F'd Ad Fridays: "I'll be taking these Huggies and whatever cash ya got"

"Edwina's insides were a rocky place where my seed could find no purchase."

What a hilarious find by Buzzfeed's Dave Stopera — a Serbian Biology lesson book that stole its "happy family" on the cover from the Cohen Brother's awesome 1987 comedy, Raising Arizona.

If you haven't seen the film (shame on you) it's about a career criminal (Nicolas Cage) and his ex-cop wife (Holly Hunter) who turn to kidnapping when they cannot naturally conceive a child.

Not exactly textbook...

Veterans fighting over the flower of peace

CBC reports that The Royal Canadian Legion is threatening legal action against another Canadian veteran group for using a red poppy as part of their logo.

The Legion, don't you know, trademarked the red plastic lapel poppy as a symbol of remembering Canada's war dead. They're the ones you're supporting when you pick one up at the liquor store.

Last year, the Legion threatened action against another group, who had designed a white poppy to represent peace.

This year's legal letter, from the IP firm Ridout and Maybee LLP to Canadian Veteran Freedom Riders (CVFR), says "We must insist that the CVFR and all of its members immediately cease all use of trademarks or other indicia incorporating the Legion's protected mark 'poppy design' and any of the Legion poppy trademarks."

Apparently, according to the Trademarks Act, every group must legitimately apply to the Legion use the poppy in any way.

A spokesman for the Legion said, "The poppy's a strong symbol, so when you see the poppy you automatically think it's for veterans and remembrance. Therefore, it must be legitimate all the time."
He added that if one organization is allowed to use the poppy, the flood gates would open for other groups.

The veteran bikers are not amused. "It's a slap in the face," said Capt. Michael Blow. "I'm a veteran, I wear that poppy for remembrance, I don't wear it for profit."

What on earth is wrong with the Royal Canadian Legion? They are acting like a soulless commercial brand protecting their stranglehold on a symbol. The moral "owner" of the poppy as a symbol for the war dead was Canadian soldier/poet John McCrae, who wrote "In Flanders Fields", but he died in the war (of disease, like many others). Following the publishing of his poem, the red poppy became the symbol of honouring war dead — and hoping for no more war — throughout the Commonwealth. The symbol, in essence, belongs to all of us. But it especially belongs to every Canadian who has served his or her country.

Good thing the Legion didn't take out a predatory trademark on the maple leaf, the beaver or the toque. Because then we'd have to ask permission to use any of our national symbols.

Netflix presents: How to fail at social media branding

Image via Gizmodo

Meet Jason Castillo. Thanks to Netflix's failure to secure the Twitter name for Netflix's new spinoff mail-order DVD business, he is now the unintentional brand ambassador for Qwikster:

(The profile picture is a recent change. Until yesterday it was an illustration of Sesame Street's Elmos smoking a massive joint, but Castillo got scared that the media attention would lead to a bust.)

Those of us charged with making up odd names for new brands that are both "intuitive" and twisted enough to be "ownable" generally go through a checklist of diligence before even getting trademark lawyers involved. We Google, check all top-level domains, and search all the major social media channels (Facebook and Twitter primarily) to make sure someone hasn't already claimed it. This oversight, for a brand as big as Netflix, is actually pretty astounding.

So astounding, as AdFreak's David Kiefaber quips, it is " so dumb that I'd think it was staged if there were anything for the company to gain from it."

Is it possible? I doubt it. Considering the many gaffes that Netflix has committed recently, it's not stretching credibility to think that they simple dropped the ball. And while this kind of situation is usually dealt with by a quiet negotiation and modest cheque, Castillo is so gloriously stoned that he continues to play his hopes for making "bank" on this as the slow-motion trainwreck only social media can provide.

Meanwhile, Business Insider points out that Twitter's TOS expressly forbid the selling of Twitter names. So by being so publicly greedy, Castillo could blow the whole deal.

And Netflix? Everyone hates the split anyway. It may be time to cut bait and run in a different marketing direction.