Now, the company is taking advantage of a happy coincidence — the fact that part of its logo happens to look like the Danish flag — to welcome people to Denmark, recently voted the “happiest country in the world” by the United Nations.

In honor of the Danish tradition of greeting arriving visitors by waving flags, Coke’s local agency, McCann Copenhagen, created an interactive airport ad that dispenses flags. Coke says it’s purpose is to “let Coca-Cola and Denmark spread happiness together.” The below video of a case study shows people’s reactions to the machine.

Little kids and elderly people jubilantly waving flags as loved ones rush to greet them, all made possible by Coke. We’d categorize this as a highly creative branding win.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Benetton

Those “underpinning values”, however, are being questioned in light of the company’s denial that it had any ties to the garment factory in Savar, Bangladesh, that collapsed last week, tragically killing at least 377 people. The company tweeted on April 24: “In reference to the tragic news on the collapse of the building in Bangladesh, Benetton Group wants to clarify that none of the companies involved are suppliers to Benetton Group or any of its brands.” .

Since then, however, strong evidence suggesting Benetton clothing was being manufactured at the factory (known as Rana Plaza) has been uncovered. Photos taken of the rubble by the Associated Press and Agence France-Presse clearly show shirts with “United Colors of Benetton” labels. Also, one of the manufacturers that had been based at the factory, New Wave Bottoms, lists Benetton as a client, and labor rights activists said they found documents linking Benetton to the factory while they were digging through the debris.

In light of this hard-to-ignore evidence, the company released a statement on April 29, which said: “A one-time order was completed and shipped out of one of the manufacturers involved several weeks prior to the accident. Since then, this subcontractor has been removed from our supplier list.”

While Benetton is far from the only big-name company connected to Rana Plaza (Wal-Mart, Ireland’s Primark, and Canada’s Joe Fresh all made clothing there), the company’s dedication to social activism — coupled with its initial denial — seem to be making it a prime target for public ire. continued…

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Most female mannequins are so proportionally ridiculous that even the smallest clothes need to be cinched at the back to keep from hanging loosely off their bony shoulders. And if they were to come to life (see aforementioned uprising scenario), they would be too thin to menstruate. Given these facts, it’s no wonder that when this photo of more realistically-sized mannequins in a Swedish store hit the Internet, the response was an international roar of approval.

A blogger at Women’s Rights News posted the photo of the department store mannequins to Facebook last week, and the comments have been pouring in ever since. Although the dummies still represent the idealized hourglass shape, blonde hair, and fair skin, their softer-looking tummies and fleshier thighs have inspired 61,538 likes and over 19,000 shares as of this writing. The fact that they are dressed in lingerie also helps to perpetuate the idea that this store recognizes its shoppers don’t have to be a size 2 to be sexy.

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Late in 2012, Chinese media reported that the chickens provided to KFC by a few of its suppliers were raised to maturity in only 45 days thanks to the use of said substances. Disgusted consumers began turning away from the restaurants in droves, but instead of immediately issuing an apology, parent company Yum Brands simply stated that it was cooperating with investigators and that all of its products were safe.

Customers were apparently unconvinced, as KFC China‘s sales slid a whopping 41 percent in January, prompting the company to issue an official apology and take further action. China is the source of about half of Yum Brands’ revenue, and so a plan was hatched to get its reputation back on track in this all-important market.

The resulting PR/marketing campaign, which boasts the laughably epic name “Operation Thunder” (is Thor involved?) began in recent weeks with a mini-site detailing the steps the company will take to ensure the safety of its chicken and promising to keep customers informed about potential safety issues. But it’s the social media aspect of the campaign that really seems to have reached consumers.

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As Patrick Madden, executive director of UNA-USA said, “There are various conspiracy theories swirling around about what the U.N. does. In the U.S. it’s a particular challenge since most U.S. citizens don’t see the U.N. directly at work in their country. That makes it harder for most of the American public to see the benefits”. Minh-Thu Phan, UNA-USA director of public policy, added, “Many Americans care about these issues, but not enough to act on them or to call their congressmen.”

Sustainability is an area where the U.N. has been active, and one that has gained traction in the public and private sectors. On Monday the panel discussed the aftermath of Rio+ 20, a U.N. conference on sustainable development that was the U.N.’s biggest conference ever, with 50,000 attendees in Brazil last June.

“The message was simple: we need to re-think development”. Those were the words of Nikhil Seth, a U.N. director of sustainable development. He provided a broad overview of the Rio + 20 conference, and Eban Goodstein, director of Bard College’s Center for Environmental Policy, focused on sustainable business issues.

Click through for takeaways.

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The motion was proposed, according to councillor Danny Healy-Rae, because “people are living in isolated rural areas where there’s no public transport of any kind, and they end up at home looking at the four walls, night in and night out, because they don’t want to take the risk of losing their licence.”

Let us just say that being of Irish descent, having lived in Galway for several months, and having spent a fair amount of time in Kerry, it really is true that the Irish pub culture is as much about socializing as it is about drinking (if not more so). It’s also true that many rural parts of the country have few, if any, social outlets aside from said drinkeries. Therefore, as ridiculous as it may sound, these concerns about people becoming socially isolated if they can’t go to their neighborhood watering holes are legitimate.

That said, we do feel the need to point out that the whole problem could also be resolved if these isolated folks just practiced heading to the pub, taking part in conversations, listening to music, playing cards with their neighbors and not drinking excessively (ludicrous, we know).

All jokes aside, though, we would be very surprised if this motion were accepted by the Minister for Justice (the next step in becoming law).

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Her first big break was the Iranian Revolution. In this episode of My First Big Break, Christiane Amanpour talks about how escaping Iran with her family was the first step of a journey that took her from a local NBC station in Rhode Island all the way to the front lines of the first Gulf War as a reporter for CNN.

For more videos, check out our YouTube channel and follow us on Twitter: @mediabistroTV

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For the past twenty years, the Torre Argentina Cat Shelter has taken responsibility for feeding, vaccinating, and caring for the local population of feral cats, which have become something of a tourist attraction themselves. “People are interested more in cats than in monuments”, said shelter founder Lia Dequel. “The two together are fantastic.”

But now, national archaeological officials have issued an eviction notice, saying that the long-standing (but never officially authorized) shelter poses a threat to the safety and upkeep of the historic landmarks it abuts. The cats, they say, are not the issue and will be allowed to stay–a decision that seems counter-intuitive to shelter workers like Dequel. “If I leave these cats here, who sterilizes them? They wouldn’t go to [a] doctor and say, ‘Hi, doctor, sterilize me,’ or ‘vaccinate me,’ or [to] be fed”. Other shelter-supporters were less subdued in their comments. “If they want war, we’ll give them war…The cats need us”, said Silvia Viviani, another of the shelter’s founders.

On the unenviable flip side of the argument stand the officials charged with preserving the local historic sites.

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An interesting study in Communist Party PR unfurled this week. For the past year or so, Chinese politics has revolved around the sort of organized transfer of power that occurs once every decade; most observers believe that current President Hu Jintao will hand the reins off to his VP, Xi Jinping.

The transfer, already plagued by the arrest of top official Bo Xilal and his wife on charges of fraud and murder, ran into even more controversy thanks to a recent New York Times expose focused on the finances of prime minister Wen Jibao‘s family–a proudly humble clan that has somehow managed to accumulate billions of dollars in assets over recent years via assorted business alliances.

Like the Wen family’s finances, the Party’s damage control plan is all over the map: First censors blocked web access to the Times site throughout China; then they scanned the popular Chinese Twitter equivalent Sina Weibo in order to scrub all references to the number 2.7 billion (the supposed financial worth of the PM’s family). After relying on the government to implement a “nothing to see here” approach, members of the Wen family pivoted, directly addressing a story that they’d previously tried to erase and threatening legal action against the Times for reporting on “corporate and regulatory records” that were available to the public. What’s more, the family never directly addressed any of the story’s particulars–and the Times report did not allege any sort of illegal activity.

This completely ineffective response to the scandal hints at the complexity of Chinese politics: in an unelected government, public perception is invaluable because brute force can only accomplish so much.

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After watching his political fortunes fizzle and his domestic life fall apart, Strauss-Kahn is still fighting charges that tie him to a French prostitution ring while simultaneously hyping his new consulting company and his return to the international lecture circuit. It’s all part of another valiant attempt to reclaim what he clearly believes to be his rightful place on the world stage. We might almost pity him at this point, were he not such a demonstrably skeevy old man. His newest line of defense seems to be “I am a man! Of course I love women! Is that a crime?” (Note: statement must be read in a ridiculously cartoonish French accent.)

So DSK decided to follow Schwarzenegger’s lead on his “no apologies” apology tour by acknowledging that what he did was wrong while simultaneously throwing his hands up and daring the free world not to be taken in by his charms. Of course he is a horny old bastard who enjoys “secret soirees… that start with a fine meal and end with naked guests and public sex with multiple partners.” Who doesn’t?

We’re still fascinated by the man’s story for some reason.

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Luckily, John Seabrook of The New Yorker just published a fascinating article about the carefully choreographed process that fuels the fast-growing world of Korean pop music—and its top PR teams’ plans to win Western fans with their dizzying mix of contemporary production, eclectic stage shows and a shocking amount of plastic surgery.

South Korea’s top three entertainment PR firms have essentially come to run the K-Pop industry by adopting the British/American boy band business model…on steroids. And they’ve completely dominated the Asian music market by beating predecessor J-Pop at its own game and winning the Chinese public over with their bizarre videos and promo events.

Now music publisher and promoter SM Entertainment—whose Twitter profile reads “Follow us for 10 years, we’ll make you pretty and famous”—plans to take over the United States, one flashy tour at a time. Founder and former entertainer Lee Soo-man is often described as the creator and mastermind behind the K-Pop phenomenon who made good on his plans to recreate American pop for the Asian market, and he inspires conflicting emotions among fans.

The industry is hardly limited to music; K-Pop idols frequently star in ad campaigns, soap operas and feature films. There’s even a term, “hallyu”, for the incredible influx of South Korean culture that has blanketed the continent over the past decade, and the country’s government has aggressively promoted its distribution as a form of “soft power.”

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Esser appeared on a panel at the Social Good Summit on Saturday along with other foreign diplomats in order to provide attendees with a snapshot of their digital media experiences. The three-day conference takes place at New York’s 92nd Street Y during UN Week and concludes today.

The State Department under Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has embraced internal and external digital platforms as tools to interact with employees and the public. As Esser said, “nothing replaces face-to-face diplomacy, but social media cuts away time barriers.” She noted that the State Department had recently hosted a “Google hangout in Persian to engage in dialogue with Iran, where the U.S. doesn’t have an on-the-ground presence.” They invited a few journalists to join in.

Charles Ray, former U.S. Ambassador to Zimbabwe, pointed to another well-documented advantage of using social platforms. “Social media is not a magic wand, but it’s an effective tool to have ongoing conversations with people who are hard to reach with other methods.” He was referring to those who are under 30 years old; in developing countries, members of this demographic primarily use cell phones since they have only limited access to the internet.

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The State Department and the James Beard Foundation would like to change all that, and last Friday they officially named more than 80 big chefs from across the US as members of the first “American Chef Corps.”

The team includes such food-world luminaries as Dan Barber of Blue Hill and April Bloomfield of The Spotted Pig (sorry, we’re partial to New York), and their responsibilities will include preparing distinctly American meals for foreign dignitaries, conducting educational programs for audiences overseas, and inviting top chefs from around the world to cook in their stateside kitchens. Most importantly, they want to remind our overseas friends that American food is, in many cases, quite good. While they won’t get paid for the honor, they do get free uniforms.

This sounds like a fairly interesting idea!

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You might ask yourself some variety of “what the hell were they thinking” when considering this most ridiculous of PR moves, and the big question is: was it an intentional provocation? Did the shop’s owners knowingly court controversy in the interest of selling more hip tees bearing the likenesses of Superman and Ghandi (love that pairing, BTW)?

The store’s owner initially pled ignorance regarding the name’s historical significance, and his “aw shucks” innocence was more believable in India than in almost any other country: The swastika was originally a Hindi symbol, and the practice of naming things “Hitler” is apparently “not uncommon” on the Indian subcontinent (though this is news to us). At any rate, the owner claimed that he bestowed the title in honor of his partner’s father, who earned the nickname “Hitler” after portraying the world’s most murderous dictator in a college play. End of story? Uh, no.

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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.