Flogging across America

2006 was not Madison Ave's year of embracing the internet, but that didn't stop it from being interesting: GE came up with a solution for TiVo, a slew of virals broke out, and the PR world faced a brick wall after creating fake blogs, writes The New York Times.

General Electric's One Second Theater invited consumers who owned digital video recorders to pause their 30-second ads at designated spots to view secret content. The campaign was promptly followed by G.E.'s Imagination Theater, featuring short films that could be viewed on video-on-demand and online.

And lets not forget the viral. P&G creeped us out with its offbeat "you can sleep when you are dead" Happy Morning viral, Smirnoff Raw Tea submitted the hugely popular Tea Partay, which parodied a rap video using rich, white people singing about privilege. Smirnoff Agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty later lost the account.

Then, finally, the PR world attempted a sneaky web tactic of its own, the flog (fake blog), only to find the people and press flogged the strategy to its doom. Exposed last week was one by Zipatoni that praised the Sony PSP using a made-up amateur hip hop artist. Earlier, McDonalds was caught with one, and Edelman launched Wal-Marting Across America earning it a rebuke from WOMMA.