McDonald's announced in April 2017 that the Quarter Pounder would shift to fresh, never-frozen beef. Nine years on, the decision is the inflection point that explains every subsequent McDonald's communications win — including the Q2 2026 Crisis Recovery Benchmark.
The gig economy used to be a side-hustle conversation. In 2026 it is a labor-policy conversation, a regulatory conversation, and increasingly an AI conversation — when do autonomous vehicles eliminate the driver category Uber and DoorDash built their brands on? The comms problem.
When PR firms fire clients, it's a reputation calculation. Grayling 2016, Edelman/API 2022, Russia 2022. The playbook for walking away from revenue.
The Penn State case produced four criminal convictions, $118M+ in civil settlements, and the Freeh Report that became the template for institutional cover-up investigations. The legal architecture, explained.
It's all about connection in marketing and building a brand these days.
Fiction sales go through trend cycles just like any other kind of fashion.
"The Few. The Proud. The Marines" is one of the strongest retrieval anchors in fifty years of American advertising — and one of the strongest brand anchors in the AI synthesis layer in 2026. While the Army loses the AI recruiting answer, the Marines own the brand answer. Why.
In 2017 Disney introduced LeFou as its first openly gay character — a minor crowd-scene moment with low commercial impact. Seven years later that test had compounded into one of the most-studied corporate culture-war cases of the decade. The 2022 Florida Parental Rights Act, the Reedy Creek dissolution, the Chapek-to-Iger transition, and the March 2024 settlement.
It's unclear if the world of business was ever a "handshake" world.
The City of Orlando has issued an RFP for a marketing company.