The adware king, Gator, has settled one of its many lawsuits with the parent companies of The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and the digital arms of Knight Ridder and Conde Nast.
The terms of the settlement were not disclosed but let's hope it included a big collective kick in the balls.
Gator, if you've been living under rock the past year, is the company that serves pop up advertising software when they install a separate product for filling out online forms and remembering passwords. Gator also comes hitched with free software from other companies, including games and file-sharing programs.
Gator has the ability to pop up ads over other publishers sites and in particular, their own ads. Publishers don't like to have their ads covered by other ads. Gator just doesn't play nice that way.
While some hate it, Gator is very popular with advertisers (500 to date) because of the targeting abilities it can offer allowing advertisers to reach well defined demographic targets.
Gator still faces similar lawsuits from United Parcel Service, which said unauthorized pop-ups have included ads for rival FedEx Corp., and from Six Continents Hotels, which operates Holiday Inn and Crowne Plaza and complains that Gator directed visitors to deals from Marriott and other competitors.
Other lawsuits, including one filed Jan. 27 by MetroGuide.com travel service, have targeted Gator's advertisers, without naming the company as a defendant.
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In an effort to keep and draw in more readers, Money magazine is expanding it's nuts and bolts financial coverage to include more lifestyle related items. with stocks in the toilet, the magazine hopes to create new topics of interest.
"Money is an essential magazine about you and your life," said Robert Safian, its managing editor since 1998. "We have to be nimble about things that our readers are spending their money on, such as real estate and consumer electronics."
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HBO has offered a "network cleansed" version of its popular Sex in the City. HBO approached NBC, CBS, ABC, and FOX. No firm deals yet.
Even with so much hype around the show, HBO is only in 30% of homes which leaves a large untapped audience for the show.
I wonder, though, how good this show can be in an edited version.
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SBC Communications has taken its $100 million account away from Goodby, Silverstein & Partners and will spread the account over several other agencies it has on its roster.
"We have been with Goodby for the last six years, and they have done a terrific job," said Larry Solomon, the SBC spokesman. "They have some great talent at the agency, but moving forward, we decided we would move in a different direction."
Yea, right. That's code for "someone screwed up".
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As reported below, technology marketers plan to ramp up in 2003. On the publishing side, things are looking better too. In fact, publishers say that the bad times of the past 2 years really were not as bad as reported. Technology was the one category that dragged everything else down, say publishers. Yet the technology spend level is still more thean $1B and that is helping the business books stay alive and actually see business increase. [via MediaDaily News]
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As reported in eMarketer, the CMO Council reports 40% of senior level marketers at technology companies plan to increase their marketing budgets in 2003. Additionally, 93% say they will either increase headcount or keep it the same.
The study was done by GlobalFluency and the Aberdeen Group who together surveyed 350 senior level marketing executives working at tech firms with aggregate annual revenues of over $100 billion.
Let's just hope this prediction comes true.
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Here's a little press release that found it's way to Adrants:
Students wishing to ease the pressure of mounting debts are being urged to use their heads as billboards to advertise brands such as FHM.
Creative marketing agency, Cunning Stunts, which is best known for projecting Gail Porter's bottom onto the Houses Of Parliament, is offering students a fee of �88 pounds a week to use their foreheads as advertising space.
Nial Ferguson, group marketing manager at FHM, commented: "We are constantly looking for new and impactful ways to communicate to men. If we can do this and pay for the next round at the union bar at the same time, then it seems like a good idea to us."
Youth pay-TV channel, CNX, has also signed up to the new initiative and Richard Kilggariff, head of the channel, added: "We want to hit our viewers right between the eyes so what better place to place an ad than on their foreheads."
Although some students will be unwilling to see their faces temporarily disfigured by a semi-permanent transfer, others have no qualms about becoming walking adverts. Oli Merrrel, a design student at Falmouth College of Arts, commented: "Advertising is everywhere you look, you can't get away from it. I don't see the difference between an advert on a billboard and an advert on my forehead, except that I'll be earning money from it being there."
Cunning Stunts views the initiative as a creative way for students to alleviate their cash-flow problems. According to John Carver, director of the company: "A number of our employees have recently left university and these massive student debts are a real yoke for them. This initiative gives brands a unique advertising medium as well as giving something back to students."
What's next? Ass cheek advertising for thong wearing beach goers?
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 January 29, 2003 - Los Angeles - Rhizome.LA today announced the speakers and agenda for "Live from the Blogosphere!" on February 15, 2003, in which renowned bloggers and technologists will explore the online phenomenon of weblogs and their impact on American popular culture.
Co-producers Susannah Breslin, Xeni Jardin, and Beverly Tang--in conjunction with Rhizome.LA, the Electronic Orphanage gallery, and the Southern California Wireless Users Group--present this evening of panel discussions and a live "town hall" meeting on the past, present, and future of blogging.
Recently, blogs have been written about in The New York Times, Newsweek, and The Washington Post, featured in PBS television specials, deconstructed at conferences held at Yale University and the University of California at Berkeley--and new blogs continue to spring into existence every day. So, what's all the fuss about? Why is the Blogosphere expanding so quickly? How will blogs change the ways in which we relate to each other on and offline?
"Live from the Blogosphere!" brings together six innovators in blogging: Mark Frauenfelder, Heather Havrilesky, Evan Williams, Susannah Breslin, Doc Searls, and Tony Pierce. The panel will discuss the birth of blogging, the emergent tension between blogs and traditional journalism, innovations in blogging such as video-blogging, audio-blogging, and mobile-blogging, the shifting roles of race and gender in the Blogosphere, the state of the blog economy, and the way blogs may be reshaping contemporary media.
'Live from the Blogosphere" will be held on February 15 at the Electronic Orphanage in LA.
More on the event here.
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Coca-Cola gave it's North American Coke Classic creative business to Berlin Cameron/Red Cell, the agency behind the new 'Real' campaign. The WPP agency, Berlin boots aside McCann-Erikson, which handled the Coke Classic account since 2000.
"Berlin Cameron has done an excellent job helping us create and express the 'Real' marketing platform," said Chris Lowe, chief marketing officer for Coca-Cola North America. "They've become an invaluable partner, and we're looking forward to working together with them to develop and evolve the next phase of 'Real' as we integrate the concept throughout all our Coca-Cola classic marketing initiatives in the U.S."
McCann will keep all other Coke business around the world. [video courtesy of Ad Age]
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WNBC in NYC reports the Department of Justice believes there is now enough evidence to charge Martha Stewart.
"We have a solid criminal case against Martha Stewart," said one Justice Department official.
A WNBC Poll shows 77% think Stewart did something illegal. [via Gawker]
RELATED: TARGET EXEC TAKES SWIPE AT MARTHA STEWART
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