But he’s clearly met his match in Noval Djokovic, a tennis player who’s admirable in his efforts to rehabilitate Serbia’s international image, and even more supremely talented.

Yesterday’s Australian Open men’s singles final was Nadal’s finest effort against Djokovic,  but he still came up short – for the seventh time in seven straight finals.

(You can read the gory details here and especially here.)

Here’s hoping for a Nadal-Djokovic final in the French Open four months from now. Maybe – maybe – Rafa can get the Novak off his back there.

Representative excerpts:

Mitt Romney is enduring attack ads—accurate and otherwise –by the Gingrich campaign and the pro-Gingrich super PAC Winning Our Future; he is also the target of a six-figure radio offensive launched by Priorities USA, the super PAC supporting Obama, the Service Employees International Union, and a television spot produced by another liberal group AFSCME, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.

* * * * * * *

Between the commercials produced by the Romney campaign and those aired by his super PAC, Romney—not necessarily by design—has evolved a three-pronged approach to winning the state and improving his chances in November. Prong one, aggrandize Mitt. Prong two, attack Newt. And three, attribute every woe this country has been feeling lately to Barack Obama.

* * * * * * *

The anti-Newt ads, “Unreliable Leader” and “Undisciplined” are equally as powerful. Former Gingrich colleagues from the House of Representatives provide stone-faced testimonies about his precarious record while unflattering shots of the former speaker are intercut throughout. Simple yet convincing, these ads are sure to have an impact.

In contrast, the anti-Romney commercials being aired by the Gingrich campaign are far more complicated, gimmicky, and petty. And, as such, they are bound to be less potent.

Read the whole piece. It’s very good.

Many Brands Bid for Product Placement on ‘Modern Family,’ but So Few Make It

Advertisers are working furiously to get their goods into the hands of the characters on ABC’s “Modern Family.” But only a select few will make it, as the producers are wary of turning the nation’s best-loved TV family into a clan of shills . . .

Although requests from advertisers have ramped up in recent months, “we turn down, I would say, about 90%” of them, said Steven Levitan, one of the comedy’s executive producers and creators. “We get offers constantly. We do very few. We try to be extremely selective.” Mr. Levitan said the show will attempt one to three of these integrations per season, perhaps more if the story takes the cast to a remote location.

Those making the cut: Toyota, Audi, Target – and Apple’s iPad, which got a free ride:

 Apple received huge exposure in 2010, even though no money changed hands, when its iPad — at the time not available to the public — was made a major part of a plotline in which technophile Phil Dunphy was coveting the new product.

To all the TV shows coveting new product placements, take a lesson. Less is more.

Originally posted on the Newer! Improveder! Sneak ADtack!

Several networks have asked the Mitt Romney campaign to stop airing an ad in Florida called “Mr. Washington Insider” which targets Newt Gingrich. The ad includes various news clips both current, and from Gingrich’s days as House Speaker. NBC News has asked that the ad be pulled from Florida TV stations as it includes a clip from “NBC Nightly News” when it was anchored by Tom Brokaw . . .

In a longer version of the ad . . . CNN’s Anderson Cooper, CBS’s Jan Crawford, and even Carole Simpson, who hasn’t been with ABC News since 2003, are included. CNN executives have asked the Romney campaign to remove the Cooper clips from the spot.

Said spot:

Despite all the high dudgeon on the broadcasters’ part, the Romney team is still using the ad and Florida TV stations (even NBC’s Miami affiliate) are still airing it – mostly, as Politico reports, because they’re required to by “federal law and Federal Communications Commission regulations [which] say that stations have to either take no ads from presidential candidates or take them from all candidates. And the station has ‘no power of censorship’ over the ads.”

It’s even doubtful the ads violate fair use standards, so those spots are going nowhere but on.

But given this Romney ad – and a Gingrich campaign spot that uses footage of Mike Huckabee in spite of his objections -  GOP looks like it stands for Grand Old Pirates nowadays.

The respective front pages of the Herald and the Globe on the death of legendary Boston Mayor Kevin White:

The text tells the tale, though: the Herald was compact, the Globe was comprehensive.

Edge: Brian Mooney’s Globe piece – a wide-ranging appreciation of White’s tumultuous tenure as mayor of a big city in transition and turmoil.

The hardworking staff will say it again: Gotta love a two-daily town.

Except former GOP presidential flameout Mike Huckabee does not approve this message.  From Politico’s Morning Score:

HUCKABEE CRITICIZES IT: “Any use of an out of context quote from the Republican Presidential primary 4 years ago in a political ad to advocate for the election or defeat of another candidate is not authorized, approved, or known in advance by me,” he said in a statement on is PAC’s website. “I have made it clear that I have not and do not anticipate making an endorsement in the GOP primary, but will support the nominee.”

Good luck with that.

ROMNEY’S NEW AD HIGHLIGHTS GINGRICH’S 1997 ETHICS VIOLATION: The 30-second spot is simply a clip of Tom Brokaw at the top of the January 21, 1997, NBC Nightly News. “Good evening. Newt Gingrich, who came to power, after all, preaching a higher standard in American politics, a man who brought down another Speaker on ethics accusations, tonight he has on his own record the judgment of his peers, Democrat and Republican alike,” Brokaw reports. “By an overwhelming vote, they found him guilty of ethics violations; they charged him a very large financial penalty, and they raised – several of them – raised serious questions about his future effectiveness.”

Said ad:

NBC, not surprisingly, is less than thrilled with this archival looting, so the network has issued a cease and desist request to the Romney campaign. From MSNBC’s First Read:

NBC News today is requesting that the Romney campaign remove NBC material from an ad that went up yesterday in Florida attacking Newt Gingrich for 1990s-era House ethics charges.

The ad prominently features then-NBC Nightly News anchor Tom Brokaw reporting in 1997 on the ethics charges at the top of the Nightly News broadcast that evening, Politico reported this morning.

“The NBC Legal Department has written a letter to the campaign asking for the removal of all NBC News material from their campaign ads,” said Lauren Kapp, NBC senior vice president for marketing and communications, in a statement.

Brokaw isn’t pleased either:

“I am extremely uncomfortable with the extended use of my personal image in this political ad,” he said. “I do no want my role as a journalist compromised for political gain by any campaign.”

At post time, the Romney campaign was claiming its appropriation of the newscast footage is “fair use.”

Expect NBC execs to disagree. Problem is, they have no mechanism at this point to squelch the ad.

But at least someone is monitoring it.

From techPresident:

The Wall Street Journal has launched its interactive look at Super PAC spending.

The site is a gold mine of links and dollar figures to help you sort out who’s doing what with how much.

Essential reading in the current world of unfettered campaign spending.

“BLOOD MONEY” – GINGRICH SUPER PAC TO ATTACK ROMNEY AS A MEDICARE CON ARTIST: “Winning Our Future released a clip on Thursday of a seven-minute online documentary they plan to unveil on Friday labeled ‘blood money.’ It takes aim at the acquisition by Romney’s private equity firm, Bain Capital, of the medical testing company Damon Corp. The company was reportedly fined more than $35 million and eventually went bankrupt. The clip features an exchange from Monday’s debate in which Romney says he never did business with the government.”

The one-minute Blood Money trailer:

This all comes compliments of casino billionaire Sheldon Adelson, who’s contributing the blood (sweat and tears) money of the average gambler to keep the Gingrich campaign afloat.

This GOP presidential primary is one ugly affair, and when Mitt Romney emerges as the eventual winner he’ll be . . . a loser.

Internet sites like Trip Advisor and Yelp, of course, are populated by a bunch of strangers, who’d normally be low-impact. But it’s the “bunch” – the volume effect – that gives them credibility and authority. Until, that is, you plug “Yelp sued” into the Googletron and get this.

A sense that online reviews are rigged can easily trump the volume effect. So Internet merchants and e-review sites couldn’t have welcomed today’s New York Times pieceheadlined, “For $2 a Star, an Online Retailer Gets 5-Star Reviews.”

Lede:

In the brutal world of online commerce, where a competing product is just a click away, retailers need all the juice they can get to close a sale.

Some exalt themselves by anonymously posting their own laudatory reviews. Now there is an even simpler approach: offering a refund to customers in exchange for a write-up.

By the time VIP Deals ended its rebate on Amazon.com late last month, its leather case for the Kindle Fire was receiving the sort of acclaim once reserved for the likes of Kim Jong-il. Hundreds of reviewers proclaimed the case a marvel, a delight, exactly what they needed to achieve bliss. And definitely worth five stars.

And the piece is definitely worth reading, even if it does itself go overboard at times. Case in point, this statement:

As the collective wisdom of the crowd displaces traditional advertising, the roaring engines of e-commerce are being stoked by favorable reviews.

Yes, well, the engines of e-commerce can roar all they want - nothing has displaced traditional advertising.

Yet.

Especially not e-reviews.

No stars for that pronouncement.

Originally posted on the Newer! Improveder! Sneak ADtack!