When I watch Today every morning, I wonder how some of the people that are standing in Rockefeller Plaza are able to bring signs that are blatant advertisements. I figured there was someone at the entrance to the taping area that would inspect each sign and reject ones that are inappropriate.

Turns out that's true, but Ad Age says that what's in the inappropriate category is less than you think. All the staff looks for is inappropriate language and readability. In fact, NBC doesn't seem to mind that a lot of companies are getting a ton of free advertising by asking people to bring signs and display them, hoping to get a lingering glance or even one of the hosts to come over and speak to someone reading the sign.

HBO has launched yet another quirky, viral marketing campaign - this time to promote the return of Rome on January 14th. From January 10th through the 13th, 100 Italian eateries in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago will be offering complimentary bottles of Rome wine, a cabernet sauvingnon bottled in California and labelled for maximum ad appeal. Rather than have servers push the wine on customers, a card will be placed on each table offering diners "a taste of Rome."

The brainchild behind the promo is Lime Public Relations & Promotions who feel that the campaign is "innovative but tasteful." Lime president Claudia Strauss reported to AdAge that, "The show is all about indulgence, and we just felt this was a great way to bring to life one of the key aspects of the story line." In keeping with the show's over-the-top sex and gore, participating restaurants will also allow diners to drink the blood of Christian martyrs, sodomize select servers and retire to a vomitorium following their meal.

Amazon.com is getting in on the internet video craze. According to AdAge, next month it's launching Amazon Digital Video, a service that will make full-length movies and television shows available for download. There are reportedly two ways to pay for the service: 1) a subscription and 2) pay-per-view. No word yet on what the cost per episode or per movie will be. Apparently, Amazon was planning to focus on selling downloadable music but decided that iTunes has cornered that market. Video, on the other hand, is still fresh and new. While iTunes does offer a significant amount of video, it does not offer movies and the television offerings are somewhat limited (although more are becoming available every day). No word yet on which television shows will be available for download off Amazon.

[Via Lost Remote]

The American Family Association has convinced T-Mobile to pull its advertising from FX because of the adult-themed subjects covered in Rescue Me and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. According to AdAge, Don Wildmon and his supporters in the American Family Association "bombarded" T-Mobile and other advertisers with e-mails to complain about advertising on two programs that the organization does not support (what do they support??). T-Mobile CEO Robert Dotson said the e-mails prompted him to actually watch the programming that they're supporting through advertisements. In a letter to the AFA, Dotson says, "Candidly, some of the choices we have made are inconsistent with who we are and what we stand for." Consequently, Dotson pulled all advertising from FX. So far this year, T-Mobile spent $1.2 million on advertising on FX and it is the network's 21st largest advertiser.

I wonder whether this will backfire on the AFA. Granted, it succeeded in pulling advertising (they got lucky, says Joel over on AdJab). But, this news may cause people to tune in to see what all the fuss is about.