Vinny Warren of The Escape Pod likes what he calls "the hard sell."What is the hard sell? The hard sell is the ad that instantly makes you want what's being advertised. You'd think this would be the permanent orientation of advertising ALL THE TIME. But it isn't. People can get a bit lax in good eco...

Almost every day, fresh diagnoses of or fresh prescriptions to the economic crisis are put forth. Much of it is political hogwash driven by partisan Republicans eager to see Obama and the country fail. That comes from the same party that spent the past sixteen years blaming everything that went wron...

"Seems so long I felt this way and time sure passin slow My time coming, anyday, don't worry about me, no " - John Perry Barlow Mark Morford is a columnist for The San Francisco Chronicle. In his latest piece, he imagines a glorious "green in every way" future for the Golden State.Pot is, by a huge ...

There are times when Mad Men let doubt creep in. Times when they wonder if their investment in advertising is well spent. If you're suffering from such thoughts, maybe this will help... According to Market Watch, America's Top 100 brands (as ranked by BusinessWeek and InterBrand) generated a 31% ret...

How has the economic downturn affected a cozy-chic downtown Manhattan neighborhood? We surveyed the retail territory around Gawker HQ in NoLIta. What'd we find out there? Lots of closed stores and a lot of sales. Intern Whitney Jefferson traversed a few blocks around our front door — between B...

. There’s been much hand wringing in the cartoon world the past few weeks. Village Voice Media, publisher of many alternative weekly newspapers, has “temporarily” suspended publishing comics in all its papers due to shrinking budgets. Max Cannon goes so far to suggest that the comi...

If we buy them fresh bindlestiffs, they’ll still be bums. These, the folks who spat the word ’socialist’ at me like a vile epithet, now benefit from the worst form of government: reverse meritocracy. The competent haunt the breadlines. I can get behind the rescue, but I insist they...

Do these moves portend a new and aggressive Obama? I certainly hope so. After the can of whupass that was opened up on him by Beltway Republicans and Democrats last week, he’s really the only hope that we’ve got. Last year’s Nobel Prize-winning economist isn’t pleased, enthus...

Wall Street is more than a street in New York, just as Madison Avenue is more than a street in New York. In fact, a large part of Wall St. now exists in Charlotte, NC--The Queen City. Which is perfect really. Bankers can move money around in Manhattan by day and be back at Lake Norman for ribs and c...

There is no such thing. Can we stop with all the happy talk now? These are hard times which we will survive. The best way to do that is to come to terms with what is happening....