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upposedly, the Kane & Lynch debacle was settled weeks ago, but it’s very possible that Eidos recently decided to pull future ad campaigns, which definitely could have been the straw that broke the camel’s back for the bigwigs at CNET. Like it or not, the “professional” sites, whose opinions seemingly matter most, battle with the balance of journalistic integrity and advertising relationships day-in and day-out. And it should come as no surprise that it’s the “community” sites that are much more resistant to these influences because advertisers aren’t flocking to them as frequently.

I remember a story from an old college professor of mine who works for Time Inc.: Time magazine published an article that slightly badmouthed one of IBM’s computers, which resulted in the computer giant in pulling its advertising for the following three years. Whether or not the writer was fired, I don’t know.

Beans, Blogs, and Feeds Four basic conditions? That's all you got, Surowiecki? Your conditions have just met their match: bloggers are a wise crowd. Diversity of opinion - That's a no-brainer. Bloggers publish hundreds of thousands of posts daily, each one charged with its author's unique opinion. Independence of members - Except for your friends saying "You've got to blog about that!" bloggers are not controlled by anyone else. Decentralization - There is no central authority in the blogosphere; publish your blog anywhere you want with any tool you want. A method for aggregating opinions - Blog feeds make aggregation a snap and there is no shortage of services that take advantage of that fact.

Does the lone bird see the cohesive beauty of the flock? It doesn't matter because this fact remains: the whole is greater than the sum of all it's parts. As a blogger, you are both an individual force and a neuron in the giant, interconnected mind that is the blogosphere. Yes, it sounds like a bad sci-fi movie, but it's all true.