Advertising

The Week in Privacy Problems: Who's Hacking, Selling, and Manipulating Your Data

This hasn't been a good week for privacy -- but is it ever, these days? Here are the hot messes that dominated the depressing privacy discussion this week. Hacking: Last night, Chinese hackers broke into the Times' computer network and stole every single employee's password, then used the data t ... More >>

Super Bowl Commercial Week: Brad Pitt Ditches the Paparazzi (and Jennifer Aniston) on a Beer Run

Despite opposing claims from TMZ, celebrities are actually nothing like us. Take, for example, this 2005 Heineken commercial starring a beer-thirsty Brad Pitt. In it, the star uses some stealth techniques to avoid the legions of photographers who capture his every move. The ad ran on the heels of ... More >>

McRib Surfacing Again In December?

According to Advertising Age, the McRib is scheduled for another comeback in December. According to a memo obtained by Ad Age from McDonald's Operators National Advertising Fund, the chain's national-franchise council, the McRib marketing window was originally scheduled for Oct. 22 through Nov. 11 ... More >>

Planned Parenthood's Worried About Money Problems (As Explained In $4.6 Million Ad Campaign Bashing Mitt Romney)

Planned Parenthood is worried that a Mitt Romney presidency would leave the group strapped for cash -- and it's explaining the potential predicament by spending more money on political attack ads bashing Romney than it's ever spent before.We'll repeat: Planned Parenthood is concerned about potential ... More >>

5 Funniest TV Food Commercials of Stan Freberg

Starring character actor Jesse White, this commercial, circa 1960, treats Esskay franks as if you could smoke them. Born 1926, Stan Freberg was an American satirist, active in the 1950s through the 1980s. Something of a Renaissance Man, he was a radio personality, comedian, wrote books, voiced ani ... More >>

Potted Potter

James Bond Becomes a Beer Man, Fans Not So Impressed

James Bond will no longer be ordering martinis "shaken, not stirred." The Bond franchise has sealed a marketing deal with Heineken, rumored at $45 million, to have the spy sip on the Dutch beer instead of the usual martini in the upcoming Bond film, Skyfall.

Presidential Campaigns Rip Pages Out of Zuckerberg's Playbook

Conservative Christian males and liberal atheist females are being targeted -- on Facebook, at least. According The New York Times, these kinds of digital details are increasingly valuable to office-seekers than ever before. As we all know, Facebook thrives off of tracking our web patterns, analyz ... More >>

Shoplifters Cannot Resist Axe Body Spray

Today Adweek has a helpful and revealing list of the items people steal from retailers the most. Apparently, we're a criminal lot, with one in 11 people stealing something he or she didn't pay for -- and 70 percent of shoplifters (most of whom are adults who also have jobs) saying they didn't plan ... More >>

Is It Battlefield 3 or Occupy Oakland?

We were somewhat confused tonight when we clicked on the livestream of Occupy Oakland and saw the above video. As of right now, when you click on the link, you see a flash of live footage from the rowdy streets of Oakland, then the above ad for the PlayStation game Battlefield 3. The intercut juxt ... More >>

Page One: Inside the New York Times

Here's My Sumptuous, Full Page Ad In Odyssey Magazine

​Thank you, Odyssey magazine! Thank you Lee Kimble, who laid out the ad for me!

Annoying, Endearing Local Commercials Up For Annoying, Endearing IFC Awards

​IFC, the channel of Portlandia if that says anything, is sponsoring the LoCo Awards & Sweepstakes, a celebration (which is actually just a huge promo for one of their new shows) of those zany, cheaply made local commercials that we all love to hate so much. Although you can still nominate com ... More >>

Pomplamoose

Last Tango in Paris

Now Prisoners Have to Watch Commercials in Jail

​Pity the prisoner. The one place seemingly protected from the 24-7 marketing blitz that is life in 2011, with all of its product-placement surround-sound digital marketed glory -- that is, jail -- has fallen prey to the great beast of advertising. Inmates at the Erie County Holding Center in ... More >>

American Apparel CEO Dov Charney Sued For Allegedly Keeping Teenage Sex Slave

​Dov Charney, the controversial founder and CEO of American Apparel, is being sued for grimy sexual abuse graver in dirty detail and larger in dollar amount than any other grimy sexual abuse he's been accused of before. A new lawsuit from an ex-American Apparel employee seeks $260 million in d ... More >>

Sacrilegious Super Bowl XLV Doritos Ad Yanked By Frito-Lay

I thought the ad -- recently screened on AOL, so it's still being mainstreamed on some level -- was funny, and a little stoopid, too. It's really like something you'd see in a Luis Buñuel movie, like The Phantom of Liberty or The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie: A group of congregants li ... More >>

Last Tango in Paris

A NEW CHAPTER

Joshua Ferris reads from his second book

New New York City Ad Promises if You See Something, You'll Be Something

via New York Times​The new New York City ad campaign (because we want people to come here, right? Right?) launching this week promises that the more you see, the more you'll be, and since New York is positively riddled with things to see, seeing them means you'll be quite a lot. In support of ... More >>

New York City Unveils New Anti-Smoking Commercial, in Which You Are the Bubble Wrap

New York City is introducing a new round of anti-smoking commercials, and while these won't make you retch in a cab after a night of excessive drinking (lady without fingers, anyone? Tracheotomy guy?) -- or just really, really sad (kid with implied dead smoker parent) -- they are super-dramatic, fea ... More >>

Judge Laughs at Pissed Off Variety Advertiser Over Being Pissed That They Didn't Get Good Review They Paid For

"We're gonna need a bigger ad buy."​Some guy with a movie called Iron Cross - starring the late Jaws actor Roy Scheider - decided to advertise in dying Hollywood trade rag Variety after Variety approached them about selling advertising. When Variety gave Iron Cross a bad review, the advertiser ... More >>

VIRTUAL GALLERY

Playing with avatars at Postmasters

The Best Man

Adventures in Grizzly Bear-Related Licensing

​If given the choice between debuting a new song on a music blog, Twitter, your own website, etc., why not choose the Washington Lottery? Starting today, an ad will start running in that state, featuring a new, unreleased track by Brooklyn's Grizzly Bear. Cole & Weber United, the ad agency tha ... More >>

Mr. Cutlets Weighs In on the At-Home Butchery Craze

rumpleteaser/flickrButchering at home: it's just cool.​With the rock star butcher backlash looming, at-home butchery is the next step in this culinary climate that favors DIY and nose-to-tail cooking. In his Time column, Josh Ozersky takes a look at the trend of hacking up one's meat in the co ... More >>

Leon Redbone

Stephen Colbert's Mayo-lution, Televised & In Print

Does anyone find the Miracle Whip-Stephen Colbert feud creepy? Colbert aired a faux pro-mayo PSA on his show a couple of weeks ago spoofing Miracle Whip's irritating dancing hipster campaign. Miracle Whip then responded by taking out a one-page ad in several newspapers promising to dominate the ad ... More >>

The Sometimes Riveting Infomercial The Providence Effect

Agency Sues to Defend Its Horrible, Soul-Deadening Product Placement Idea

A little firm called Denizen is suing the J. Walter Thompson ad agency because its recent creepy TV ad gimmick closely resembles a creepy TV ad gimmick they showed JWT years ago. The offending ads, for Microsoft web engine Bing, have characters from the NBC show The Philanthropist talking about ho ... More >>

I Got Dissed By Daffy's

Last year, I was asked to be in an ad campaign for Daffy's, the affordable store I actually rather liked (until now, that is). I whorishly said sure, only to later find out I had been dumped because the art director didn't want me in the least. Jeez! Was this reminiscent of my long-ago experience wh ... More >>

Bloomberg Pops Up in Rupert's Post

As Mario Cuomo famously said, when New York Post publisher Rupert Murdoch likes a politician, he lets you know it. Back in 1982 when Cuomo was campaigning against Post favorite Ed Koch for the Democratic gubernatorial nod, he griped that when normal papers endorse a candidate  "you get one column ... More >>

TV by Design; Pipilotti Rist's Pour Your Body Out at MOMA

Television tangles with modern art—Warhol wins

Madonna Wants to Sell You a Bag

Via Fashionindie we are alerted to the new Louis Vuitton print campaign featuring Madonna. We understand that a point-of-purchase display based on this shot will appear in stores soon.

My Week in Disappointment

New York City's Struggle to Take Down Illegal Billboards

City government and citizen vigilantes wage a losing battle against Clear Channel and illegal ads

America the Beautiful a Well-Intentioned, Scattershot Look at the Image Conscious

The Ad Blitzers' Facade

A city pol sheds her grace on a campaign backer. How unsightly.

Mayor Mike Plays Moneyball

'Hellbent'

Queer as TV Folk: That Other Gay Network Is Here!

We Don't Need No Thought Control: Marketers' Dirty Tricks

MoveOn Ad Competition Ushers Bush Attacks Into the Mainstream

The Medium Is the Message

A Lot of Nerve

Erotic Web Zine Swells in Size as It Plans To Become a Portal

'We've Sold Out the Eyeballs'

'Feed' Founders See Profits In 2000; Business Model Exploits Ad-Friendly Theme Issues

Women Are Easy

Why TV Ad Agencies Take Female Viewers For Granted

Die, Yuppie Scam

Signs of the Times

Huge Billboards Invade Noho and Soho