The Archbishop of Canterbury
takes the YouTube stage

Campaigns of Note:

• Drink company Diagio is using OpenAds.net to solicit creative materials from creative types — both professional and amateur — for use in a responsible drinking campaign.
• Monster is launching a rebranding campaign designed to position it as a facilitator of people's life callings. The effort is called "Your calling is calling."

Signs of What's to Come:

• A satisfying standard for online audience measurement hasn't yet been found, and it's not looking like 2008 will elicit much relief for that frustration.
• MIT and other high-prestige colleges are putting components of their curriculum online for free.

Local:

• The local online ad market isn't benefiting newspapers because small businesses seem to prefer pay-for-performance ads over display units, which is what papers prefer.
• Fox's KDFW station in Dallas is the latest to tap a local college for talent. The station sent eight Southern Methodist students to cover the Iowa and New Hampshire caucuses with blogs, video and other tools.

Europe and Asia:

• Great Britain has topped a list it probably wasn't aiming for. It was labeled the worst country in Europe when it comes to privacy protection.
• The Archbishop of Canterbury is the latest public figure in Britain (behind the Queen, no less) to distribute a holiday message via YouTube. His big takeaway: Go green in 2008.
• The Chinese government has instituted a new rule restricting online video distribution to sites only the government controls.

Biz Buzz:

• Advertising on social networks like MySpace and Facebook garners as much user anger as success, which may not bode well for "the medium within a medium," says Ian Schafer.
• The Weather Channel is reported to be seeking buyers for the network, including Weather.com. The asking price is reportedly north of $5 billion.

Tools and Software:

• AOL decided the Netscape Navigator browser is no longer cost-effective and has suspended development and support of the browser, urging users to switch over to Mozilla's Firefox instead.