Will Beg for Food and Web Site

Reader John Bradford directs our attention to the spectacle of "bumvertising" in the Pacific Northwest:

After scrambling to create an Internet development business and engineer his own Web site for poker fans, [Ben] Rogovy had lots of ideas but little cash with which to advertise them. Then, while staring at a panhandler's cardboard sign, the light bulb clicked on.

"So much traffic goes by these sign holders, I thought, 'Wouldn't it be cool if they could advertise themselves and me at the same time?' " he said.

Rogovy gives the bums some food and water and $1 to $5 depending on "each panhandler's relative value" to advertise his site, PokerFaceBook.

Whole Seattle Post-Intelligencer article here.

Let the debate begin: Is this free markets gone wild? Or is it true that if a man can't advertise on another man, he's got no rights at all?