Edition #509 Why marketers should care about self driving Waymo’s, NY has a new CFO from Ramp & Threads is pulling ahead. I was excited to see my first Waymo in NY this week. A glimpse or promise of a driverless future around town. Getting to self driving is a mean feat. It’s achieved progress by starting with sandboxes, defined areas, then adding a lot of training data, real world practice and then expanding it. Behind the scenes there’s a… Continue reading
Edition #508 Riff on unoriginal takes on ads (ha!), what if all media is marketing? And there’s a new search engine in town. Grok is launching with ecommerce ads. Copilot is launching with carousels for image ads. So is Gemini. This has to be the least original idea for this new environment. Ecommerce ads. Now we get why, it’s the hey we gave product recommendations, let’s show an ad for that. It also, reflects consumer behaviour which seems to be… Continue reading
Edition #507 Even the AI innovators don’t see it slowing down, increased advertising investment & acquisitions. I was at two Axios events this week, in DC & NY. Axios + AI was in DC. Very where AI intersects with government focused. The Anthropic POV was quite profound, self described technology optimists who think it’s moving faster than anticipated. Basically their view was kind of, hey we’re at the cutting edge, and we don’t see it slowing down anytime soon. Continue reading
Edition #506 Are we on the verge of M&A mania? Not Wheels brand partnerships and the new AI economy. We see more movement in the AI economy, with Koah raising funds to put ads in LLMs. The founder of RSS working on RSL – licensing for chat bots. And Raptive also looking to remunerate their creators from usage of their chatbots. They don’t promise big bucks but it’s more that this is a step in the right direction on the… Continue reading
Edition #505 On Google, creator brand safety and influencers in the corporate box. My homework is to read the Google ruling. It’s ~230 pages. But hey at least it’s double spaced. After Perplexity made a bid for Chrome, I feel like that had an impact. Because it demonstrated even through Google is a behemoth, it is prone to disruption, and even has interest from new upstarts. So much so, that they could be buyers for the assets. This gives weight… Continue reading
Edition #504 Guillermo del Toro, Snapchat & moar AI (and new LLM advertising options. I dug Guillermo del Toro’s quote in Variety, calling for more craftsmanship on sets rather than leaning on CGI. Guillermo del Toro refused to make Frankenstein with too much visual effects and green screens: “I want real sets.” “I don’t want digital. I don’t want AI. I don’t want simulation. I want old-fashioned craftsmanship. I want people painting, building, hammering, plastering.” With the onslaught of… Continue reading
Edition #503 AI Browsers, Bilts Roomies & new web paradigms. With Perplexity placing a bid for Google Chrome this week, it has AI Browsers under the spot light. Having had a play with them, the best analogy is, it’s like an enhanced web experience. For no extra effort from the web, it adds a new dimension and actions you can take. Can you get by without one today? Well yeah, we all did not long ago. But the play… Continue reading
Edition #502 On ads are the ultimate micropayments platform, LOADS of AI stories, Vogue goes amiss & acquisitions. “If you really want to get to a billion and then five billion people, you can’t do that with a paid offering… you need an indirect business model. Ads are the obvious one.” -Marc Andreesen. Every now and again, someone talks about making micro payments for content. And the reason it never works is, decision fatigue. It’s easier… Continue reading
Edition #501 On quiet periods, AI search (lots there) and a return to brand marketing. Ahead of earnings, public companies enter what is known as a quiet period. Where they won’t comment on stories or make big announcements. This is to clear the air and avoid any unfair releases or advantages. And to give focus to the earnings. Now, savvy reporters and activists will sometimes use this window, to drop news, knowing the firm can’t or won’t respond. Continue reading
Edition #500 Facebook has creators backs again, Substacks secret weapon & more AI summaries. In 2014 I wrote on my personal blog about a year of health and wellbeing. And that year was pivotal, but it also really was the start of a decade of continuing to improve on health & fitness. That year we also started a newsletter called This Week in Native Ads. And I know some readers will remember that! As you’ve come along for the… Continue reading