AB InBev is warned by U.K. regulators about ad linking Budweiser to "sexual success"; emerges as main suitor for maker of Presidente beer.

Apple and five book publishers are sued by Justice Department over e-book pricing, elevating role of Amazon in setting prices.

BrightSource Energy withdraws IPO in a blow to green power.

Conde Nast furthers its push into Hollywood.

Dish Network names P&G vet as new CMO.

Dollar General expands presence nationwide.

Dollar Shave Club puts men in a lather.

Dos Equis stalls marketing push because of recall of amber bottles. Continue reading...

Spotify, the free music sharing service that has gone viral over Facebook, just launched an embeddable Play Button so that any Spotify music can live on any website.

"Today we’re giving every blogger and web editor the ability to light up the internet with music. Adding a personalized soundtrack to your website or blog has never been this easy,” wrote chief product officer Gustav Söderström. “You want to give your fans access to any song, album or playlist of your choosing and in its entirety, while ensuring people stay glued to your site. The Spotify Play Button does all of this for free, while making sure artists get paid for every play."

In a strategy similar to what they did on Facebook, moving from mobile to stereo to social, jockeying for position as "the operating system for music" on all digital platforms, Spotify has now pushed its client web-ubiquitous.

“In many ways, the Spotify Play Button is akin to Facebook’s 'Like' button. It’s a way of integrating service across the greater web, while also offering users additional value," writes Mashable's Christina Warren. "This all brings Spotify one step closer to becoming the online hub for music.” Continue reading...

Kicking off this week's Brand Bites, model Bar Refaeli's new under.me lingerie line campaign channels an iconic cheeky tennis poster.

PETA take note: the Sierra Club's new "Coal Will Say Anything" campaign shows how it's done.Continue reading...

As the appetite for all things Hunger Games seems insatiable, with its record-breaking $155m weekend opening and Fandango pre-sales for more than 1,200 showings, one key player that deserves credit for making the pre-release marketing a hit on social media is a relative newcomer: thismoment.

Simply put, “Lionsgate social media marketing is centered around thismoment’s social infrastructure,” writes Forbes. Entrepreneur-centric Inc. also acknowledged the thismoment-powered social media savvy of The Hunger Games pre-launch marketing. Their secret sauce?Continue reading...

The Hunger Games movie opening is expected to break all Hollywood records, even eclipsing the now benign-seeming franchises of Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings and Twilight. The first of four planned movies is projected to rake in more than $100 million at the box office this upcoming weekend, with more than $1 million worth of tickets already pre-sold.

The trilogy, written by bestselling author Suzanne Collins, has 24 million copies in print in the U.S. and a built-in fan base that Lionsgate Entertainment has leveraged with unprecedented acumen.

They started traditionally with print ads in newspapers, 50+ magazine cover stories, 3,000 billboard and bus shelter displays, and 80,000 distributed posters. And then came the digital build, creating a series of “little online brushfires to create a box office inferno,” as New York Times reporter Brooks Barnes comments in the video that accompanies his must-read story.

Starting a year ago, the Lionsgate marketing team, led by CMO Tim Palen, leveraged social media to the hilt, building anticipation and participation via Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr, iPhone games and the promise of live Yahoo streaming at the premiere.Continue reading...

If nothing else, it has to be a lot of fun being associated with businesses owned by Virgin. Behind them all, whether it's Virgin Bingo or Virgin Hotels or another of the myriad Virgin-branded businesses, you can always bank (literally) on the sometimes loony but always shrewd iconic entrepreneur, Richard Branson, Virgin's brander-in-chief. Don't think of them as brand extensions so much as Branson extensions — reflections of the Virgin founder's personality, passions and interests.

You can pretty much depend on Branson's trademark wit and showmanship in the promotion of a Virgin brand. The latest campaign from Virgin Mobile USA is testament to that, going so far as to depict what it must have been like "growing up Branson."Continue reading...

Chronicle — the new #1 movie in North America, taking in over $22 million over Super Bowl weekend — is a thriller in the tradition of The Blair Witch Project, in which the film is presented as a collection of real footage found after the event. But Chronicle's innovation goes well beyond the "found footage" gambit.

Where the film was truly innovative was in a promotion that won the film boatloads of attention and earned media. The week before its release, 20th Century Fox flew "people" above New York City in a stunt that generated viral buzz.Continue reading...

American Airlines parent AMR plans to cut 13,000 jobs and pensions.

Apple's iPhone 5 may be coming in June.

Benetton family plans to take retailer private.

Deutsche Bank profit tumbles on European debt crisis.

Facebook sets stage for historic IPO as valuation game begins.

GM cancels half of upfront ad commitments in cost-cutting move.

Google responds to Microsoft criticism of privacy policies.Continue reading...