HOW THIN-SKINNED ARE TORONTONIANS? Three months ago, Molson Coors Brewing put up a billboard announcing that its Coors Light beer was "Colder than most people from Toronto." But after a Toronto newspaper ran a story on the ad this week, prompting a flurry of online carping, the brewer apologized and pledged to take down the offending creative. At least one Twittering Torontonian shrugged off the brew-ha-ha (sorry, we couldn't resist), tweeting, "We're not offended that you called us cold. We're offended that you suggested we'd drink Coors."

Read More >> Simon Houpt looks at product placement and explains why Canada is behind the States when comes to adopting this growing practice. In Created, he reviews a Virgin Mobile ad that spoofs the infamous restaurant scene in When Harry Met Sally. In Quoted, Houpt reports on the Canadian Tourism Commission's effort to get the video diaries of two travellers to go viral. And in Noted, Houpt writes about the video ad planned for the Sept. 18 issue of Entertainment Weekly.

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This fall, Los Angeles- and New York-area subscribers to Entertainment Weekly will experience a media first.

EW's Sept. 18 issue, a preview of the upcoming television season, will include a bona fide video player among it pages. The player is part of a print ad for CBS that will promote the network's new Monday night line-up along with Pepsi Max.

Read More >> Guided by media services giant OMD, Nissan is testing a new technology for online display to promote its Infinity convertible, the G37.

The technology "turns surfing through images into a 'Minority Report'-like experience, letting people sweep through a wall of photos or videos with a mouse, rather than endlessly clicking 'next' to browse from photo page to photo page," according to Ad Age.

Read More >> Ad Week reports that a number of online music sites have renegotiated their revenue streams and, in doing so, have lived to stream another song.

"Back in June, things looked grim for ad-supported online music services...," it writes. "The economics of ad-supported music simply weren't working."

Since then, however, top sites like Pandora and imeem have "renegotiated deals with the music industry on more favorable terms and developed innovative ad integrations that have enticed some big brands--moves that have helped put them on the path to profitability."



Read More >> "Two of the National Advertising Review Council's investigative units plan to announce Tuesday their first decisions involving blogs," the New York Times reports.

"That's nothing shocking, but it's part of a sharper focus on the relationships between bloggers and advertisers. Attorneys general and the Federal Trade Commission, which is about to expand its endorsement guidelines to include blogs, are investigating the area."

Read More >> Amy Verner profiles Toronto agency Juniper Park, whose clients include Virgin Mobile, the Red Cross and, in the States, Frito-Lay. In Noted, Simon Houpt brings us "a striking new spot" for Barclays bank in which "a man steps out of a pub near Wall Street to realize with growing panic that nothing around him is what it seems to be." In Quoted, Houpt reports on a YouTube video that registers a young girl's first disillusionment with advertising. Finally, Houpt brings us a spot by F/Nazca Saatchi & Saatchi "extolling the benefits of peeing in the shower."

Read More >> WHEN YOU THINK OF THE ATHLETIC PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE what consumables come to mind? Power Bars? Gatorade? Muscle Milk, maybe? C'mon, push yourself, champ: How about a Big Mac? If you're planning to attend the 2012 Summer Olympics, you might want to start endurance training at McDonald's, since the fast food behemoth is close to sewing up rights as the official branded food purveyor at the London Games. And here we'd thought the Olympic ideal represented the highest level of human achievement, not the highest level of human caloric intake.

Read More >> Not everyone likes the Coen brother's Big Lebowski. But, as the Alexander Keith's slogan says, those who like it, like it a lot.

Count your humble blogger among those who like it a lot. Imagine my delight, then, when I stumbled across a new campaign for Volkswagen's See Film Differently campaign in support of independent cinema.



Read More >> Some of marketing's brightest minds have free advice for General Motors, according to an Associated Press story that ran yesterday in The Globe and Mail.

"Decades ago, GM's ads helped link America's love of cars with the Detroit auto maker. A generation grew up singing 'See the USA in Your Chevrolet' with Dinah Shore in the 1950s. Decades later, the company used rocker Bob Seger's song 'Like a Rock' to sell Chevy trucks," AP's Emily Fredrix writes.

But the automaker's ads have been less successful in recent years. Wisconsin School of Business marketing prof Deborah Mitchell tells Fredrix: "'[They] were all over the place. One might say they should be all over the place because they've got different brands. But the problem is even within the campaigns, there was a lot of jumping around.'"

Read More >> CAN A DRINKING GAME ENCOURAGE sobriety? The Dutch brewer Grolsch is touting a game it developed for the iPhone that uses the mobile device's motion-sensing accelerometer app.

Walk the Link tests players' ability to walk in a straight line, tracking their movement with a red dot along a radar-type scope. Makers of the swivel-topped beer rolled out the game at the North Sea Jazz Festival, where players with high scores were offered a free photograph at the Grolsch bar while their inept counterparts were given a sobering glass of water.

Read More >> "Sony has yanked a recently launched series of video ads from the PlayStation 3 game WipEout," Adweek reports.

The move is in response to Web-wide furor on the part of gamers that erupted almost immediately after Sony announced that "in-game ad firm Double Fusion had begun inserting video ads within the popular racing game."

The gamers' beef? The perception "that the video ads--featuring the brand State Farm--were actually slowing down load times in the game."

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