McDonald's is trying to take advantage of the recession to crush Starbucks by flooding America with cheap, faux-fancy McCafé coffeé. Despité the nation's most annoyingé ad campaigné, McD's is winning the battle for the (formerly) yuppié soul:

Why did Starbucks decide to sponsor MSNBC's Morning Joe? To "promote its ethical commitments." Whatever that bullshit means. One human-like online Starbucks advocate supports them strongly!:

Microsoft's new search-dealie "Bing" is going up against The Google, which is hard! Fortunately, Bing's marketing wizards have devised the world's most annoying ways to promote it. (*Bing* sound)!

Harvard has looked at the data and two studies have reached an unavoidable conclusion: Self-absorbed loudmouth guys have overrun Twitter like no other place on the internet. You probably figured. But now there are numbers.

Look, this is the business card of what we would call an "Urban Marketing Agency," from back in the olden days. Oh, the shamelessness! Luckily we have made much progress since then:

New York City, which is broke, of course, is selling off naming rights for its city parks. For mere millions! Using sociogeographical insight and imaginary marketing expertise, we have compiled a list of exactly who should buy these rights for a half-dozen parks. Read it and argue:

When the American Girl corporation had to pick a name for its new Jewish Girl doll, they went with: "The name of an Earth Liberation Front enviro-terrorist arsonist wanted by the FBI." Hey, that's racist.

Here's what Grape Nuts is, really: wheat, barley, yeast, water. Here's what Grape Nuts is not: everything they told you it was.

Pussy™ Energy Drink: "Pussy is a 100% natural drink. No nasty chemicals and nothing manufactured."Pussy is Jonnie Shearer's vision. He set up from his bedroom at 21 and launched in June 2004." You can't go wrong, copywriting-wise. Pussy's not available in America, sadly. [Here, via Copyranter]

I mean, every single ad campaign in America has had some sort of 'Hard Times' theme since the stock market tanked. It's beginning to lose its force. They have to step it up a notch. You are literally living in the Dust Bowl, people! Buy your cleaning supplies or whatever!

Vice Magazine is trying to be the coolest magazine in the world and, simultaneously, the biggest bunch of sellouts ever to walk the streets of Williamsburg, in an effort to see if it's actually possible to bend over backwards far enough to give a blowjob to oneself.

If more dudes shaved their balls, that's like, thousands more razors they can sell every year. Every little bit helps. [via Adfreak]

If you don't follow the denim industry closely you could be forgiven for thinking that world has gone crazy. Levi's, the Americanest jeans you can possibly buy without a flag sewn on them somewhere, is publicly endorsing gay marriage. The gays have literally wrapped themselves around George W. Bush's butt!

Like hostages whose will for freedom has been completely sapped, slack-jawed Americans aspire only to befriend vapid, idolized television personalities while downing grease-laden comfort food, a new poll has confirmed:

There's a new Hamptons venue you'll want to add to the list of places to stay miles away from this summer. Actually, it's not new. It Dune in Southampton, which is sporting a new name this season—"The Axe Lounge"—as part of a silly marketing scheme concocted by, yes, Axe. The stunt is the brainchild of Mike Heller, the nightlife promoter-turned-entertainment marketer whose stellar resume includes putting a smoke-free tobacco product called Ariva in the hands of Lindsay Lohan and connecting America's Next Top Model's CariDee English with Raptiva, which is apparently a psoriasis medication of some sort. (He's the one crouching down in the photo, by the way.)

Julia Allison was paid in cash to blog about her trip Sea World, the "lifecasting" celebrity wannabe has belatedly disclosed. So how have the first few days of the trip gone? Allison, who announced her trip with five exclamation marks, seems belatedly conflicted.

Haha, we know exactly what to make of this: Axe Body Spray is sponsoring a nightclub in the Hamptons for the whole summer. Brah:

ABC's marketing department is so hardcore that they will get Mickey Mouse to hand out cigarettes to children if that's what it takes to get people to watch their crappy shows!

Last month NBC's Chuck had that Subway sandwich product placement that was so laughably flagrant we thought, "This will surely hurt the credibility of NBC's 'Chuck!'" How young and naive we were. Turns out that that Subway deal is literally the only reason that Chuck still exists: