Every weekday, PR Daily associate editor Alan Pearcy highlights the day’s most compelling stories and amusing marginalia on the Web in this, #TheDailySpin.

Good for goldfish. Good for colorful barfing. Good for Dawson hysterically weeping. After 25 years, the GIF (graphics interchange format) remains the gift that keeps on giving—and no, not just because its plays on a loop. Directed by Sean Pecknold and presented by SmartWater in association with Moving the Still: A Gif Festival, Legs Media brings us a short history of our favorite animated image to (perhaps) explain our cultural obsession with them. How’s that sound to you, Jessie Spano? (via The San Francisco Egotist)

The “GIF” was also named word of the year by the Oxford University Press, but that doesn’t mean it was the most searched—at least not according to Merriam-Webster. Reports The New York Observer, America’s heightened political interest in the presidential election helped bestow that honor upon “capitalism” and “socialism.” Other top words included “touché,” “Schadenfreude,” and “meme.”

Of course, there are times when both animated graphics and words prove unnecessary. In Hollywood, for instance, just one image is all it takes to potentially make or break a film. (Depending on placement, it can also rewrite history or recast an ensemble.) Dubbing its winners and losers of the film industry advertising, the Yahoo Movie blog names its picks of the best and worst movie posters of 2012.

Yahoo isn’t the only one reflecting on the year that was. As part of its “Top 10 Everything of 2012” feature, Time breaks down the 10 best tweets from the last 12 months.

Meanwhile, BuzzFeed traveled the world in search of 2012’s 31 best fast food innovations.

As for Business Insider, it recently named its selection of the year’s 10 biggest PR disasters.

RELATED: The 5 worst media disasters in November

Anyone who thought a $55,000 backpack covered in pharmaceutical pills might spell disaster for the Olsen twin’s high-end line The Row is sadly mistaken. According to New York magazine, the rare, limited edition bags are selling quickly.

Maybe $55,000 is a little more than you wanted to spend this holiday season, let alone on any one particular gift. Surely you can find something from The Daily Beast’s interactive gift guide.

Maybe you’d prefer a gift guide that is less reliant on technology. You might consider something from any of the many catalogs that retailers mail this time of year. And while you’re likely to come across a few duds in your search for the perfect present, you might find a few studs. Reports The Daily Dot, a new Tumblr created by blogger Liz Pride is introducing shoppers to their new L.L. Bean boyfriend. And you were worried you wouldn’t have anyone to take home for Christmas, again.

RELATED: 3 hallmarks of an ‘80s Christmas

Boyfriend or not, whatever anyone picks out for George Howell, make sure it’s not a Starbucks gift card. In an interview with Boston magazine, the inventor of the Frappuccino explains his disdain for the coffee snobbery of today’s café culture. (via The Daily Meal)

RELATED: Starbucks introduces its most expensive coffee yet

New York Times op-ed columnist Roger Cohen, however, seems to have reserved his disdain for today’s social media culture and its inexplicable need to post and share everything. “Incorrigible!”



Is there something you think we should include in our next edition of #TheDailySpin? Tweet me @iquotesometimes with your suggestions. Thanks in advance.