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Executives at these businesses, and their investors, agree that virtual worlds are engaging enough to children to provide an unprecedented opportunity for marketing. But in a nascent industry with relatively no standards for advertising, media watchdogs, educators and even some gamemakers are worried. "This kind of marketing is designed to operate at a subconscious level. And kids don't know how to think critically about how someone's trying to get them to be loyal to a brand or buy their products," said Kathryn Montgomery, a professor in the School of Communication at American University and author of Generation Digital: Politics, Commerce and Childhood in the Age of the Internet.