The 10 things in advertising you need to know today
1. Robert Downey Jr. doesn't just star in HTC's latest TV ad. He wrote the script.
2. Xiaomi's VP Hugo Barra told delegates at Mobile World Congress that the brand spends virtually no money on advertising. Its largest media outlay will be promoting a Facebook post every now and then.
3. Motorola has a customizable smartphone service called Moto Maker where you can pick the color and materials your device is made from. But the most popular color option is black...the default color of its smartphones.
4. Lots of companies are rushing to launch tacky black and blue or white and gold-themed products after the viral dress photo. But nobody is going to buy them.
5. Japanese messaging app LINE is blowing up. Here are the stats to prove it.
6. Pizza Hut is experimenting with connected cars. It has partnered with Visa to launch a service that lets you order food from your car, without needing to pick up your phone.
7. Carrie Underwood has just dealt a big blow to Adidas. Dick's Sporting Goods will remove women's clothing items from Adidas and Reebok to make room for Underwood's Calia line.
8. The iPhone 6 Plus is killing tablet sales. Sales of tablets have crashed 30% across the industry, Best Buy CEO Hubert Joly said on an earnings conference call.
9. Entrepreneur Peter Thiel thinks the Google search monopoly is about to end. "If the EU goes after Google, this could be a sign that the search monopoly might be about to end," he said at the Launch conference in San Francisco.
10. Facebook's most important tech project has launched its first startup. Facebook's Open Compute Project has launched a software as a service (SaaS) platform for IT pros called Coolan.