Bottom-up advertising is an idea whose time has come.

The tipping point came about 3 days ago, when John Battelle finally published a short but powerful blog post entitled "Sell Side Advertising: A New Model?".

The idea had been indeed circulating for some time through a few blog sites and you just could it feel coming: independent Web publishers becoming the true drivers of a new advertising paradigm.

The current advertising model is turned upside down with control and direction taken over by the end publishers, Web 'zine editors, online reporters, news bloggers. Call it "transitive advertising", bottom-up advertising, open listings, ethical grassroots marketing, it is the realization in vision and strategy of what the Cluetrain Manifesto philosophy has been paving for the last four years.

"In essence, this new model for online ads reverses the relationship between publishers and advertisers.

In traditional advertising models, the advertiser holds all the cards. They decide what they want to spend, and most importantly, where they want to spend it.

The advertisers are no longer choosing the publisher with whom they are doing business, they are instead choosing keywords, concepts, context."