The booming participation in social media is creating both a big opportunity and potentially a giant sink hole for media companies and marketers.  How this will play out is far from being known at this stage, says Larry Kramer, founder of MarketWatch whom I consider a true media visionary.

I caught up with Larry today in Manhattan.  He says the way for media and marketers executives to view social media is as "local."  Not geographically local, of course, but community-centric.

Larry will explore this topic next week when he leads a panel at the paidContent social media conference in Los Angeles.   

A couple weeks ago, I interviewed Forrester analyst Josh Bernoff who cites marketers who are finding successes in social media.

All the best to Rafat and the paidContent crew for a big success next week. 

— Andy Plesser