Land Rover have paid 40 celebrities to write about their Range Rovers on social networking site Twitter.

According to Marketing magazine the sad celebs received a free vehicle for their spontaneous and honest endorsement and included fashion designer Henry Holland, model Daisy Lowe, editor of GQ magazine Dylan Jones, and presenters George Lamb and Ben Shephard, all based in the UK. Outside the UK the paid brand ambassadors included models, actors, presenters, journalists, editors, and chefs, who will all be doing some well-paid twittering in 2011.

The ill-conceived arrangement has undermined the integrity of Land Rover, Twitter, and the celebrities involved and will reduce consumer confidence in the marketing sector, as well as positioning celebrity endorsement as completely valueless.

Advertisers are developing TV ads that can be understood if run at up to 12 times the normal speed.

The move is in response to the growth in digital video recorders (DVR’s) which allow viewers to fast forward through the ads between the recorded programmes. Also fuelled by the DVR boom is the charging of premium rates for the last ad before the start or re-start of a programme, which media experts say has the highest recall.

Meanwhile the rise of reality TV shows is one main reason why 70% of over-55s claim that TV today is not worth the licence fee (YouGov poll).

Many also feel that the product placement in programmes due this year can only further reduce the quality of output.

Savvy shoppers are learning that their perception of larger packs being cheaper is costing them money.

Asda, Tesco and Sainsburys have all been found to offer larger packs that cost more than buying several smaller ones, the latest being Tesco that were selling a multi-pack of three tins of tuna for £1 more than the cost of buying the three tins individually.

The supermarkets claim that the examples revealed are human error, rather than cynical pricing.

Southeastern Trains have been accused of cancelling hundreds of trains during the recent cold weather, to avoid paying the compensation to their customers that is due if trains are late.

The company now charges more than £5000 for an annual season ticket to London from Hastings, Rye or Tonbridge and contributes significantly to making train fares in the UK the highest in Europe.

Gillette have dumped disgraced golfer Tiger Woods and a multi-million dollar sponsorship deal with him.

A TV ad featuring Woods with the strapline “SHOW THE WORLD HOW PHENOMENAL YOU CAN BE” won the Campaign magazine’s “Top Turkey” award in December 2008.

Woods still receives $40 million a year from Nike, and payments from computer game company Electronic Arts.

Rumours that the next Nike campaign will use the strapline NIKE. YOUR SUPPORT WHEN YOU’RE PLAYING A ROUND should, in our view, be dismissed as jolly funny.

One way of saving on the marketing budget is to produce a product or service that demonstrably outclasses everything else around.

The Cornish Cheese Company of Upton Cross, Cornwall, will be finding this out, their Cornish Blue cheese having taken the top honours at the World Cheese Awards. It beat 2,000 other entries and is the first British winner in the last ten years.

German budget supermarket chain Lidl have been accused of destroying the magic of Christmas by selling reindeer steaks.

These, say vegetarian group Viva! are 70% likely to come from calves rounded up in Siberia by snowmobiles.

The Technology For Marketing and Advertising (TFMA) exhibition takes place on March 1/2 at Earls Court 2.

The organisers are promising more than 100 seminar sessions.

www.t-f-m.co.uk/register