What will you remember from 2008? What will you want to forget? There is a lot to choose from in the list of highlights, lowlights and even lowerlights; Olympian achievements, presidential PR prowess, at least two wars and a global economic meltdown of historic proportions. Life in our world of advertising, marketing and media has also been a wild ride. On these pages, Adweek's writers pick a few of their favorite ups and downs from a year that will be hard to forget.

Client Chutzpah
It's not news that there's no loyalty in the agency business. Still, it took a certain amount of nerve for OfficeMax to ditch its shops for its holiday campaign this year. After all, Toy New York and EVB for two years created a certifiable viral sensation in "Elf Yourself," a holiday microsite for people to put their photos on dancing elves to send to friends. Last year the site drew 193 million visitors, meaning that the shops had, in effect, created a media property for OfficeMax. It also meant that OfficeMax, which holds all the intellectual property for "Elf Yourself," didn't need its agency partners.  Instead, digital entertainment company JibJab offered to produce it for free. Toy and EVB were left out in the cold. (The original agreement contained language that would give Toy future intellectual property rights, but the client removed it, per sources.) OfficeMax might get more than coal in its stocking: early appraisals find the JibJab version clunky and the site hasn't shown the kind of viral takeoff experienced in prior years. -Brian Morrissey

Effective Spending Rewarded
Anomaly in New York won a string of awards for its public relations/buzz-building/online effort for Keep a Child Alive, a children's HIV/AIDS charity. With only $600 to spend, Anomaly decided to hitch KCA's wagon to Apple's star, specifically the launch of the company's iPhone in June 2007. Anomaly partner Johnny Vulkan got to the front of the line outside an Apple store in Manhattan and, with the help of the shop's staff, held his place for four days until the store opened its doors to sell its first iPhone. While Vulkan waited, he was interviewed by more than 100 reporters, telling the story of how he planned to auction his phone on eBay to raise money for the charity. KCA supporter Spike Lee joined him as the doors opened and both flashed cash as Vulkan bought the phone later sold on eBay for $100,000. The scene was captured on a video that Anomaly posted on YouTube. The initiative earned a Purple Chair honor from Yahoo, a silver Clio and a gold Effie. It also vied for a Grand Effie, losing out to Leo Burnett's target-redefining launch of Nintendo's Wii console. The decision came after an hour-long debate in which a small but vocal minority argued that Anomaly's effort was incredibly effective and an example of how the industry is redefining itself. As one juror told Adweek: "It's the lack of resources that made it interesting. What is it? I know it's not an ad campaign." Not bad for the cost of one night at a Ritz-Carlton. -Andrew McMains



Not So Live From Beijing
This summer's Olympic Games were fraught with public-relations danger for China's government, as was evident when angry protests followed the Olympic torch on its worldwide travels before the games even began. So, the country's leaders must have felt some relief as the adorable 9-year-old Lin Miaoke sang the anthem "Ode to the Motherland" during the games' opening ceremonies. Here, at least, was nothing to which the picky outside world could take exception. But it turned out they'd botched this easy chance for a heartwarming moment, as word soon got out that the girl who seemed to be singing was merely lip-synching. And why? Because Chinese officials had decided that the girl whose voice actually was heard around the world, Yang Peiyi, wasn't cute enough to serve as the nation's on-camera face. At best, this would have been a clumsy footnote to a show that otherwise did China proud. But such deceptive stage management was all the worse for seeming to be the behavior of a regime determined to clamp down on any sort of expression that didn't fit its own tightly scripted narrative. In other words, it was a Milli Vanilli moment (remember them?), but not even a funny one. -Mark Dolliver

Cannes Giveth...
Production company Epoch Films won a bronze Lion for "Speed Dressing," an uncharacteristically naughty spot for JC Penney that depicted a teenage boy and girl practicing how fast they can dress before they meet up at the girl's house-presumably to make out downstairs-without getting caught by the girl's mom. Cannes film juror and BBDO executive creative director Susan Credle was impressed with the spot's beauty and cleverness. "From a filmic standpoint, there was a freshness to it," she said. The problem was that the Plano, Texas-based Penney never approved the concept and the spot never aired on TV. Lead creative agency Saatchi & Saatchi distanced itself from the work, even though Epoch had listed Saatchi executives on the creative credits and the director, Michael Long, was a former Saatchi cd. Penney cried foul, Saatchi said it regretted the ad's message and just a few days after being awarded bronze, Epoch withdrew its entry, thereby forfeiting its Lion. The fracas raised the question of whether Cannes should add yet another category-for speculative work. But another cd who served on a Cannes jury this year said scam or director's cut ads are an industry-wide problem that discredits the value of any award. "It's all bullshit," the cd told Adweek. "But people will enter and come as long as they are giving out trophies." -Andrew McMains



Worst Use of Corporate Jets -- Ever
You'd imagine that with the legions of PR people, man servants, assistants and attaché-case carriers paid to follow Ford's Alan Mulally, GM's Rick Wagoner and Chrysler's Bob Nardelli, someone would have remembered to pack a business plan before sending them to beg Congress for a $25 billion bailout. You'd also think someone could have advised them to leave the G4s at home. But such are the perks of Detroit's automotive ruling class that it never occurred to anyone that firing up the corporate jets in the midst of possible bankruptcy proceedings might make them look like latter-day Marie Antoinettes. After a thorough scolding from various senators (some of whom have no doubt hitched corporate rides themselves in the past), the crack PR people got on it. All three returned, plans in hand, via an eight-hour drive in their company's not-too-fuel-efficient hybrids. Photographed getting out of the crowded Chevy Malibu, Wagoner looked like the sad-sack middle-management dad on The Wonder Years. What did they learn? No matter how uncomfortable motoring to D.C. was, it still beat flying commercial. -Barbara Lippert

The Spike That Wasn't
There was a time not that long ago when TV stations around the country could kick back every two years, count all the political ads coming in over the transom and chalk up another double-digit growth year. Not any more. Oh, the political ads, such as Hillary Clinton's "3 a.m.," were there this year in record numbers -- more than $2.2 billion worth, according to estimates by the Campaign Media Analysis Group, a unit of TNS Media Intelligence. Problem is, instead of being incremental dollars, this year they were replacement dollars for all the car, retail and financial services money that got sucked out of the ad market by the economic meltdown. Even with the political money, local TV ad spending will be down roughly 7 percent this year, according to figures in the most recent forecast from Magna, a unit of the Interpublic Group. The declines will be even bigger next year without the political spending infusion. "We really need those automotive dollars back," said CBS CEO Leslie Moonves addressing the state of local TV at the UBS Media Conference in New York last week. When asked if the CBS network might simply switch to a pay TV model and let station affiliates fend for themselves, Moonves said, "That could be a very interesting proposition down the road" after current affiliate contracts expire. For stations, that would be like getting hit by a Mack truck. -Steve McClellan



Best Advertising Rejoinders
After years of pretending that Apple's sharp-witted, hard-hitting "Get a Mac" campaign starring a bumbling Bill Gates look-alike as "PC" and a laid-back creative type as the friendlier and user-friendly "Mac" wasn't hitting a nerve, sleeping giant Microsoft finally shook off the cobwebs and took a Crispin Porter + Bogusky-fueled swing back. The debut work for the brand from the Boulder, Colo., MDC Partners shop left many scratching their heads. In it a butt-wiggling Gates and a bizarro-world Jerry Seinfeld were seen on a road trip to connect with everyday people in a world where the "future is delicious." But the follow-up "I'm a PC" series not only hijacked the popular Mac TV campaign's opening line but also spoofed the spoof. The introductory commercial opened with a Microsoft engineer repeating the Apple line heard by consumers for the last two years, "I'm a PC," and declaring "I've been made into a stereotype" before it proceeds to show a succession of people from around the globe-from celebrities like Deepak Chopra and Eva Longoria to scientists, teachers and fishermen-proudly repeating the line in celebration of the billion-plus-strong PC community. Apple didn't take long to respond with more friendly fire from longtime agency TBWA\Chiat\Day, casting its PC character as a "Bean Counter" allocating cash to "fix Vista's problems." Observing the advertising pile towering over the miniscule Vista investment, Mac tries to advise him, but PC decides to keep it all in marketing. Advertising hasn't seen a brand conflict as entertaining as this since "The Cola Wars." -Eleftheria Parpis

Runaway 'Runway'
The Weinstein Co. CEO Harvey Weinstein thought he was in the catbird seat early this year when he cut a deal to move the hit clothing-design show Project Runway to Lifetime from NBC Universal's Bravo. Just one little problem: NBC says it had a right of first refusal that Weinstein ignored. Runway's future has been in limbo since NBC filed suit in April. While Weinstein claims that NBCU CEO Jeff Zucker is a good friend, he seems to feel that Lauren Zalaznick, who oversees Bravo and a bevy of other female-skewing cable and online services for NBCU, decidedly is not. Weinstein feels Bravo ripped off the Runway concept with look-alike shows such as Shear Genius, diluting the franchise. Meanwhile, a New York State judge granted NBCU an injunction in September barring TWC from moving the show until after NBC's claims are tried. Lifetime then added a new wrinkle and filed suit to have the case moved to federal court, claiming that its signed and copyrighted deal for new episodes trump NBC's right of first refusal claims. The big question now is will viewers still care by the time the legal mess is sorted out? -Steve McClellan



Most Inflammatory Super Bowl Ads
In 2007, Salesgenie.com's first Super Bowl ad, created by company founder Vinod Gupta, was widely disparaged as being the worst of the game thanks to its poor production values and irony-free hard sell. But the spot drove enough customers to register at the Web site that Salesgenie returned to the game in 2008. Again, Gupta chose to write and develop his own spots, this time openly courting the "worst ad" title while preparing to service the flood of customers. He doubled his media buy and created two different animated ads, one featuring a heavily accented Chinese panda and the other a salesman named Ramesh who gave The Simpsons' Apu a run for his money in terms of inflammatory Indian stereotypes. There were so many objections to the racist Chinese accents that Gupta ended up withdrawing the Panda ad, although he told The New York Times that, among other things, "the pandas are Chinese; they don't speak German." Salesgenie is not returning for Super Bowl 2009 -- but neither are Big Game regulars such as FedEx, Garmin and General Motors. We can only imagine how bad some of the newcomers will be. Salesgenie.com, we hardly knew ye-and we're sorry we don't have you to kick around anymore. -Barbara Lippert

Rear-View WaMu
In February, as fears of a recession were rising, Washington Mutual tried its best to be optimistic, rolling out a campaign that celebrated its services with the bold, Simpsons-inspired slogan "Whoo hoo!" (the company trademarked the phrase with an added H). Now it seems that the more appropriate emotional outcry should have been boo hoo! Less than a year after TBWA\Chiat\Day introduced its first campaign for the Seattle-based company with ads that showed customers slipping into reverie when they heard about the bank's services, Washington Mutual, since acquired by JP Morgan Chase, no longer exists. The Los Angeles-based Omnicom agency wasn't alone in feeling the pain of a $100-million-plus account loss. Consumers may have been more than a little disappointed to find out that the sassy bank had now morphed into the fee-wielding, old-guy bankers a campaign from its previous agency Leo Burnett, Chicago, made fun of. But not as disappointed as WPP and the arsenal of agencies it had marshaled to successfully pitch the $145 million Wachovia account. Less than a day after the Ogilvy-led team won the bank's business, bidding began to acquire the bank, which like Washington Mutual and the entire financial services industry was suffering from irrevocable mortgage-related losses. -Eleftheria Parpis



In Phelps' Wake
The Michael Phelps Show played for several weeks this summer in most American households and many around the world. The Olympic swimmer/man-dolphin, with the albatross-like wingspan and a body seemingly made to glide through water, dominated the Summer Games in Beijing. NBC centered its opening week of coverage on his audacious attempt to win an unprecedented eight gold medals. Phelps delivered in stunning fashion. Along the way, he developed a brand that his agent has said could net him $100 million. With that much brand appeal, it's no accident that a few lucky brands got a free ride in his wake. Take Apple. It isn't on the 23-year-old swimmer's brand roster, but the millions of viewers who tuned in each night to see his swims saw a preternaturally calm Phelps arrive on the deck with the trademark white ear buds dangling. How much must it have been worth for Apple to be associated with arguably the greatest Olympian of all time? Apple wasn't the only hot brand to benefit. In a post-race interview, NBC's Bob Costas noted that Phelps had more Facebook fans than most Hollywood celebrities. Phelps added that he had 7,600 friend requests pending. These unintentional endorsements are likely to continue. In his first post-race interview with 60 Minutes, Phelps showed off his stockpile of Nutri-Grain bars and Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, also accidental sponsorships. -Brian Morrissey

Soda With That, Mr. Rose?
If you can't depend on an oddball rock 'n' roller to be undependable, who can you depend on? Dr Pepper may deserve year-end derision more for Unluckiest Promotional Gimmick of the Year than for Stupidest Promotional Gimmick of the Year now that Axl Rose's Guns N' Roses has released its long-delayed album, Chinese Democracy. This obliged the brand to come through on a smart-alecky promise it made last spring: a free can of its soft drink for everybody in America if the album came out by year's end. Given that the album was 17 years in the making -- people were still playing records on Victrolas, almost, when its release was first promised -- this must have seemed like a cost-free way for Dr Pepper to generate publicity. The irony is that it has ended up getting lots of publicity, but most of it bad, as consumers overloaded the Web servers and phone lines through which they could claim a coupon for the free beverage. It can't have been easy for a major brand to make itself look more flaky than Rose (who had his lawyers dispatch an angry letter to the company in the aftermath of the fiasco, demanding redress for one and all), but Dr Pepper managed it. -Mark Dolliver