US retailer Best Buy is using augmented reality to give their newspaper ads a little more excitement. Readers have the chance to see featured products in 3D – if they can be bothered to hook up a webcam to the flyer. Less patient souls can just watch Best Buy’s video to see how it all works.

Google TV Ads have hooked up with tv message optimisers Visible World to deliver a targetted tv ad service which they claim brings a new level of innovation to television and the media buying process.The system selects based on usual criteria like programme and time but also adds context to tv planning. This means advertisers can automate multiple creative messages based on the target audience, context differences and media performance data.

Earlier this year, Google pulled out of the radio and print markets after failed attempts to grow their business into these traditional media spaces. However, TV is a much bigger prize, so we should expect them to persist in this domain a while longer.

A PR stunt promoting a violent video game is getting a lot of press but seems very fake. Publishers THQ claimed that sledgehammers were left to allow members of the public to do a smash ‘n grab raid on cars left around London, just to pilfer a copy of freshly released Red Faction Guerilla. The clip above shows a bloke with a brolly in an unconvincing scene.

And here’s a woman at it, too – because it’s not just boys that play violent video games, you know.

These clean cut thugs must have been thrilled to find a copy of the third-person shooter that happened to suit their platform. THQ’s press release claims that:

“footage captured hundreds of passers-by picking up the sledgehammer left chained next to the vehicle in Covent Garden, London, and smashing their way to success and grabbing a copy of Red Faction Guerrilla”

I don’t see any evidence of that. None at all.

THQ’s PR Manager, Simon Watts, tells us:

“Because Red Faction Guerrilla features the world’s most realistic destruction engine, we thought that it would make for an interesting experiment to find out how many people, going about their everyday business, would stop in a busy city street to work out some stress by smashing their way into a car to earn a copy of the brand new game.”

Simon, the answer appears to be none, because such a marketing effort would be too dangerous and would open up your company to all sorts of legal trouble. Now go back to your little computer and pretend to smash things up.

Proving that they’re all softies at heart, the press release ends with:

Notes to Editors

Following the ‘Smash&Grab’ activity, the car used will be recycled.

Haha. Hahaha. This has made my Friday.