Would you say article marketing is now an arms race?

Would you say article marketing is now an arms race?

I ask this for a few reasons...

a) Go into google and type in any query related to any kind of "how to" and you'll literally see thousands of pages that link to various marketing sites (quite simply because they all seem to follow the same 'sales page' template)

b) Not only that, but you'll see tons of 'disinformation', with spun articles that would make someone that learned English as a second language embarassed (imagine what would happen if they were trying to improve their English by reading spun content! )

It seems in only a few short years, it has escalated from this:

a) One marketer finds writing articles makes sales, writes 10
b) Other marketers find out that works, start doing it
c) New guy wants in, but finds it's too much work, so hires someone for $2/hour
d) Other marketers find that out, so do the same. Since it's "cheap", they now do 100 articles.
e) Other marketers find $2 is too expensive, get software to 'rewrite' articles. Spin & submit 1000 articles.
f) Other marketers, not to be outdone, and don't want to even write the original articles, get software that scours article directories, spins 10,000 articles, and re-submits those articles
g) Seeing article directories were effective, other marketers use software to make 1,000 of "article directories", repackage it as a "SEO Submitting Service", and sell it to other marketers to get an 'edge' on competition

So now, a poor guy comes along, chances upon (whether a thread here) or some product from 1-2 years ago that extols the virtues of article marketing, decides to jump in, and wonders why he doesn't see sales, or sees a very minimum return on the effort expended?

(Case & point just read a post by a guy talking about how he wrote/submitted '90' articles, hammered his list until they bought, and effectively had a "$1.23" return per list subscriber (got around I think 300 subscribers for the 90 articles. Don't believe he knew about spinners, resubmitters, article link directories, etc, etc).

Your thoughts?