I'm going to have some fun today and, hopefully, stir up a bit of controversy. Fellow Online Spin writer Joe Marchese wrote a provoking column on Tuesday entitled "Advertising is NOT Content." In his column, Joe charges that advertisers, marketers and agencies are too one-dimensional in their obsession with making ads that people like. Joe argues that industry folks should recognize that in this "attention economy" age they would be better served spending their time developing new business models where people could pay to avoid ads, rather than making them more attractive. While I generally love Joe's columns, I absolutely …

"Maybe we're coming at it from all the wrong ways." Have you ever uttered that sentence, or one like it? Have you ever had the nerve to completely deconstruct what you're doing -- and admit that you might be doing it wrong? It takes nerve and courage. It's hard for someone to debunk their own internal mythology, the set of "tried and true" guidelines that have driven lives and careers to date, in order to start over -- but that scenario is on the agenda for many right now.

With apologies to soap operas, advertising is not content. How can I be so sure of this? Because given the choice, a vast majority of consumers would prefer to consume actual content without advertising. Yes, even the really good advertising like Super Bowl commercials.

On personal levels, many things fuel the dynamism of life: by whom and how you were raised; physical surroundings; social fabric and settings; intentional pursuits and happenstance; your adventures and exposures; the company you keep. Personal life relies on the tensions, textures, and contradictions within all that to thrive. And so, it follows, does our business.

This week AOL appointed former NBC Universal exec Chris Grosso to the newly created post of "general manager of the Homepage." I was intrigued by this announcement. Not because of AOL's decision to appoint Grosso, but because his title underscores the respect and authority that any homepage deserves.Homepages are the virtual storefronts and front desks to so many businesses. It won't be long before no business can survive without a meaningful homepage.

Everyone who grew up with newspapers also grew up with the maxim "Don't believe everything you read." Over the past week or two, we've seen a number of news stories in both mainstream media and across the Web (redistributing the mainstream media stories) recounting how a New Hampshire burglary ring supposedly used Facebook to identify people who were traveling and whose homes were unoccupied, then robbed them. The suggestion of those stories was false.

I'm a 100% Apple convert. Over the last few years, I ditched my PC in favor of a MacBook Pro, and generally every device I buy has that little Apple logo on the back. That being said, I feel I need to be critical of the new launch of iTunes and its integration of Ping (Apple's social music network), but only from the perspective of someone who wants to see it succeed. Consider it constructive criticism with a hint of gadgetry love.

All attention that consumers give to advertising comes at a cost. The easiest measure is how much time a consumer spends with advertising vs. the consumer's actual goal of content consumption. Just to get ahead of it, please don't tell me that some consumers like highly relevant or high quality advertising. Sure, the Old Spice Man is great, but is he so great that you'd like to stop watching the show you were immersed in to see the new advertisement? Don't be ridiculous.

We've all been subjected to the "fans and friends" outburst -- whether as an agency, a peer, or in casual cocktail conversation with self-made celebrities of the digital age. Sound familiar?: "We got 200 fans overnight." Or, "I'm doing really well. I have 1,000 friends and my page has 100 more fans than my competition." But, unless the marketer or celebrity can transform that passive attention into action, no one can be sure that fandom and friending count.

I often find myself having to join conference calls while on the go -- walking, driving or even while standing in lines. Most conference-call services require participants to dial an 800-number, followed by a passcode. That's reasonable, except when the pass codes are longer than six digits.