JPMorgan Chase reaches nearly $6 billion in losses on "whale trades" but posts multi-billion-dollar quarterly profit.

Digg, a social-media pioneer, sells for pittance and gains new CEO.

Richard Branson takes on Stephen Fry in new Virgin UK campaign.

Axe replaces bikini-clad women with Kiefer Sutherland in new spot.

Coca-Cola launches Hispanic campaign for Olympics and reintroduces controversial drink colors in Freestyle dispensing machines at UK Burger Kings.

Olive Garden owner Darden to buy Yard House for $585 million.

Facebook starts automating home-page ad buying and monitoring chats for criminal activity.Continue reading...

Burger King today unveiled the post-celebrity kick-off to its summer campaign: "Barbecue Day." The description: "Summer time is all about great food, good company and fun! This is the time of year we all look forward to. It’s BBQ time friends! Let’s have a BBQ today at BURGER KING®!" 

Click here to watch its new commercial, and take a look back at its (somewhat) controversial, just-wrapped celebrity-studded campaign for its new menu below.Continue reading...

As expected, Burger King's latest celebrity-starring TV commercial features Aerosmith rocker Steven Tyler. The American Idol judge promotes BK's new chicken strips, adding feathers to his headset as he minds the store (click here to watch the new spot). Tyler joins Sofia Vergara, Salma Hayek, Jay Leno, David Beckham and Mary J. Blige on the BK star duty shift roster.

Fast-food brands aren't going to get out of the meat business any time soon. But Burger King wants to be the first big U.S. fast-food chain to at least do that with chicken and pigs that don’t spend their lives caged up.

The plan is for the 7,200 Burger Kings across America to be using 100 percent cage-free eggs by 2017 and also only buy pork from “suppliers that can demonstrate documented plans to end their use of gestation crates for breeding pigs,” according to a press release. 

The animal welfare announcement comes as the chain is promoting the chicken strips on its new U.S. menu in a celeb-laden (now adding Steven Tyler? Update: yes, Tyler) advertising campaign.Continue reading...

AFA Foods files for bankruptcy after pink-slime hit.

Apple faces UK inquiry on advertising, while stock price projections soar.

BSkyB sees resignation of James Murdoch as chairman.

Carl's Jr. and Hardee's ride the zeitgeist with Kate Upton, also in DirecTV spot.

Chrysler invests to boost quality.

Dropbox faces time to come through on hype.

ESPN reaches out to Hispanics with Spanish-language ad for SportsCenter.

Express Scripts and Medco win U.S. merger approval.Continue reading...

Liv Tyler continues her long association with Givenchy, this time taking a page from her father Steven Tyler's songbook by breaking out her rock chick persona to cover the INXS hit, Need You Tonight.

The campaign is for the launch of Givenchy'sVery Irrésistible Givenchy Electric Rose perfume, with this music video/commercial shot by director Johan Renck. According to Givenchy, "The Need You Tonight video captures Liv's resolutely rock 'n' roll spirit and shows her more magnetic and irresistible than ever. Featuring a choreography by famous dancer Bianca Li, its unique style and energetic vibe resonate perfectly with the Givenchy world."

See her previous campaigns for the brand below.Continue reading...

Last year, after the departure of Simon Cowell as the acerbic judge and the face of the show, American Idol confronted a fateful moment: How would the FOX mega-property fight a long-term slide in ratings without its fascinating bad boy and its most compelling personality – especially one who was going to create a competing show that would debut on the same network this fall?

Idol producers succeeded handsomely, bringing in Jennifer Lopez and Steven Tyler as judges to join holdover Randy Jackson, and making the show’s narrative about really developing really good talent instead of allowing not-so-good singers into the final ranks and then savaging them when they performed down to their level.

Viewership for Wednesday night’s finale was 29 million people, up about 18% from last year’s according to Variety. Votes cast for the two finalists, winner Scotty McCreery and runner-up Lauren Alaina, totaled well more than 100 million, easily a record for the show (thanks largely to its addition of online voting to the old-fashioned phone medium). Inevitably, Idol questions about how long it can keep going, now arise.Continue reading...

On the list of unsympathetic figures in the entertainment business, Simon Cowell certainly has to rank in the top ten – maybe jostling for #1 or #2 with Donald Trump. Such status is ensured by a decade of absorption of his often-biting persona on American Idol and his opportunistic exit from the show after last season, when presumably Cowell saw it as a sinking franchise.

But if you’re ever going to feel sorry for the glowering, acerbic, v-neck-clad Brit, now might be the time to do it. Not only is Idol arguably better in the post-Cowell era, and with renascent ratings, but there also is an unexpected competitor to the music impresario’s plan to launch an Idol fighter this fall in a U.S. version of his UK hit talent show, The X Factor.Continue reading...