Young & Rubicam has announced that it is bringing customized interactive marketing technology to LG Electronics USA's new digital billboard on the corner of 45th Street and 7th Avenue in the heart of New York's Times Square. The billboard, which went live Dec. 14, builds on LG's brand motto, "Life's Good," by projecting positive news from around the world using an innovative animated platform developed for LG by Young & Rubicam.

The concept behind new billboard is supported by LG-commissioned research that showed that 83 percent of Americans agree that the United States is suffering from a good news deficit, with six in 10 Americans saying they don't even know where to look for good news.

The billboard will feature Gil, the first LG Good News Ambassador and Times Square intelligent digital resident, who will invite passersby to share their own good news via text message and tweets. The project also showcases the latest in out-of-home technology, and is the first ever wraparound HD billboard, developed by LG, which allows both southern and western views to one of the world's most visited streets.

"'Life's Good' is much more than a motto to us," said Peter Reiner, SVP, marketing, LG Electronics USA Inc. "We want the people of New York and travelers from around the world to look up at our new LG billboard and smile, knowing that there is still a lot of good in the world."

Viewers in Times Square can watch Gil's behavior change as he responds and reacts to the good news displayed on the billboard, which will include stories gathered from RSS feeds and user-generated messages via social media portals or SMS interaction. Gil will also react to time of day, weather conditions, holidays, and even the people he sees around him.

"This is a perfect convergence of LG's technological leadership with their 'Life's Good' brand value," said Glen Jacobs, Executive Creative Director, Young & Rubicam. "Because Gil is animated in real-time 3-D, instead of using loops of pre-rendered animations, Gil will respond differently to messages, weather reports or news feeds so that he feels really alive."

Young & Rubicam and Stockholm, Sweden-based North Kingdom teamed up with Dynamic Digital Displays to create a unique architecture for LG that integrates real-time 3-D animation with Unity3D, mobile services, a customized CMS to source and moderate all data, an advanced AI controller logic and a unique puppeteering system. Other agency partners, including LG-One and Mindshare, are supporting integrated marketing launch-day activities.