In a sign of just how far the automaker has fallen, GM recently announced plans to completely eliminate the Pontiac brand. Once a symbol of the American muscle car, this tired brand is now more indicative of GM’s inability to innovate or capture even the slightest interest of the 21st century car buyer.

Most people would argue that the issues began with lackluster product designs. That isn’t entirely the case though. In fact, Pontiac has been lauded for some of its recent designs including the sporty solstice convertible. The real issue comes down to brand – or lack thereof. The truth is a more defined brand would have gone a long way toward informing the designs more effectively.

Pontiac hasn’t been able to successfully communicate what the brand stands for in the post-muscle car era. And if they don’t know what it means to drive a Pontiac, consumers surely won’t know and won’t buy. Though, that much is clear given sales numbers in recent years.

A brand is a personality; it’s a perception; it’s a promise of what you’re going to deliver. Unfortunately for Pontiac, its personality is bland, its perception is blurred and its promises were broken a long time ago.

So where does that leave it? — on its way to the junkyard that’s where. It’s a sad day when what was once a marquis brand drives off as not much more than a marketing memory. It’s even sadder because GM didn’t have to reinvent the wheel on Pontiac they simply had to shine it up a little. In the end, they couldn’t.

So much for American ingenuity. So much for the muscle car and marketing muscle. So much for Pontiac.

“A do-it-yourself home funeral can be cheaper, greener, creepy and a bureaucratic hassle — and, some say, a more meaningful ritual for the living,” quotes the NY Times.

With conventional funerals costing on average $6,500, the American public is beginning to rebel and develop their own alternatives to saying goodbye to their passed loved ones. Some have decided to build their own caskets using plywood and deck screws purchased from Home Depot. The total cost? $90.98.

There are websites such as http://naturalburial.coop/ that offer environmentally sustainable alternatives as well. They don’t use chemical preservatives and bodies are buried in biodegradable caskets or simple shrouds. Natural markers that don’t intrude with the landscape, such as plants, trees, flowers, shrubs are planted which help form a natural wildlife preserve and the sites are protected from any future development.

A comment left by a reader of the NY Times article quoted a song by Lucinda Williams, which best describes this latest DIY revolution. It reads:

“Don’t buy a fancy funeral.
It’s not worth it in the end.
Goodbyes can still be beautiful
Without all the money that you’ll spend.
Because no amount of riches
Can bring back what you’ve lost.”

In these tough economic times, it seems even dying has gotten cheaper.

Let’s be honest. In a recession, we get desperate. This desperation has permeated every industry, every company and every consumer. Everything is for sale. And it’s cheap, too.

At Citizens Bank Park, dollar dogs (courtesy of Hatfield) have never tasted so good. Too steep? Check out the dogs at the Triple-A Columbus Clippers’ games during Dime-a-Dog Night. Yup, 10 cents per dog.

In the journalism industry, things have gotten so bad that Newser’s Michael Wolff says 80 percent of print newspapers will be gone within the next 18 months. Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., is considering a newspaper government bailout; it’s no coincidence that the Boston Globe is struggling financially and expects to lose $80 million in 2009—if it makes it through the year. Parent company The New York Times just announced a loss of $74.5 million in Q1. Not a pretty picture.

It’s no surprise that professional sports teams are feeling the challenges of a difficult economic environment. Likewise for the TV stations that cover them. And they’re both getting desperate.

Take, for example, a few recent product placements in the NBA. (I’ll recap because there are only a few NBA fans left.) At the NBA All-Star Weekend, three young stars played a game of Horse spelling out G-E-I-C-O; to promote the new “X-Men” movie, Charles Barkley flashed a “Wolverine claw;” and Reggie Miller flashed his own armor, a shiny, new BlackBerry.

Advertising to sports fans works. It’s more efficient and effective. It’s that simple. But, do these placements cost brands in other ways? And do they cost the TV stations playing these “games.”

TNT’s NBA coverage has become the laughing stock of journalism. But, beyond that, where will product placements end? Will local governments take sponsors? How about churches? Will journalists become employees not of a newspaper or TV station, but of an advertiser?

What’s the price of waning consumer confidence? For the California leafy greens industry, the price was $100 million – the losses suffered when Americans stopped eating spinach for weeks following an E. coli outbreak in 2006. Other produce, from tomatoes to jalapeño peppers to almonds, suffered similarly devastating losses following outbreaks in the last decade.

Kudos to the leafy greens industry for showing action following the crisis and taking bold steps to restore consumer confidence. In the absence of FDA oversight, the industry has contracted the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) to administer rigorous safety checks of handlers representing nearly 99% of the leafy green produce. Participating producers display the CDFA Certified logo on their products to reassure consumers and publicize the additional safety checks. It all amounts to good branding and good business – especially given that the industry has been outbreak-free in the two years since the initiative began.

Critics balk at the conflict of interest resulting from the fact that the safety inspectors are being paid by the very industry they are assigned to oversee. From a branding perspective, this should be a nonissue given that the industry’s best interest, first and foremost, is to ensure strict oversight and prevent another outbreak. Failure to do so could mean a second devastating blow to consumer confidence and would nullify any goodwill built up through the CDFA partnership. Strict oversight is a small price for the industry to pay for brand preservation. Other at-risk produce should take note and take similar action to protect their brand.

Certainly people in the newspaper industry think so.

Despite the search engine giant’s slogan “Don’t Be Evil,” journalists and old-fashioned newspaper devotees are pointing the finger at Google for, in essence, stealing their content. Maureen Dowd is concerned for her job and Wall Street Journal editor Robert Thompson compared Google and other media aggregators to life-sapping parasites that will ultimately kill of journalism. And for folks who believe journalism plays an important role in society, killing off newspapers definitely qualifies as evil. (Of course, the newspapers themselves have played just a small role in their impending demise).

Google vs. the newspaper industry (an unfair fight) is a story that has gotten traction over the last week, since Google CEO Eric Schmidt delivered a keynote address to the Newspaper Association of America. Among other things, Schmidt told the newspaper editors that Google plans to begin generating revenue through advertising through Google News, something it hasn’t done to date. That left journos up in arms – Google will soon be generating revenue off newspaper’s content. In the face of their complaints, Schmidt told them they can opt out and they won’t be included in Google rankings. Will anyone call his bluff?

Associated Press has launched what it calls a “news content protection” initiative, an attempt to re-set the rules of engagement, which is to say, put the genie back in the bottle.

Newspapers certainly qualify as “the little guy” but they certainly are the underdog; it’s hard to imagine them winning. Especially, when Big Bad Google seems to be shifting its moral compass – they’ve dropped the “Don’t Be Evil” motto.