Five pro teams in Seattle came together to celebrate LGBT equality. With members of MLB's Seattle Mariners, the NFL Seattle Seahawks, MLS Sounders FC, WNBA Seattle Storm and National Women's Soccer League Reign FC in attendance, it marked "the first time that a city's professional sports teams have partnered together in such an endeavor to stand in solidarity with the LGBT community," according to Athlete Ally.

"He's the man with the answers. Alex Trebek is someone I trust." That's often the first comment from older adults when they call the 800 number at the life insurance company Colonial Penn, galvanized by commercials starring Trebek, host of "Jeopardy" and the longtime spokesman for the Philadelphia-based firm.

Amazon's Jeff Bezos' request to the Twitter-sphere - asking how he can best use his wealth to help people "right now" - has set off a frenzy of responses from every corner of the world. Michigan native Madonna invited Bezos to visit Detroit to engage with three charities there: The Empowerment Plan, which creates jobs for homeless women by manufacturing coats that double as sleeping bags; Downtown Boxing Gym, a youth program that provides academic support; and the Detroit Achievement Academy, a free public charter school.

Mercedes-Benz USA is lifting a key restriction on local advertising by dealers. Instead of limiting that ad spending to new-car sales, Mercedes will let dealers use the money to promote any area of the business. While the change seems like a simple thing, it gives dealers a chance to improve their service retention or their used-car sales, dealers said.

The Rio Olympics failed to generate the kind of return brands had hoped for from the first-ever South American Games, promoting sponsors to reconsider their deals. The recent swap between McDonald's and Intel illustrates the changing landscape Olympic marketing, one where brands, like athletes, must prove they can contribute something towards the experience for audiences.

NBA marketing partners were all-in for the NBA Draft presented by State Farm. Among those that had marketing tied to last night's event were American Express, Anheuser-Busch (Bud Light), Cisco, ExxonMobile, Foot Locker, Gatorade, Jack Daniel's, JBL, Mountain Dew, New Era, Spalding, State Farm, Tissot and Verizon.

In a split with other circuits, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled Thursday that the federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act does not allow consumers to demand that they stop receiving automated calls if they agreed to provisions opting them in. The suit was brought by a car lessee who demanded to no longer be phoned by the car financing company after defaulting on his lease.

UPS will levy peak surcharges to U.S. residential packages for the holiday season. The charges, ranging from 27 cents to 97 cents per package, will be applied to individual and commercial customers shipping to U.S. residences in November and December. Shoppers could pay more if e-commerce retailers look to pass on the fees to customers.

For Taco Bell, getting fans into the far end of the "love" spectrum is what continues to drive its content and social strategy. Being open to discourse is something that Taco Bell and Madison + Vine, one of the brand's agencies, takes very seriously. And the love halo that the brand has seen starts simply with respecting the channels that consumers are in at any given moment.

Kia has once again taken the top spot in one of the auto industry's most closely watched quality surveys. Another Hyundai brand, Genesis, took second place, making it the top luxury car brand in J.D. Power's Initial Quality Study, which ranks brands by the number of flaws found by owners in their new cars in the first 90 days of ownership. General Motors, Ford and Fiat Chrysler all showed improvement.