Late last night, commenter Lion King pointed me to the MYPLASH Danity Kane Visa card website. The reason this matters? Because the artist information at the site says that they are now in the studio working on an album called "From the Ashes." It has an old bio that has been updated to include a mention of "Welcome to the Dollhouse," and the title "From the Ashes" is rather ominous, of course, given what has transpired.

A lot of outlets, especially gossip sites, pounced on this to report the rumor that the group has already been working on a third album. Some of them are even saying that it's some sort of diss to Diddy, as if they are secretly recording an album. If it's on the MYPLASH website, they must be really, really bad at keeping secrets!

So, what's the story? According to a source at Bad Boy, these reports are completely "false." The girls have been released from their contracts and they are not working on a third album, at this time.

Digging deeper, Newsarama.com reported back in September that Danity Kane would have their own Visa card. A month later, Diddy removed Aubrey O'Day from the group. So, it appears that this credit card has been due out for a while and it is just coming out now.

One other aspect of the story that I'd like to tackle is the fact that some outlets are attaching the Visa name to the story, sometimes labeling them a Danity Kane sponsor, possibly in hopes of increasing the legitimacy of the story. This sort of branded credit card is called an affinity program. This is when a brand lends it's name to market a credit card, receiving payment for both the brand recognition and, potentially, the use of an existing client list.

I spoke with a friend who used to manage affinity programs for a major bank and he filled me in on how these programs typically work.

He said that, with this sort of thing, Visa would not be sponsoring Danity Kane. If anyone was sponsoring them, it'd be MetaBank.These cards are issued by MetaBank, as noted in the MYPLASH website footer. Visa has licensed their name to them, yes, but MetaBank is the financially responsible party here and the one that has created this MYPLASH program.

These MYPLASH cards are targeted at young people, especially teenagers, so they work with brands that will create interest with teenagers. That's why they are working with the Danity Kane brand and why this deal was seemingly initiated last year - before the group had been separated.

Unfortunately, I think we'll be seeing more and more rumors like this. Take them with a grain of salt and do not get your hopes up.