founder and president, Sweepstakes Today It's no secret that people love themselves a game show - look no further than Bob Barker's spray-tanned, four-decade reign at The Price Is Right or Howie Mandel's recent germ-free career resurgence on Deal or No Deal. Free entertainment plus free stuff creates a foolproof formula for success for fans and marketers alike. Craig McDaniel, a 25-year sales and marketing veteran, channeled this no-brainer into sweepstakestoday.com, a promised land of online sweepstakes for members to strike it rich: Exotic vacations! Home gym equipment! Lifetime annuities!

The numbers don't lie, and they say Web video producers should be raking in the dollars. After all, advertisers are expected to spend $1.4 billion on online video this year, then $2.1 billion the next year, then $3.1 billion the year after, according to eMarketer. But most of that money is going to established players, like ABC.com with its network fare, or Yahoo and its popular music videos. Sure, Michael Eisner's Web studio turned a profit on last summer's Web hit "Prom Queen," which generated more than 15 million views, while the creators of the popular Web series "Ask a …

With its sleek, muscular curves and stylish interior, Nissan's 2008 Infiniti EX35 is definitely a looker. But what really sets the compact luxury sport utility vehicle apart, the carmaker says, isn't just good looks - it's advanced technology.

Some in the industry argue email is recession-proof. And while no channel truly is, email does have all the attributes to survive.

Frequent and business flyers feel like they don't count as much as they once did. With fewer rollover opportunities for points and more blackout dates, the devaluing of the customer is one obvious effect of the budgetary crunch in the travel sector. But airlines may be giving them an upgrade.

Broadcast is ephemeral, but Web sites live on and on. Once upon a time, if you had a PTA meeting on Tuesday night, you missed your favorite TV show. Your only hope was that you might catch it months later during summer reruns. Otherwise, it was lost to you, gone into the ether from which it came.

When you fly in the United States, your trips are mostly no-brainers. Thanks to e-tickets, you really don't have to carry anything except your wallet, and barring bad weather, rotten luck and overzealous TSA agents, air travel in the 48 contiguous states is essentially easy.

In case you haven't noticed, the economic climate has been getting a good deal chillier lately. Inevitably, this is making for a much more cautious marketing community, with brands contemplating an uncertain future and beginning to plan on reducing advertising and marketing costs. If you are in traditional media, this does not bode well, but conventional wisdom holds that if you are in digital media, you will be somewhat recession-resistant. Of course, some traditional channels will do okay and some digital channels will have problems. But we are already seeing a general belt-tightening accelerate the shift of budgets from traditional …

Standards for ad formats have always been, shall we say, loose. Or altogether nonexistent. Enter Adobe and Panache. The two are now in a partnership that just might change all that.

We thought the first one might have been a joke. Our open call for Rising Stars nominees brought in a nomination for one Mr. Sweepy of sweepstakestoday.com. The site's mascot, a rolled-up $20 bill with googly eyes and gloved hands not attached to his body named Mr. Sweepy, greeted us with disturbing jocularity. A second Mr. Sweepy nomination came in. Then another. Then more. Overnight, nominations flooded our form, and more poured in every minute. We sent a cease-and-desist request to the site, but to no avail. Sweepy would not be denied.