People loathe, loathe, loathe being sold things. Much like the canvassers parading up and down the block with clipboards, it's easy to avoid most hard sells if you keep your eyes to the ground and your finger on the TiVo button. Banished to the realm of petty annoyance, advertisers have had to adapt to the increasing chatter that consumers use to drown them out, and the result haven't always been pretty. Your shows get "paused" by snipes. Your reading material gets absorbed by advertisers. And now, you're basically reading advertising copy in your leisure time.

Hence, Bill Engvall interrupting Family Guy mid-episode to promote his own show, a tactic, called a "snipe," heretofore unseen on television. You have to give credit to Fox for innovation, even as you're cursing them for the disruption.

This week word arrived that TV Guide would hand over its newest issue to ABC shows, which will fill up all of the mag's ad pages and come with a special DVD insert pushing the network's fall line-up. It's going to feel like Target's New Yorker takeover, but with even less ability to distinguish advertising and editorial.

Blame it on the writer's strike — everybody is! — which crushed the amount of decent programming coming out this season. Network's can't rest on their product alone to draw in the big viewers, so the burden rests in over-saturating the market.

But what can be said for this Metro Sports cover that features both the first female amputee to finish an Ironman triathlon, and the Nike swoosh logo strategically placed in the bottom right corner? Not to mention the fact that the runner, Sarah Reinertsen, is wearing a shirt that promotes the date that Nike is holding its own marathon?

Folio nostalgically remembers a "church-state separation, where magazine editors and ad salespeople are divided by Plexiglas and the cover is an untainted, pristine piece of real estate," but as in every technological and artistic advancement this century, advertising has found a way to worm its way in and leave its mark. (Wait till Esquire's blinking cover becomes Esquire's blinking advertisement.)

When you no longer know if the viral video you are watching is from a high schooler or a brilliant marketing strategist, you might think the question is one of entertainment: "As long as you're being amused or informed, does it matter where the idea originated?"

Sometimes, no; entertainment is entertainment, whether a clever writer delivered it, or a clever copywriter. You don't enjoy the Super Bowl any less just because Budweiser is footing the bill.

But with a magazine, especially one engaging in service, there's a level of trust expected between the editors and the reader. Letting advertisers piggyback on that sacred relationship dilutes the listicles of how-tos, must-haves, and self-helps. Yes, readers are usually savvy enough to spot marketing material. But they shouldn't have to be.