"Pay-To-Say" Marketing: Emerging Story to Watch for 2007

This just in from Kate Kaye, a fellow ClickZ writer and author of the highly provocative (and dissonance-generating)  Sales Pitch Society II: a thoughtful article/survey of the emerging (time for a new name) "Pay to Say" marketing industry (Paid Blogging Hits a Nerve, Spurs Competition).   It's a highly troubling development (see earlier post when PayPerPost entered the scene), and raises very tough questions about the integrity of marketing.  Importantly, marketers at some point need to make a choice about the type of environment we want to shape.  Just about every CMO today is waxing poetic about the power and importance of "authentic" and "original" voices emanating from "empowered" consumer, and the VC community is reinforcing this loud chorus in their positioning around "Web 2.0" and "social media."  Is this what we really want?  Maybe not?  Again, it's all about choices.   Data is certainly not the issue here: to be sure, there's ampler research and analysis reinforcing the backlash factor of consumers feeling duped or betrayed if ostensibly trustworthy recommendation are in fact the product of "outside" forced; and even in an environment of "qualified" comments or recos, magic astericks, and other forms of real or sly disclosure, we're creating a mess of a confusing environment for consumers.  Again, it's all about choices.  What environment do we want?  Again, here's Kate's article.  Read it a couple times.