Arguably the best part of the ongoing tech wars is just how catty all of these Silicon Valley giants are when it comes to their competitors. While a Microsoft spokesperson allegedly told Mashable that the above spot was “not meant for public consumption,” it’s an obvious continuation of the brand’s “Don’t Get Scroogled” campaign, which started running late last year. Perhaps all they needed to add before it went live was a Microsoft logo. Oh, and if you’ll notice after the jump, it’s a direct parody of Chrome’s “Now Everywhere” spot from early March.

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Well, you asked for it, and we’re giving it to you. To follow up on our Porsche review post from yesterday, we’ve heard from very reliable sources that the pitch for the automaker’s North American creative account is indeed down to two: Chicago-based incumbent Cramer-Krasselt and, you guessed it, Minneapolis-based Olson. Consider us surprised as we thought everyone’s darling agency Droga5 would be in the mix, but not so. Anyhow, we’re hearing Porsche’s decision is imminent and that the brand is getting more digitally focused in terms of its creative efforts. The other two finalists as mentioned before were CP+B Miami and McKinney. We’ll keep you posted.

The Spy line was spot-on once again as we’ve received confirmation that BBDO New York is indeed making some cuts this week that “are significant and across departments.” No numbers have been revealed (trust us, we inquired), but as your probably know, the agency’s longtime relationship with Gillette recently ended when parent company P&G passed over its shaving brand’s account to Grey a few weeks ago. No word if the “significant” reductions were directly related, but we’ll let you do the math. We’ve been told that the reductions are still happening, so we’ll let you know if we hear more.

Russia’s abysmal track record for gay rights got unnecessarily worse last year, when a court ruling banned gay parades in the country for the next 100 years. Today, Stockholm Pride and M&C Saatchi Stockholm are fighting back with gowest2013.com, a digital campaign that lets Russians celebrate gay rights on Twitter for one well-intentioned thorn in the side of the Russian government: to get “Go West” trending in Russia. How are they going to accomplish this from a Swedish website, you ask? All tweets from the website automatically change location to a Russian city. Got to love technology.

If Stockholm Pride accomplishes their goal, I’d love to see the faces of Russian government officials after “Go West” starts trending. Stalin rolls in his grave, Putin rolls in his bed, Sting makes more music videos like this. If you’re interested in contributing, you can tweet from the website to help the cause and watch as Princeton, New Jersey turns into Ufa, Russia.

We’ve been hearing murmurs about this for a couple of weeks and now, sources familiar with the matter confirm that Toni Hess, who most recently served as partner/executive creative director at Rosetta, is no longer with the Publicis Groupe-owned agency. No word from those in the know if there are immediate plans to replace Hess, whose departure comes less than a month after Rosetta and CCO Gary Scheiner parted ways. Hess joined Rosetta nearly four years ago as partner/group creative director within the agency’s creative/customer experience group. Prior to her most recent gig, the New York-based Hess, who’s also taught at the Miami Ad School, spent several years as a GCD at both Draftfcb and JWT.

-We’ve already mentioned the 2013 Grand Clio winners list. In case you didn’t attend last night’s show in NYC (you missed some nice interaction/ball-busting between host Eric Stonestreet and Rob Schwartz by the way), the Clio crew also handed out their first ever “Gravity Award” to Mayo Draftfcb Lima for inventing a billboard that converts condensation into potable water. See case study here.

-Since you rarely, if ever, see a Lucky Charms ad on the telly anymore, Saatchi & Saatchi, Calabash Animation and PatMan Studios are here to create some nostalgia via the viral mashup above.

-McGarryBowen London managing director Ida Rezvani is heading across the pond to assume the same role in said agency’s New York office. link

-Kevin Smith takes a stand against celeb crowdfunding (as do others, as you may have heard). link

-The “world’s first parrot search engine,” you say? link

-No worries, Netflix won’t be selling ads for its streaming site. link

Pim de Koel is not the most interesting man in the world, but he may be interesting enough to make you want to travel to Holland. Koel headlines a new Dutch travel spot, “Holland. The Original Cool.” that was put together in a joint effort from Mustache, the Netherlands Board of Tourism and Conventions, KLM Airlines, Schiphol Airport, and Amsterdam Marketing. The commercial focuses on how Holland is fun, quirky, pretty, forward-thinking, artsy, and generally better than wherever you live. They also like to say Van Gogh in thick accents. I can’t argue against their sophisticated European sensibilities, Holland is cool. You should visit there just so you can meet the one old, bitter Dutch dude who doesn’t speak English. And there’s no need for weed jokes or Red Light District quips, because Pim keeps it clean. The pitch has worked thus far, racking up close to 125,000 views in only one day (see how it’s blown up this week on Reddit after the jump).

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-This is what happens when Dos Equis hires actor/comedian Michael Ian Black to tweet about their Facebook app (above). See the rest unfold here.

-Holy crap. A 24-year-old Ogilvy China staffer has apparently died from “overwork.” link

-Seattle-based agency DNA has hired Wexley School for Girls alum Roxanne Tolnas as account director and Jenny Lee, formerly of The Hacker Group, as senior art director. link

-Director/VFX artist/animator Drew Lightfoot has joined Toronto-based Untitled Films for Canadian representation. Lightfoot is represented by Passion Pictures here in the States.

-L.A.-based digital agency Sensis has welcomed Polly Beale and Joe Hyde as creative director and director of technology, respectively.

-Campbell Mithun unit Compass Point Media has launched an ad agency trading desk called OdinRTB for retail and CPG clients. link

-Family-owned Massachusetts brand Late July Organic Snacks has tapped Twin Cities agency Haberman to handle its social marketing expansion and new 2013 campaign.

Yes, Carlos Ricque, VP/executive creative director at Moxie Interactive who worked out of the Zenith Media agency’s New York office, is indeed calling it quits. The agency elaborates, saying, “After three great years at Moxie in both Atlanta and New York, Carlos Ricque has decided to leave the Moxie New York office to pursue his video content creation dreams. He leaves on great terms with the agency.  The creative EVP has said that Carlos is one of the good guys in Creative.  Where Carlos goes, good work always follows.  He will be missed.”

It’s not such a stretch for Ricque to head into content creation as the creative has also moonlighted as a screenwriter over the years and won Best Picture back in 2005 at the roving 48 Hour Film Project. On the ad side, meanwhile, prior to Moxie, Ricque spent well over four years at Atlanta-based Fitzgerald+CO, where he last served as co-chief creative officer. During his career, Ricque has also served as a senior copywriter at BBDO and an ACD at what is now 22squared.

This week, T3 is hiring a media planner, while Scratch needs a manager of project leadership. MediaWhiz is seeking a senior SEM/paid search analyst, and Mullen is on the hunt for a group strategy director. Get the scoop on these openings and more below, and find additional just-posted gigs on Mediabistro.

• Media Planner T3 (San Francisco, CA)
• Manager, Project Leadership Scratch (New York, NY)
• Senior SEM/Paid Search Analyst MediaWhiz (New York, NY)
• Group Strategy Director Mullen (El Segundo, CA)
• Senior Brand Strategist Mullen (Boston, MA)

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