CBS to Air Pontiac-Sponsored Micro-Series During Ad Breaks

Making sure to ward off criticism by calling it an experiment, CBS will launch an advertising-sponsored week-long "micro-series" titled The Courier on Tuesday, January, 24 in the first act break of CSI: MIAMI after 9:00 PM EST/PST. The serialized short film, sponsored by Pontiac and broadcast about the same time each night in seven short episodes, will premiere as a 60-second installment with subsequent editions running for 40-seconds.

more »

Google Maps Super Charges Rooftop Advertising

Boing Boing digs into digg and finds MIT Advertising Lab talking about advertisers discovering the value of Google Maps and placing large ads of rooftops for those using Google Maps to see. Target's done it. Realtors are using Google Maps to their benefit as well by letting home buyers examine maps, zoom in on house and view selling details. Yes, Google does rule the world.

Google Expands to Radio, Buys Radio Ad Management Company

Cnet reports Google will acquire radio digital services provider dMarc for $1.13 billion. dMarc helps radio stations manage ad inventory, deliver song/artist/station text information over broadcast and help advertisers manage their radio campaigns. Pressumably, Google will us dMarc to deliver its AdWords text ads over the system dramatically extending the search giant's reach into another medium and to many more ear/eyeballs. Maybe the day will come when a media planner can "buy the world" at the touch of a button.

Unentertaining Video Promotes Sprint's Mobile Entertainment

Hoping to cash in on a bit of Numa Numa and William Hung viral fame, Sprint has launched a knowingly goofy video clip in which a bunch of guys get all jiggy with themselves in an attempt somehow...that's it...sell phones! That's right. Sprint has seeded the goofy video which points to gothookedup.com, a site that promotes Sprint's mobile entertainment services it feels are far more entertaining than lame online video clips. It's a nice sort of nudge-wink effort that does it's thing without being clandestine about it. Whether it goes anywhere, only Sprint will know.

Anti-Advergame Slams FedEx Kinko's

Random Culture points to Disaffected, an anti-advergame of sorts in that, rather than lauding a brand, it pokes fun at a brand. It was created by Persuasive Games to show distaste for the apparent lack of competence displayed by FedEx Kinko's workers. As described on Persuasive's site, "Disaffected! gives the player the chance to step into the demotivated position of real FedEx Kinkos employees. Feel the indifference of these purple-shirted malcontents first-hand, and consider the possible reasons behind their malaise - is it mere incompetence? Managerial affliction? Unseen but serious labor issues?"

While there are plenty of brand hate sites out there, Persuasive Games created the game to demonstrate that all advergames don't have to be all about brand love. We haven't played the game nor do we know if this is a first but we do like the idea. Gotta love dissent.

Online Magazine Extends Spoof of MPA Campaign

When the Magazine Publishers of America launched an ad campaign that illustrated even though life would be very different in the future and that people would still be reading magazines, online magazine ZOOZOOM spoofed the campaign and talked about how life is right now and that people are reading magazines online right now. ZOOZOOM has extended that spoof into a real campaign, taglined "Doing It," which shows people online in various scenes. There's also a video that illustrates how magazines aren't even good at killing a fly anymore.

Greenpeace Trots Out 911 For Anti-Nuclear Power Ad

Capitalizing on Friday the 13th fears, Greenpeace, through The Viral Chart, has released an online video (here too) that, with compelling imagery, claims building more nuclear plants is an invitation to terrorists 911-style. Sarah North, head of Greenpeace's nuclear campaign, said, "Millions of people could die as a result of a terrorist attack on a nuclear plant. This is a totally unacceptable risk. This film shows that building new nuclear power stations is a catastrophic gift to terrorists."

more »

Cheesy Law Firm Promotes Pizza

If bad law firm advertising is your thing, you'll love this. Martin Willimas has created a really bad law firm website for law firm Warwick Seltz complete with the cheesy tagline, "If you've had bad pizza, we'd like to meetz ya." Yes, the law firm's speciality is pizza. Huh, you say? Hey, there's lawyers out there for every other conceivable thing. Why not pizza? OK, OK. The site's fake. It's a guised promotion for Donato's pizza. The site's got all the goodies including four really bad TV commercials with really, really bad jingles and the now required element in all online endeavours, a Subservient Chicken rip off that's actually funny.

Photo Site Shares Ad Revenue With Users

Online photo sharing site Image Gravy has launched and will share advertising revenue with its members. It appears Overture is used to the ads and users will be paid based on how many times their images are viewed. The service is free to users.

Firefox Gets Help From Million Dollar Homepage Knock Off

In what might be the first use of a million dollar homepage for something other than personal gain, Sweden's Sam Nurmi has created HelpFirefox.com, a site that sells pixels for one dollar a pop and donates all the money to the Mozilla Foundation, makers of the open source Firefox browser. Given that the Mozilla Foundation has been very successful is raising money both for development and for advertising, it would appear this particular million dollar homepage idea might see some action.