Interesting blog post - comments anyone?

[Randall Reetz]

The slippery (or in this case "invisible") slope of "gorilla" PR is powerful especially and only because it sneeks so silently and politely under our BS radar.  So called "multi-level" marketing proponents have known this forever.  Sell to "friends" and your effectiveness skyrockets.  Any activity that acts "friendly" but has a commercial motivation fits this category.  We have become so used to having it done to us (and doing it ourselves) that we don't still have that hair up sensation that used to be our reaction.  But the result is a hardening, a loss of the separate sameness that used to be reserved only for the category "friends and family".  Now we expect to be targets of the misuse of that privilege.  An arms war where the winner can only result in the loss of real trust and the very real need for a sanctuary away from "pitch" and "spin".  We can't have our guard up all of the time.  Too costly.  Neither can we let go of the distinction between authenticity and huckstering.  Subtle but important.  The old warning, "Never cry wolf", never had as much relevance. And none of this has anything to do with the actual topic of the relevance of the xtalk programming family.  That is sad.

randall