Amazon violates contract with Kindle, U.S. authors' guild says.

Anthony's Pizza & Pasta takes on national pizza chains in Colorado.

Apple adds Disney CEO Bob Iger to board as the company warms up to the business market.

Cadillac takes broad aim with new flagship XTS sedan.

Citigroup trims workforce.

Dow sponsorship deal creates headache for London 2012 organizers.

Facebook invokes the wrath of Salman Rushdie with real-name push.

Family Dollar arrives in California.Continue reading...

For 2011, BMW has an 8,000-car lead on Mercedes-Benz for the privilege of supplanting Lexus as the best-selling luxury brand in the United States. And now its executives are expressing confidence not only about this year's race but also about getting off to a fast start in the 2012 upscale-sales derby.

"We have a window to stay No. 1 in the first quarter" of next year, Ludwig Willisch, who took over BMW's North American operations, told Bloomberg this week. His confidence comes in part because BMW is introducing a new 3-Series sedan, an updated version of its classic entry-level vehicle that hits the sweet spot for Millennials who want to move up into the luxury niche. BMW has introduced a redesigned 5 Series sedan and X3 sport-utility vehicle over the last year.

His remark contradicted a view offered in August by his predecessor, who believed that Mercedes — also on the strength of new-product launches — might take a first-quarter lead. Neither did Willisch address the rest of 2012. One factor that he and competitors are acutely aware of is that Lexus is beginning its return to ample supplies of all vehicles this quarter, and by early next year expects to be flush with all of the Lexus vehicles that its highly loyal customers want to buy.Continue reading...

AMC kills Bing product placement deal for Walking Dead.

Apple's iCloud service goes live in first major product launch since Steve Jobs died.

BlackBerry outage response not RIM's finest moment, says BBC.

British PM David Cameron holds kids' advertising summit, while Tory Party rebrand has missed the mark, critics argue.

Cadillac unveils 'Cue,' its connected car system.

Chrysler strikes tentative deal with the UAW.

Diddy makes a landmark donation to the Boys & Girls Club of Harlem.

eBay looks to deepen its relationship with Facebook.

Google sees 60% drop in Google+ usage.Continue reading...

This week's number one film Robot Rocky Real Steel is a litmus test for which generation one belongs to.

In one generational corner are those who joke that the film as a live adaptation of the old board game Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots. In the opposite corner are those who jest that Real Steel is just a boxing movie about the NFL on FOX robot mascot, Cleatus.

But when it comes to the latter, one wonders why FOX's gridiron cyborg wasn't even involved in the film's promotion despite having done similar robot movie tie-ins in the past.Continue reading...

Joel Ewanick has been in charge of General Motors' U.S. marketing for about 15 months now and has been its global CMO for a few months less than that. So he's still in the midst of performing due diligence on GM's 10 solely directed or shared global brands, figuring out what GM must do to make each marque effective both in individual markets as well as globally.

"You can imagine the amount of effort it takes to market those seven brands," Ewanick recently told Automotive News. "Some other car companies have just one or two brands."

Among Ewanick's current tasks are to reposition Cadillac for success in China and to nurture the momentum that Buick has built in the U.S. market. He also likes to emphasize the importance of keeping GM's brands in their natural "swim lanes" — something that is decidedly easier now that those lanes are wider and fewer than just a few years ago, given that GM has shed four of the eight U.S. brands it had until 2009.Continue reading...

Joel Ewanick was recruited as General Motors from Hyundai with expectations he would become a game-changer last year, positioning his new employer for long-term global success for its remaining brands. But the GM CMO doesn't think some of the advertising agencies that are supposed to help him are up to game speed yet. And he's getting impatient.

In recent days, trade press has been rife with reports of Ewanick's dissatisfaction with both Goody Silverstein on Chevrolet and Fallon on behalf of Cadillac. Ewanick told Automotive News and Adweek that Goodby "hasn't been consistent" since its much-heralded takeover of the Chevy account after Ewanick arrived at GM last fall, and that Fallon "is still trying to find a way to the work" that will succeed for Cadillac.

No wonder Ewanick is a little edgy these days about the two brands. Chevrolet has gotten stronger since his arrival, but a huge reason for that is one single new product: the Chevrolet Cruze small car, whose appeal seems based on fuel efficiency and strong vehicle features rather than buzz-worthy advertising. Ewanick's concerns echo doubts outsiders expressed last year when he debuted the brand's new "Chevy Runs Deep" positioning. It wasn't clear exactly what that message would do for the brand.Continue reading...

The sleeper hit of the summer, The Help, does not have much by way of product placement. But what it does have, it works, weaving various iconic products from the 1960s into the plot about the struggles of black maids in white households during the turbulent Civil Rights era Mississippi.

Cadillac, Corvettes and Coca-Cola: is there a trifecta of brands more emblematic of America's era of the economic ascension? Coke probably scores the best placement of the film in both prominence and role, as two cold bottles are shared by characters during a heartwarming moment of racial transcendency. In the book, Coca-Cola plays an even more important role, as one maid gets one for her employer to calm her after a miscarriage.Continue reading...

General Motors isn’t the only company hoping to benefit from its current summer promotion: a test offer of a free year of car insurance to new-vehicle buyers in Washington and Oregon. MetLife, the policy provider, is looking for a potentially significant bump as well.

The Warwick, R.I.-based insurer and the Detroit-based automaker have structured the marketing as a sort of co-branded arrangement designed to do just that. 

MetLife is hoping for greater exposure in a weak geographic market for its brand, Bob Lundgren, VP of product development for MetLife Auto & Home, told brandchannel. GM also is seeking to boost its market share in a traditionally sub-par market, although the company has done a bit better in each state this year than last year so far.Continue reading...