After attracting millions of eyeballs with video clips of dancing cats and lip-synching coeds, YouTube hopes to cash in on its popularity with online infomercials. Starting Tuesday, the video-sharing site let advertisers create "channels" filled with clips they produce themselves - and then in turn sell sponsorships to other advertisers. Among the first: a channel created by Warner Bros. Records devoted to Paris Hilton's new album, including the making of the music video for the song Stars Are Blind. Fox Broadcasting Co. will advertise on the Paris Hilton Channel to promote the fall season of the television show Prison Break. Placing ads within ads further blurs the lines between entertainment and its sponsors, a trend the Web is accelerating. It also defies the conventional wisdom that the young viewers who while away afternoons on sites like YouTube and MySpace don't want to be the targets of corporate marketing campaigns. But advertiser-produced clips frequently rank among YouTube's most popular, particularly those with exclusive tidbits about popular shows or bands.
Ford to power F-150 pickups with diesel engine
Ford Motor Co., losing money this year on falling sales of F-Series pickups, will release a revamped Super Duty version of the truck with a cleaner diesel engine. The 2008 Super Duty that goes on sale early next year will have a 6.4-liter diesel that emits no more particulate exhaust, or soot, than an equivalent gasoline engine, the company said in a statement Tuesday. The F-Series is the best-selling line of vehicles in the United States, and Super Duty sales account for about 40 percent of F-150, F-250 and F-350 truck volume. Ford, of Dearborn, Mich., plans to provide additional details on the Super Duty truck when it's unveiled Sept. 28 at the Texas State Fair.
Other chatter
ICE CREAM AND EGGS: Ben & Jerry's Homemade Inc. was under fire Tuesday from an animal welfare group for buying eggs from a company the Humane Society of the United States says mistreats chickens. The hens are kept in cages so small that the birds can't spread their wings, according to Humane Society spokesman Paul Shapiro. "We feel that Ben and Jerry's, because it makes these claims of being socially responsible, has a responsibility not to support heinous factory farm practices," Shapiro said.
