Bell Pottinger founders Lord Bell and Piers Pottinger (also the names of my neighbor’s cats!) and other firm execs plan to pay £19.6 million in cash and company shares to purchase the namesake firm from Chime Communications. Shareholders will have their say on June 18. Talk about a buyout started a few months ago.

Shares of Chime stock increased nearly 10 percent with the news, though Sir Martin Sorrell, the WPP CEO whose company is the largest shareholder in Chime, is opposed.

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Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who is known for trying to force New Yorkers to be healthy with smoking bans and calls for the outlaw of artificially trans fatty foods, is now on the attack against oversized sweetened beverages. He’d like to do away with the sales of sugary drinks bigger than 16 ounces at restaurants, food carts, arenas, and movie theaters. You would still be able to buy these ginormous drinks at grocery stores and convenience stores.

Some question whether this sort of thing will actually make an impact on the obesity epidemic in the U.S. But when you have people ordering Mountain Dew/orange juice mixed drinks for breakfast, you’ve got to do something.

Responding to the controversy over this proposal, the Mayor said, via video, at the All Things D conference, “This is something we think we have the legal authority to do. Obesity is a local problem for us, and that’s why we’ve addressed it.”

At the same time, he will be supporting National Doughnut Day, which is tomorrow. Doughnuts every day please.

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As we mentioned in the Ticker this morning, New York’s Gov. Andrew Cuomo has launched a $5 million tourism campaign that will change the iconic “I ♥ NY” logo in order to reflect the many wonderful things there are to do in the state.

“You still have the icon but you have to bring it back to New York. You have to reimagine, you have to reenergize it,” said Gov. Cuomo. The folks at ad agency BBDO agree the logo has been diluted by co-opting and overuse.

Ordinary people are being asked to submit their ideas for what the new logo should look like. An ad (available after the jump) changes the heart to, among other things, a roller coaster, wine, and Niagra Falls.

Business Insider has done a number of stories about the evolution of long-standing and well-liked logos. But the decision to rebrand in this way is a major one.

For today’s PRNewser poll, we ask, “Should the ‘I ♥ NY” logo be revamped?” Click through to vote after the jump. The poll closes tomorrow at noon.

And in the comments, we invite you to share your thoughts about when a business or organization should redesign their logo.

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Waggener Edstrom Worldwide has acquired Patzer PR, a Munich-based firm specializing in healthcare PR and services for the OTC pharmaceutical industry. Patzer will keep its name for the time being, but the team will be pulled into WE’s existing renewable energy, tech, and healthcare groups. Patzer is among the most recognized healthcare PR firms in Germany.

The move will double the size of Waggener Edstrom’s Munich office.

In March, the firm entered the South Korean market with an investment in Shout. The firm has also expanded in Australia, Belgium, and South Africa.

Big Facebook news today, totally unrelated to stock price: You can now schedule posts! Hooray!

Our AllFacebook colleagues have got a breakdown of the instructions, which look pretty clear cut and simple.

Facebook has also introduced the ability to give different admins different roles. With many people working on a Facebook campaign, this could be plenty useful for PRs. A how-to on that is available here.

Also from Facebook: the company introduced a Promoted Post function yesterday that gives users the ability to highlight big happenings, like a marketing push or event. More detail about that here.

And what about the stock? Well. That’s not doing so good at moment, falling below $28 by midday. But at least Facebook is getting credit for bursting that tech bubble.

Mike Tuffin, EVP of America’s Health Insurance Plans, the trade group that reps the health insurance industry, has been named the MD of APCO Worldwide‘s Washington D.C. headquarters, starting June 25. He’s replacing Robert Schooling, who has been appointed president of APCO Americas.

Tuffin joined AHIP in 2005. Prior to that, he was a VP at APCO, where he worked with pharmaceutical and other healthcare clients. He has experience with political campaigns, grassroots advocacy, media relations, and other areas of communications.

The Washington D.C. office has 200 staffers.

Havas has taken a majority stake in European digital health and wellness comms firm Creative Lynx. Creative Lynx is a 25-year-old firm with clients like Johnson & Johnson, GSK, and AstraZeneca. It’s based in Manchester, England.

The firm, led by MD Neil Martin, digital director David Hunt, and healthcare director David Whittingham, will work with the Havas Worldwide Health network. That network has about 30 clients, including Pfizer and Novartis. It encompasses Euro RSCG Life, Health4Brands, Euro RSCG Life PR, and Euro RSCG Worldwide PR. According to a fact sheet we received, the network has achieved more than 10 percent organic growth so far in 2012.

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So the Mitt Romney team is trying to pull a Bieber. When his app’s epic fail became a trending topic on Twitter (spelling “America” “Amercia”), his team set up a promoted tweet so that everyone searching for the gaffe would see a tweet from @MittRomney stating, “.@BarackObama is spending your tax dollars to create jobs. How’s he doing? Solyndra isn’t even half the story mi.tt/Ko291P.” Trying to be all social media savvy.

Romney is the official GOP nominee, so now things are getting serious. Or maybe not, to the dismay of some. But really, they are. And the noise has gotten so loud that these sorts of gaffes become a very large speed bump in campaign progress.

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Adweek: Instagrammers in Demand By Major Brands

CapitalNewYork: I hate New York’s nonsensical new tourism campaign

The Guardian: WPP investors put on high alert over sir Martin Sorrell’s 30% pay rise

Council of Public Relations Firms: A Letter to the Class of 2012

The New York Times: Obama Video on Fox News Criticized as Attack Ad

The 2012 edition of the AP Stylebook was released today, and it includes a new chapter on broadcast, and more entries for social media and fashion.

The social media chapter, which was added in 2010, now includes “direct message” and “modified tweet.”

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