It’s official, traditional media will die. How do I know? Bill Gates says so yo.

Chairman Bill Gates spelled out his vision of the future of media Tuesday, in front of about 1,000 advertising professionals in Seattle for Microsoft’s Strategic Account Summit of its top advertising customers.

“We’re saying newspapers will go online, and there will be massive innovation that comes out of that,” Gates said. “We’re saying that TV, the biggest ad market in the world, will completely go online and have the kind of targeting interaction that you only get out on the Web today.

“As dramatic as things happening on the Web are, that’s actually what all advertising … will be in the future.”

Gates painted a grim picture of the transition for traditional media.

“I have a lot of friends in the newspaper industry and, of course, this is a tough, wrenching change for them, because the number of people who actually buy, subscribe to the newspaper and read it has started an inexorable decline,” he said.

By the way, Bill Gates is really awesome, in case you didn’t know. Check the link for proof.

Robert Scoble cranks off a good rip about the ‘Fear of Google‘.

Yesterday, during his speech at the Forbes shindig I attended, Geoff Ramsey, CEO of eMarketer’s funniest remark was when he told us that the “Fear of Google” was so prevelent that it even had a three-letter acronymn: FOG.

Anyway, I’ve been hearing more and more about FOG all weekend as I talk with advertising and marketing executives from some of the world’s biggest companies.

It’s interesting to watch how this will play out from a branding perspective. In the recent years, Google has been the cool, fun, useful golden-child that the world thinks can do no wrong.

You know, like Microsoft used to be and isn’t anymore?

But wait, are roles reversing? Is Google becoming the big, bad evil empire? And is Microsoft quietly and slowly becoming the underdog?

It could happen. If I was Google, I’d be worried about that momentum/brand perception switch. It could take only one bad public relations situation to trigger this into action.

People love rooting for the underdog, even if it is Bill Gates.