Is vox populi becoming more important than the opinions of movie critics?

This Forbes column observes that "11 movies so far this year haven't been shown to critics--up from two in the same period last year."

Does that mean that digital word-of-mouth, and online reviews written by fans, are gaining in influence?

Marc Babej and Tim Pollak write:

...There are millions of consumer-generated Web sites and blogs on just about every topic, including every movie genre, sub-genre and sub-sub-genre. Many of these sites are particularly effective at generating word of mouth among die-hard fans on just about every topic. For movie studios, fan outreach represents a golden opportunity. As it happens, many of the mainstream critics' least favorite genres, such as horror or sci-fi, have fan bases that use the Internet heavily and accept the opinion of a passionate amateur over that of a critic any day. It won’t be long until the next big horror release is pre-screened to top horror bloggers, while professional critics are left out in the cold.

`Silent Hill,' opening this weekend, wasn't screened for critics.