Google and the future of advertising…

Sean Ammirati at Read/Write Web wrote up Google exec Sheryl Sandberg’s keynote at the Supernova conference in June about the “future of advertising” (around the same time that Marissa Meyer spoke about Google’s overall future). This relates pretty closely with a dialogue a colleague and I had recently regarding possible approaches to advertising and the merchandising of products going forward. Clearly, other folks must agree with this approach, given that AOL just announced it’s buying Tacoda. Advertising is increasingly less about interrupting folks while doing things that interest them and more about meeting a need at the appropriate time. My only issue is its presentation as "the future of advertising." William Gibson once said "the future is already here; it’s just not evenly distributed." Is the future Sandberg describes already in place for your competition? Is the future already here for you?