Al Gore prepares 24-hour global warming Climate Reality live-stream event.

Angry Birds spurs 1M t-shirts and 1M plush toy sales per month for Rovio.

AT&T will use plant-based packaging for accessories as Coca-Cola's PlantBottle arrives on UK shelves.

Bank of America announces 30,000 job cuts.

Boston Globe newspaper puts up online paywall.

British American Tobacco gears up for legal battle vs. the Australian government.

Broadcom bets on web traffic for mobile with $3.7 billion NetLogic deal.

Glenn Beck says his new TV network is "not for slugs."

Google - just another ad company?

Groupon sued by its own employees.Continue reading...

As the world's largest online marketplace, eBay has to constantly defend its brand against vendors selling knock-off branded goods on its site.

To make clear its commitment to thwarting counterfeiters, eBay has partnered with the US Council of Fashion Designers of America on "You Can't Fake Fashion," a campaign to raise awareness against counterfeit goods and celebrate original design.Continue reading...

Chrysler was clearly onto something when it launched its breakthrough "Imported from Detroit" campaign. Sales spiked, leading the company to launch phase 2. Explaining the positioning, Chrysler CMO Olivier Francois told brandchannel, “American coolness is essential to our strategy, because that’s exactly what imports do not have, and some other American [luxury] brands don’t have as well.” 

Chrysler isn't the only one latching on to the rising "Made in USA" star. In March, we reported on the website, MadeInUSAForever.com which was bootstrapped by Todd Lipscomb. He told CNN, "I saw this terrible need in our nation for a real alternative to buy American made products. ... It's a virtuous circle of economic activity that's caused by buying American made." Lipscomb has seen his website business grow at over 40% per year.

Many other brands are following suit, according to Bloomberg. Joseph Abboud, the maker of menswear, proudly displays a "Made in USA" moniker on its website. Brooks Brothers waves a "Made in America" banner and boasts of its factories in the US. Mark Kate and Ashley Olsen's fashion brand, The Row, promotes its American-made line.Continue reading...

Amazon has just entered the flash sales market with MyHabit, a members-only (but free to sign up) fashion destination offering up to 60% discounts on designer brands.

Featured sale items are posted at noon ET daily from high-end fashion labels including Doo.Ri, Elizabeth and James (one of the labels designed by the Olsen sisters, who are also exploring e-commerce with StyleMint), Halston and Vera Wang.

Competing with other portals' fashion-forward sales channels, along with celeb-heavy direct-to-consumer e-commerce fashion sites, MyHabit isn't just targeting women, although that's who will likely do most of the shopping.Continue reading...

Daily deal sites like Groupon and LivingSocial did more than socialize online discount shopping — they began a seachange that has taken e-commerce in a new direction.

Combine the deals concept with the selectivity sophistication of such sites as Amazon and Netflix, mix in the power of celebrity brands, and you get online "shopping clubs" — the latest craze in the evolving world of personalized shopping.Continue reading...

The CFDA-nominated actors-turned-designers Mark-Kate and Ashley Olsen could easily retire with their billion-dollar empire and the four fashion labels they're now running, from The Row on the luxe end to mid-range Elizabeth and James and Olsenboye for jcpenney.

Their latest fashion venture is a pure digital play: StyleMint.com, an e-commerce, personalized shopping venture that's subscription-based ($29.99 monthly) and designed to lure fans of their brands and personal style with a launch collection of eight t-shirts not available anywhere else.

It doesn't go live until July, so the website is deliberately obtuse: cloaked in black, giving off an air of exclusivity, and commanding with all the imperiousness of Anna Wintour: “Membership is limited. Get on the list now.”Continue reading...

Occasionally, even a retailer as savvy as Wal-Mart steps in it. That may be what’s happening with the chain’s decision to develop its own beauty line aimed at 8- to 12-year-olds — the fledgling fashionistas marketers call tweens.

GeoGirl, which debuts in February, replaces the Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen cosmetics line. It's designed for young skin, with natural ingredients such as white willow bark and chamomile. Sold in recyclable packaging, natch, the items are named in tween-speak texting slang such as J4G (Just For Grins).

“GeoGirl is about teaching this generation about beauty care in a responsible way,” stated Carmen Bauza, Wal-Mart Stores Inc.’s vice president and divisional merchandise manager of beauty and personal care. “This [line] is a great learning experience for us to determine how to communicate with this generation.”

That may be Wal-Mart's corporate rationale for encouraging kids to wear makeup. But it didn’t take long for outraged moms and others to take shots at what seemed to them like child exploitation by Wal-Mart.Continue reading...

JC Penney is still continuing to revamp with its many collaborations, this time with European fast-fashion chain Mango. Penney has weathered the recession well, recently reporting stronger-than-expected Q3 earnings, despite a comparable-store sales decrease of 4.6%, and raised its financial forecast for the full year.

The new line will be called MNG By Mango, and is set to debut next fall in 75 stores, ramping up rapidly with 600 more by Fall 2011. It is set to be Penney's largest contemporary brand, and the largest launch ever of any fast-fashion concept.

MNG by Mango will be supported with an aggressive marketing campaign to include online, digital, TV and direct mail. Recent launches for the department store have included housewares line Cindy Crawford Style and Olsenboye, from Mary-Kate Olsen and Ashley Olsen, in its junior department.Continue reading...