You can try to “control the conversation,” but it’s only an illusion.

Marketing guru Seth Godin is selling a new “service” to aggregate mentions of a company’s brand. He’s going to aggregate you whether you want it or not, and for a fee he’ll allow you to edit half the page. (Here’s my full commentary on that.)

That’s like putting honey pots around a picnic area, then charging people for the right to use the tables with ant-repellent.

Seth is somewhat famous for using his blog to promote his personal brand and his books, and is even more notorious for not allowing comments on his blog. You know, to control the conversation.

Except now Google is offering a new service called SideWiki, which allows users to add their own annotation to any web page, and see all the things other people have written.

Goose. Gander.