Gawker brightens our morning with some legal frivolity of the illogically stupid kind. Not that any lawsuits are ever overflowing with intelligence but when a magazine that glorifies women as sex objects sues a strip club that, oh, glorifies woman as sex objects, we just stick that in the WTF category, Yes, Maxim Magazine is suing Tampa-based Maxxim Men's Club for trademark infringement because it claims "an establishment that allows women to perform sexually explicit dances has hurt the magazine's trademark and Dennis' reputation." Alrightly then. And showing women in a constant state of undress for the masses to droll over doesn't hurt anyone at all? It's time for an Agency.com fist bump and a collective "dude!" between the two parties in acknowledgment of their "glorification" of the female persuasion.
 For years. we've seen the very utilitarian ads for that closet shelf company, California Closets. That utilitarian approach always seemed appropriate since closet shelving is, well, utilitarian. It seems someone over at California Closets got bored just showing pictures of their shelving in ads which were usually placed unceremoniously in the back of many newspaper's Sunday magazine. A frustrated California Closets marketing person apparently stood up and said, "Dammit, we want some far forward right hand page action!" to which the Sunday magazines replied, "Dammit, we don't want any crappy utilitarian closet shelving ads ruining the front of our preciously wannabe culturistically fashionista-like magazine pages" to which California Closets screamed,"Dammit, we need to get ourselves some hip, vapid looking, ridiculously dressed models and drape them across the ad and, like, just kinda show our shelving in the background" to which the Sunday magazines said, "Cool, we'll take your money now for this ad we know people are gonna look at and go 'what the fuck are they selling here?'" To which we say, well, we've said enough.
Tango magazine in concert with Yahoo Personals has created a contest called Big Moment which seeks moving stories from its readers in four stages of love: looking, married, taken and engaged. Four winners were chosen based on an essay and will be featured in four upcoming issues of the magazine as well as on the publication's website.
The Big Moment story of first winner Cheryl Walenta, a single 26-year old woman and Lutheran minister living in Chicago, is chronicled in the September-October issue. Walenta was facing a new chapter in her life after she ended a comfortable but not compelling relationship and was making a move to Houston to pursue a summer internship. Tango will track the adventures of Walenta via a bi-weekly dating blog on Tango's website.
As the PR rep who sent us this info suggested, "cue the Manilow music..."
Who better than whacked out Tom Cruise as a 44 year old virgin to grace the cover of humor magazine CRACKED as it makes its return after a two year hiatus? The "re-imagined" magazine has been juiced with editorial staff from the Daily Show, SNL and Chappelle and will offer up a heavy dose of humor and satire. The publisher and advertisers hope men 18-34 will flock to the mag like paparazzi flock to the disappearing Nicole Richie.
Flickr user Uncle Trick tells us Hard Rock was fined by the Gaming Commission for this ad because they took issue with the ad's apparent urging to cheat in casinos. However, urging a guy to maybe cheat on his wife with the poolside hottie is perfectly OK.
Copyranter thinks Gwyneth Paltrow is far too white for this Keep A Child Alive ad in which she dons African apparel above the headline "I Am African." And just so we're sure we understand his opinion, he writes, "Cheers to you that you support a very worthy cause. BUT, allow someone else to do the ads. You'd survive about 10 minutes in African bush. And, you just look completely and utterly ridiculous."
To drum up interest for its suburban mom as drug dealer comedy Weeds, Showtime is placing an insert in the August 24 issue of Rolling Stone with a scent strip that smells like, well, weed. Yummy. The show's good too.
JWT Toronto has created an ambient (the word everyone outside the U.S. seems to use instead of guerilla) campaign for its client Purell, a hand sanitizer lotion. The campaign uses a simple but what would seem to be effective approach by placing stickers on magazines in doctors offices with copy such as "Thumbed through by sick people since September 2005" and "Gently sneezed on since October 2002." The stickers point to a website, washyourhands.tv, which explains the benefits of Purell. Nice work.
When we picture tiny Gawker Editor Jessica Coen trying to lug behemoth September issues of the fashion mags back to her place for the soon-to-be-annual Fall Fashion Weigh-in, we can't help but feel sorry for her but it's all in the line of duty . Reporting on important issues like the weight of magazines requires a determined dedication and Jessica most certainly has that. Out of the four issues she purchased last night, Glamour, Lucky, Vanity Fair and W, it was W that beat oth the others weighing in at 3.5 pounds. While that's heavy, it's no record. If memory serves, Vogue has tipped the sales upwards of four or more pounds. Stay tuned for Jessica's next weigh-in.
Apparently in acknowledgment that every method to sell bubble gum has been done to death, Toronto-based agency Youthography chose to go with a decidedly different approach for its client Bubblicious. Celebrating the gum's pinkness, the spot gets a bit orgasmic with the stuff in that odd. nonsequitor sort of way. Print accompanies.
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