Marketers are getting the majority share of attention and people who may have better quality content are not being seen.  This happens in every industry.  It's not the most useful products/services/content that thrive, it's those that are marketed the best (at least in the short term).  This could be a criticism of marketing as a whole, not just those that do it online.  And I think social networks allow more quality content to surface, not less.  Using Sphinn as an example, people search far and wide to find the best content they can in hopes that others will find it Sphinn worthy to genuinely help others and/or increase their status within the community.  I also don’t agree that to become involved in ‘real online communities’ will help foster a ‘universal feeling of online morals’.  And even if it did, I don’t think that would be a good thing.