Webkinz Noise

What is your opinion of the webkinz craze, I'll admit my kids each have a couple of webkinz toys so they can use the website, but there are kids out there that have to have everysingle one that come out at 15-20 bucks a pop. What creates these fades and what can you do to encourage your kids to not get completely sucked into them. Is it just good marketing, is it peer pressure, is it just us as parents spoiling our generation of children? I know the kids have a lot of fun on the web site but really they only need 1 tag to get a year of access so isn't that enough?
Share your thougts with me on this or any other kids craze that you have experienced.