If everyone knows there's a bubble, will it pop?

The Economist has been fretting about rising home prices for a couple of years now, but the rest of the media has only recently jumped on the bubble bandwagon. The number of news stories about a home price bubble has recently exploded. Dan Gillmor references two articles that appeared today:

• SF Chronicle: Homeowners find much to appreciate Homeowners find much to appreciate. Despite rising interest rates, sales and prices in the Bay Area rocket to new highs. How high? The annual increase in the median home price now tops the region's typical household income.

• Mercury News: Home buyers 'flip'. Of the 1,882 houses and condos sold in the county in February, 4.5 percent -- about 84 homes -- had been purchased within the previous six months, according to DataQuick Information Systems. That's up from 3 percent in February 2004. The prior record for ``flipping'' in Santa Clara County was set in June 1989, when 3.5 percent of homes sold had been owned for less than six months.

If everyone knows there's a bubble, will it pop? Alan Greenspan spoke of irrational exuberance in 1996, but the market didn't top out until 2000. Will the cycle run its course faster this time?