How to save publishing

As you may or may not know, publishing is going through the same growing pains as Music did 10 years ago. With so much content out there for free, and with the advent of such apps as Readability, which takes away adds on websites, the future is in question. I have a great suggestion for the publishing world, PRODUCT PLACEMENT.

Now, I know that this hasn't yet actually been proven to actually work in television, or at least be worth all the money they shell out for it. You see, we have so much media thrown at us all day long that our brain can only take in so much. And granted, only the right product placement works, i.e. Coke in American Idol, a lot of it is thrown away in our cloud computing known as the brain.

Picture this, you are reading an article about publishing, and then the writer just happens to mention how awesome the new Subway sandwich breakfast sub they are eating right now is. Are you getting hungry? Let us just whore ourselves out as artists. Maybe even musicians should try this. Bands can actually start singing about products on their albums, instead of just licensing out their music to lets say to the new delicious peanut-butter snickers. I think Lil Wayne has tried this in the past.

Are you willing to start paying to read articles on the New York Times website? Are you ready to start paying monthly fees to read articles on your Apple IPad, when you can read it a few hours later in an abbreviated version on the Huffington Post. In this economy we are all becoming cheap, like the new 99 cent meal at Taco Bell.

I am just trying to get artists paid here. So many work incredibly hard to not get paid. And, since we as consumers now expect so much for free, why not take a risk? I think this all can be done in a classy way, like a brand new suit from the Men's Warehouse.