Good Week / Bad Week in Branding

Good Week: Facebook - Founder and new father Mark Zuckerberg announces he’ll commit 99% of his Facebook stock to charity, turning a fortune from social networking into a force for social good. So if you thought you were a big shot for handing out expensive cigars when your first kid was born…

Bad Week: VTech - Keeping with kids, here’s hoping that yours aren’t among the estimated 6.4 million whose personal data (along with that of their parents) was exposed when the Hong Kong-based “connected toys” manufacturer’s database was hacked. Q: “What’d you get for Christmas, Jimmy?” A: “Identity theft!!!”

Worse Week: Yahoo - The search-and-email lion's board determines that the ailing company is worth more as separate pieces and mulls jettisoning its core business, uh, search and email. This just in: McDonalds Sheds Burgers.