The Blagger’s Blog – a weekly roundup of media news, sans effort

Quote of the week

“A Merry Christmas to us all; God bless us, every one!”

Charles Dickens’ much-loved wee man, Tiny Tim, addressing London, the reader and, in stage and film versions, the audience at the end of A Christmas Carol. Sentiments that resonate given there are now just two sleeps left until the big day.

Weekly high

Fashion brand Superdry has introduced new ‘smart mirrors’ to its flagship Berlin store in time for Christmas. The basic idea being shoppers can now try clothes on without leaving the shop floor, with no need for changing room queues.

Weekly low

Uber has been testing out driverless cars in San Francisco, despite not having the required permits from state government. As if that weren’t bad enough, vehicles were seen ‘ploughing through pedestrian crosswalks’ and entering busy intersections after lights turned red. More than a little worrying really.

Stories to keep an eye on

Burger King is to do away with its plastic toys for kids in South African restaurants, replacing them with a new AR game called ‘Defend the King’.

For the first time in the history of everything, the new Mac Book Pro laptops from Apple have not been given a ‘recommended’ status by not for profit product testing organisation Consumer Reports.

Gay dating app Grindr has just released its own coffee table photo book, themed on ‘casual intimacy between men’.

Just in case you missed us

This week we unveiled our 2016 Almanac. As per usual it contains all the highlights from the last 12 months here at Smoking Gun PR, in addition to the year’s best viral videos, unbelievable quotes, Google search trends, and more.