With that in mind, I want to begin an exploration of frequently asked, but difficult-to-answer, questions. Up first: "What should we do about buying our brand terms?"