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Morning Update: Ali v Ali in new Porsche ad; Streaming services dominate Golden Globe noms; Serial launches second series

AdWeek: Ali Fights Ali in This Epic Spot for the Porsche 911

Imagine if, in his prime, Muhammad Ali laced up his gloves and stepped into the squared circle against … himself.

Cramer-Krasselt posits just this scenario in “Compete,” a captivating 60-second spot for the new Porsche 911. The ad rolls out on TV, online and in theaters in the U.S. and Europe over the next few weeks.

The spectacle of Ali vs. Ali—staged to perfection using a pair of actors who float like butterflies and sting like bees—is only the beginning. The commercial also serves up Maria Sharapova competing against herself in a tennis match, and chess grandmaster Magnus Carlsen playing a tense game against—you guessed it—Magnus Carlsen.

Techcrunch: Netflix Beats HBO, Traditional Broadcasters With The Most Golden Globe Noms

Streaming services made a strong showing when the nominations for the 73rd Golden Globe Awards were announced this morning. Netflix dominated the TV category with a total of eight nominations, closely followed by HBO – which now competes with an over-the-top service of its own. HBO and Starz earned seven nods, while Amazon and FX received five each.

Meanwhile, traditional TV broadcasters like ABC, FOX and PBS earned four nominations each, but CBS only clocked in with one. Hulu also only received a single nomination, though it has not invested as heavily in original content as its competitors, relying more on gaining streaming rights to networks’ current shows, as well as their archives.

Still, even with just one nomination, Hulu bested NBC, which was not nominated at all this year.

The-vag-bagMumbrella Asia: Men’s clothing retailer Goldlion goes risqué in first ad for new women’s collection in Singapore

Men’s clothing retailer Goldlion has launched a risqué print campaign in Singapore to introduce its first collection for women.

The ad, which features a strategically-placed pink bag and a sultry looking model, appeared prominently on the back cover of the main section of the Straits Times newspaper in full colour.

The campaign is to run in the January editions of women’s magazines Elle, Harper’s Bazaar, Female and Her World magazines.

Digiday: 2016 Year in Preview: Holding companies make diversity their business

Holding companies have for a long time buried diversity numbers in thick annual corporate social responsibility reports. That’s about to change: In 2016 expect diversity to come front and center as an industry priority.

A look at holding company’s diversity numbers — most of which are available in some shape or form publicly and were obtained by Digiday — shows that all four of the biggest companies have made diversity a key part of their business practices, and provide some encouraging hints at where the industry is heading.

AdAge: Michelle Obama, Rapper (Seriously)

What a lost opportunity, POTUS! Yesterday, President Barack Obama revealed his favorite song of the year (Kendrick Lamar’s “How Much a Dollar Cost”). But he should have waited one more day and said “Go To College,” a rap released this morning in the form of a comedic music video starring Michelle Obama and Jay Pharoah of “Saturday Night Live.” Yes, FLOTUS is a rapper now.

The goofy video, filmed in part at the White House and produced by CollegeHumor, is in support of the First Lady’s Better Make Room campaign to encourage young people to seek a higher education.

“Go To College” is also, arguably, part of a continuing White House campaign to demonstrate that POTUS and FLOTUS are, you know, hip with the kids — and the coolest First Couple ever.

The Guardian: Serial swaps the obscure for the high profile as it analyses Bowe Bergdahl

It was one of the biggest and most unlikely media successes of 2014 – the story of an almost forgotten killing, told in podcast episodes that gained such huge popularity they were downloaded more than 100m times worldwide.

On Thursday, the producers of Serial released the first episode of their second series, sparking such a frenzied rush to download the podcast that it briefly caused their website to collapse.

While the programme’s first series explored a previously obscure murder case, the subject matter of Serial’s second season is much higher profile. The podcast’s producer Sarah Koenig and others will explore the story of Bowe Bergdahl, the US army sergeant who was held captive by the Taliban for almost five years after he disappeared from his post in Afghanistan in disputed circumstances in 2009.

The Drum: Twitter’s bid to monetise 500 million logged-off audiences highlights true tonic to growth ails – and it’s not recruiting new users

Twitter is to start pushing ads to around 500 million people who visit the micro-blogging platform each month but who don’t have an account, signalling that its main priority for now is not whether it can get more people tweeting, but to cash in on the unregistered user.

More than a year after it admitted it needed to make money from its logged-off users, the social network’s plan has begun in earnest. Twitter has argued for years that its audience is far bigger than the 320 million who sign in each month and has routinely backed its ability to one day turn that into revenue in spite of Wall Street’s concerns over slowing user growth. Its latest test will try to make good on that promise.

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