Really? Seriously? Who thought this was a good idea? Disney, have you checked yourselves lately? It was one thing when Miley Cyrus began working the pole, but as BoingBoing and half the internet points out: "related images basically present these kids" - who are only 9 years old - "as cute li'l whores". Could we not go there, please? A "lingerie line for children"? Can't type anymore, my jaw has dropped and crushed my keyboard äöläökef'ir våeeeeeeeeek.

It's not new, we've seen homeless people holding up signs in exchange for pizza or wearing coats that advertised Ben&Jerry and other examples, but David Permut thinks he's on to something brilliant here. Deadline Hollywood reports that Permut passes this homeless man named Ronald almost daily, and suddenly had the idea to pay him for holding up a movie poster.

"It's been very good for us and for him," Permut tells me. "So I started thinking: why don't the movie studios go to all the homeless people and pay them to hold up one-sheets?"

Commentors are not impressed, one even brags that he did it himself ten years ago:

So when I used to work for Revolution Studios back in 2000, I used to give the homeless guy 100.00 and the movie poster, plus all the hats and jackets from the crew gifts…
This guy stood at the corner of Olympic and Bundy…
Great press until Sony told me to STOP…
Then again, it was Sony and that same movie, who lied about people raving about there movies!

None of these folks used Bumvertising to place their ads. No fair, somebody isn't getting their cut here.

Hanes has decided to drop Charlie Sheen as a spokesperson reports AP

Hanes brands has ended its advertising campaign featuring Charlie Sheen because of domestic violence charges filed against the actor, a company spokesman said Wednesday.
Spokesman Matt Hall said the seriousness of the allegations against the 44-year-old actor made the decision necessary.
"It's a pretty standard, straightforward call when somebody who's in your commercials is arrested on suspicion of something of this magnitude," Hall said. "And we would suspend the ads both for the company and, really, for Mr. Sheen and his family as well. Given the publicity, it makes sense to not air those ads during that time."
Hall said the television ads were stopped effective Dec. 28, the first business day after Sheen was arrested. He said some print ads will continue to appear into the spring.
"Unfortunately, the production schedule of those publications do not allow us to pull those ads," Hall said.

"Redbox, which operate DVD kiosks around the US, are dispatching teams to remove the Deadline box art from kiosk displays." - RadarOnline

Yikes, that's unfortunate.

Desi and his co-worker Wanda were testing out the new facial recognition software on a new HP Mediasmart computer. They discovered that this facial recognition software doesn't like to follow Desi, but it does find and follow Wanda. Interesting bug, if it is a bug, does this happen with all HP Mediasmart computers? Desi, who seems quite amused by it all, welcomes "responses to why the HP webcam, does not pick up negroes". Lets see how HP deals with this one.

"And the worst part is, I bought one for christmas!" - OK Desi, I think the wife will see this video sooner or later, so you're secret santadom ain't safe with the web, mate. But with any luck HP will see this and get you a computer with facial recognition software that actually recognizes you.

More sex and politicians in Sweden! The land of midnight fun never stops giving in the department of ridiculous sexist scandals in a b-cup.

Just the other day, the company called Panlegis, which sells the shady practice of establishing LTD's in the UK cheaper than it is to establish a limited company in Sweden, was reported to RO (Reklamombudsmannen) för sexist advertising as their holiday ad included a topless santa in a tub with the pun-bastard line "Company for christmas?". Sadly, it's not the terrible pun that's a bannable offense, it's the half-naked santa-girl sitting in a tub, which has nothing to do with the service they are selling. There are so many things wrong with this ad, the pun, the layout, the colors, the image - and who on earth wears hose and heels, but nothing else, in a tub?

Panlegis responded today by reporting Hillevi Larsson right back to RO, says politikerbloggen, and it was because of this image (in full) which is her portrait available on socialdemokraternas site. Yes, there's actual skin showing in that shot, an entire neck and a hint of cleavage. The dress is also quite snug. And she's wearing heels! Call the cops! This woman must be stopped, clearly.

Lets just take a moment to laugh at that for a second. Go ahead. I'll wait. Oh, you're done already?

The Saatchi & Saatchi approved winner of the Clever Film Competition for Toyota has already garnered some pretty offended feedback on their facebook page.

The competition, part of Toyota’s live social media pitch, gave $7000 to the winners for this ad, which was created by Play TV. The Clever Film judges consisted of Saatchi & Saatchi creative staff and Toyota representatives - which makes me wonder if this was voted upon just to scare brands off from using crowdsourcing.... [tin foil hat on!] - but then the top ten were simply judged on views and comments, and there is no doubt this one would garner plenty of views.

Now that Tiger Woods, the main celebrity vehicle of so many brands, has tarnished his brand and stepped away from golf to spend some time with his family and become a better man - which brands are dropping him? A handy list, for those at home keeping score.

Already sounded the alarm in: Scamville: the social gaming ecosystem from hell must not go unchecked. - but alas, too late. Game-playing social media folk have already called their lawyers; Lawsuit says ads in social games are scamming players

A class-action lawsuit last month highlights what thousands of consumers say are bogus offers tied to social games available on Facebook and other social networks. The 16-page lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in nearby Sacramento, details how Rebecca Swift, a 41-year-old self-employed resident of Santa Cruz, Calif., was lured into accepting two "special offers" from advertisers to gain extra game credits for YoVille, a popular virtual-world game developed by Zynga.

How will these game-apps survive when they continue to allow such ads, which have the side-effect of scaring away legitimate advertisers who don't want to be associated with "how high is your IQ" stupidity. If only legit advertisers had considered advertising in games in the first place, as the game-creators needed the cash.

Zynga CEO Mark Pincus: "We did everything possible to get revenue" via techcrunch.

The Swedish Launch of Noko Jeans was stopped before it even began. As Reuters reported the jeans were meant to go on sale this Friday at PUB in Stockholm, but they proved to be a political hot potato and PUB declined opening the Noko shop. See, the Noko designer jeans that costs a hefty 1,500 Swedish crowns ($215) are made in North Korea and as Swedish newspapers DN, SvD and Aftonbladet report that PUB - the department store where the jeans were meant to be sold - pulled the plug on Friday with the explanation: "This is a political issue that PUB wants no part of."

The North Korean Jeans idea was hatched by three young admen in Stockholm (Reuters calls the 25-year old lads "Swedish advertising executives" what their real titles are is anybody's guess). They are Jakob Ohlsson, Tor Rauden Källstigen and Jacob Åström, and they have "never worked with fashion before" according to the papers. They had found the unusual North Korean export by chance when they were surfing the web back in 2007. "On that homepage there was images of the products that North Korea says they export. It was everything from makeup, to animated films, to weapons and ships - but we also saw an image of jeans." said Jacob Åström to DN.
 "That we sell these jeans doesn't mean that I'm defending North Korea as a country, but our project is a positive step in breaking NK's isolation, and instead of selling these jeans at PUB we'll now look for a sympathetic gallery instead."

Aren't jeans banned in North Korea?

Joanna Krupa's nude PETA ad where she clutches a cross to her bosom has pissed off the Catholic church reports Fox. Imagine that. Peta ads pissing people off. How unexpected.

"The fact is that cats and dogs are a lot safer in pet stores than they are in the hands of PETA employees," Catholic League President Bill Donohue said in a statement. "Moreover, pet stores don't rip off Christian iconography and engage in cheap irreligious claims."

TMZ found the featuring Tiger Woods and the headline: The road to high performace isn't always paved in todays Wall street journal. Hat tip @agencyspy

Yikes, that's so unfortunate I feel we need a detour, here look at something pretty: Kim Joon uses "body paint", nude bodies and photography to make patterns that look delish. Scary quotes on body paint because that might just as well be photoshop but it's still pretty.

@LeslieBAP found this Very Bad use of Twitter in a Billboard.

Last but not least, Orangina is looking for you to shake your booty for their shake that orangina contest. We never thought the furries they created with dancing around in a commercial would be topped. And that still ain't, because this is just ugh. Via @adfreak

[the video of shaking asses was supposed to go here, but as usual third party embeds can't handle being adlanded]

Toshiba have gone all out weird and send chairs to space in their new campaign to support Toshiba’s SV REGZA LCD TV and Satellite T series laptops. When you can watch TV anywhere, where do you want your easy chair to be? Doing a ballon-boy? You got it.

Paris not laughing at 'vacant' Kiwi billboards

Paris Hilton is not amused. The American hotel heiress is upset a photo of her is being used to advertise vacant billboard space in Auckland.
The photo, which shows Hilton partying, has the word "vacant" written in giant-sized lettering across it.
Hilton's Los Angeles-based manager Jamie Freed said Wellington billboard company, Media5, had no permission to use Hilton's image, and they could expect to hear from Hilton's lawyers.

We can all have a giggle at what superfish says: "I love how Paris Hilton's own manager doesn't even try to dispute the content of the billboard and sticks solely with the legal aspects. He's paid to make his client look awesome no matter what, yet saw this and went "Aw, shit, they got us."
If we stop snickering for a moment, we know how well that American Apparel billboard using Woody Allen went, it cost AA a pretty penny and the news was written up around the world for several months.. Oh wait, that looks like a plan.

In all seriousness, what is going on photography in advertising lately? Did all the educated art buyers get fired? (and by educated I mean those who are aware of the legalities of using celebrities and rights issues). Take for example the recent storm over Toyota's Flickr-pillaging that adgrunt LeslieBAP has been talking about, directing me to Brandsanatomy and "The bigger the company, the bigger the blunder". Long story short, Toyota used images found on Flickr* on their new 4-runner website but forgot to do the whole rights dance. When the photographers found their images on the site, and got Toyotas attention via Twitter. @Toyota finally responded with

@calanan @Photo_John @stuartzero We're currently pulling the photos and will be in contact with each photography [sic] who was represented

Brandsanatomy says: "This is why your company needs an experienced marketer on staff. Real marketing directors have an understanding of intellectual property laws. Photographs, fonts, illustrations, and other design elements found online are not free for you to use, especially for commercial purposes."

I might add, another reason you need people with experience is that they probably won't misspell a tweet, further annoying the people they are meant to calm.

Devaluation, this constant strive to beancount and get things for cheap (or free) is causing this along with inexperience and a general muddling of people knowledge of rights, model rights and advertising law. Seems to me (and Leslie) that in the hunt for corners to cut someone skipped the Art Buyer/producer (or hired one that had no IP training) and went straight to production. Costly mistake in the end, please remember that dear beancounters. Job positions are not like appendixes, people actually fulfill needed tasks.

* Note to everyone. Just because an image is on Flickr does not make it automatically free-for-all CC-heaven. It might make it a CC-Licensed image, but even then you need to read and understand what license it is before using them in the manner allowed by said license.

Photograph of Paris Hilton Billboard taken by Lathkill96 at Flickr, all rights reserved.

Whomever did the media buy at Microsoft must have been sleeping under a rock for quite some time, as adage reports: Microsoft Shocked 'Family Guy' Humor Includes Incest, Holocaust Jokes.

Everybody has been saying that the Microsoft Windows 7 + Family Guy match will suck, and by everybody I mean brandfreak and Gizmodo who called it "the hackiest ever hackathon". Except me, because looking at everything from Seinfield to those House Parties then Kylie the cute and the random Windows 7 music video styled adverts aimed at college kids (one, two,three, four & more), I thought it was pretty clear that Microsofts advertising is as dysfunctional as the Family Guy family.

"We initially chose to participate in the Seth and Alex variety show based on the audience composition and creative humor of 'Family Guy,' but after reviewing an early version of the variety show it became clear that the content was not a fit with the Windows brand," a Microsoft spokesperson said in an e-mail statement. "We continue to have a good partnership with Fox, Seth MacFarlane and Alex Borstein and are working with them in other areas. We continue to believe in the value of brand integrations and partnerships between brands, media companies and talent."

Hat tip to @mtlb , that's makethelogobigger on twitter.

KFC 'colonel' dupes UN security. A man dressed as Kentucky Fried Chicken's "Colonel Sanders" gained access to restricted areas of the UN last Thursday, where he posed for pictures under the giant UN logo and shaking hands with the UN General Assembly president, Dr. Ali A. Treki of Libya. Only problem is, the real colonel died in 1980, as we adgrunts know. This is what you get for bring people back from the dead all the time, adland. Like Orville Redenbacher and the Jolly Green Giant, the Colonel will never die.

"It should not have happened -- that I will stress, and very strongly," said Michele Montas, spokeswoman for UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.
"There was some lapse in security and the individual in question . . . was, on the initiative of one security guard, taken . . . into the UN."

It was bound to flare up, the mainstreaming of non-traditional media has advertising using (or looking like) street art a lot lately. Like the Vespa Street art 'vespa-head' posters and the streetart Volkswagen head response, the dance between the space reclaimers and the space-owners has turned into a war.

NYT reports about A Battle, on Billboards, of Ads vs. Art. But the street artists aren't targeting just any old poster site, they going after the wild poster people that they believe don't have permissions to poster. The examples of flyposters paid for by taxpayers, and the chalk outline symbolic language of street art has been co-opted most recently by "Snakes on a cane" for the show House which might the drop the cup runneth over by.

“We’re bombarded by ads every day,” he said. “Advertising frames the public environment as being for sale but public space is not inherently commercial.”
At 10:30, Mr. Seiler and his confederates broke up into pairs, bringing along five-gallon buckets of white paint and long-handled rollers to use to spread the paint over ads.
There were ads for drinks (Bulldog Gin, Hendrick’s Gin and Dr Pepper), movies (a comedy called “Black Dynamite,” along with a documentary about President Obama called “By the People”) and albums (“World Painted Blood” by Slayer was pasted next to “Soulbook” by Rod Stewart).
Some passers-by liked the commandolike cover-ups; an artist named Jane Gennaro, who was not connected to the project, approved of the men painting over an ad for the video game Grand Theft Auto, saying, “We need to get rid of all the visual noise.”

In what seemed to be a surefire way to buy badwill, Dole Foods filed a lawsuit against the documentary filmmaker Fredrik Gertten because the documentary Bananas* 'contained falsehoods which harmed the US food giant.'

As soon as word got out, Max Hamburgers - an all Swedish burger chain that serves healthier burgers and always offers bean salad and fruit snacks in the kids meals - decided to stop serving Dole anything in retaliation for the suit. “We don’t like Dole’s actions. Suing a filmmaker instead of having a dialogue is despicable" said Max CEO Richard Bergfors in several interviews basking in the PR they got from that move. Soon enough Swedish grocers joined in, with ICA and Axfood the largest supermarket chains demanding talks with Dole as they no longer wanted to keep Dole products in the stores. Local ICA stores, like mine, boldly moved all Dole products back into the stockroom at customers request, so for a while I couldn't find Dole Food products anywhere. The Bananas* film was written up in every newspaper as it was aired on SVT (Swedens State Television) and in the space of one week, it went from perfectly normal to wildly anti-social if you had a dole-branded banana in your kids lunchbox.

Now the Local reports that Dole drops Bananas!* lawsuit.

While Dole said it believed it had a strong case, it chose to dismiss the suit because of “the free speech concerns being expressed in Sweden”.
The company maintained, however, that the film was inaccurate.
“While the filmmakers continue to show a film that is fundamentally flawed and contains many false statements we look forward to an open discussion with the filmmakers regarding the content of the film,” C. Michael Carter, Dole’s Executive Vice President and General Counsel, said in a statement.

Marketing reports that Mr. Sub has fired its agency BOS after accusations of homophobia.

Turns out that the CAW (Canadian Auto Workers) have letter-chain-mail prowess, and when they were offended by the like super, super gay dad's coming out speech, the union released their wave of complaint mails which prompted Mr Sub to fire Bos at once. (I'm picturing Auto Workers in super-hero outfits shooting letters like Spiderman when writing this, can you tell?)

“In the last few days, the sandwich chain Mr. Sub has come out with a new commercial which is shocking (and completely ridiculous) in the way that it mocks the LGBT community,” wrote Devine in one e-mail. “This is offensive and we must let Mr. Sub know that making fun of our LGBT sisters and brothers and the very difficult and often painful coming out process is no way to sell submarine sandwiches.”
In her letter to Mr. Sub president Jack Levinson, Devine said making light of the coming out experience was inappropriate. “In fact, coming out to one’s family and friends is a major cause of stress and anguish as people face the rejection, misunderstanding and outward disapproval of their loved ones.”
By Wednesday, the union was told by Mr. Sub in an unsigned e-mail from Mr. Sub’s “Information & Help Line” that it “decided to end its relationship with BOS, as clearly this campaign has not met the objective of positively engaging with our customers.” The note from Mr. Sub also said “all possible efforts have been taken to remove the ad from Internet websites.”

(more inside)

Ralph Lauren are not pleased with this image. At some point, someone liked it enough to give it the old "OK" stamp, despite the fact that this woman's head is bigger than her pelvis, and she looks like she might topple over from the weight of her own hair at any second. Back then it was good enough for Ralph Lauren.

Their unhappy began when it ended up on photoshop disasters, they clenched their fists when it was boingboinged and I'm pretty sure they didn't laugh at all when DognPony suggested that the French photoshop disclaimer on ads is due to images like this one. C'mon guys, that was funny!