Canada Post has been accused of ignoring requests to not drop off admail — presumably because of the increasingly crucial revenue represented by the likes of IKEA.

With the recent attention granted by the Ottawa Citizen, though, the pseudo-Swedish furniture chain may not have to pay for any advertising at all. A front-page story, plus six other features, were dedicated to its existence.

Perhaps the fact that IKEA and the Citizen are neighbours contributed to the perception of importance. The overkill coverage might have been a cynical gesture by editors under pressure to perform for owner Postmedia Network.

Regardless, a more subtle approach wouldn't lead to any tweets questioning the motivation. You could always find plenty of interesting non-IKEA news to read on Saturday — even if the Citizen didn't deliver it.

Being bombarded by fluff pieces about one topic seems to be less about catering to the featured company, though, than a display of what a publisher is willing to do.

Citizen sister publication the National Post linked itself to the marketing of The Muppets, with a tournament that engaged social media users, even though it wasn't a paid promotion. How these Muppet metrics connected to generating future enthusiasm for the Post itself was less clear.

As long as enough the population can remember when newspapers were taken more seriously, however, the medium will have an advantage over admail. The incredulousness over a broadsheet taking some trivial topics so seriously is an alternative to printing yesterday's news.