Edition #489
Punditry, Lyft ads & cookies.
After a spring break road trip I am back in the hot seat! I am happy to inform you of a couple of milestones, I have now dined at the place which invented the hamburger. And had a pint at the oldest pub in the US.
A lot to dig in to this week, some things I might pick up next week and go a little deeper.
The surprising news was Google Chrome set to continue to use third-party cookies. With a pending divestiture and CMA in the UK, it is surprising. But we have kind of had a swing back, with fingerprinting being ok’d and GDPR potentially being softened.
My take is that the biggest impact has been on lots of independent publishers – and no one really wants to twist the knife in. And with fingerprinting, which Google is allowing, it’s all about CTV, where cookies don’t work. And brands would want connective tissue between CTV and their digital, if possible.
I must sit down, and revisit what the cookie landscape is. Of course, for brands, you’re not worried about cookies on your site, you can track what you need to track. But the middlemen would like to use them to optimize their ads, to drive performance for you. So it is a problem.
I still think this is a strong area for models, to drive attribution, and embrace each of the different technologies available by channel. Let the models help sort through the noise. It’s an exceptional use case for them, sort through the complexity on my behalf.
Brians note on hyperpunditry was great, I’ll just share it below:
“Hyperpunditry — an approach that thrives on volume, confidence, and tribal alignment rather than typical credentials.
Punditry is simply a better business. Kara Swisher makes more money talking about tech and politics than she did running a newsroom. Scott Galloway went from giving marketing keynotes to posting viral clips on masculinity and markets. Nick Denton resurfacing as a short seller made perfect sense. Emily Sundberg’s Feed Me brand works because she doesn’t stick to a beat. There are no lanes anymore. Even companies aren’t immune: OpenAI wants to get in on social networking? In this context, why not Stephen A. 2028? To be clear, Stephen A, you do have a choice, trust me.“
Notable stories this week
- Is X originals going to be a thing?
- Marketers are putting more content and quality control in the hands of AI.
- YouTube, at 20, Has Hosted 20 Billion Videos and Launched Superstars. It Wants More—Including Some Prestige.
- Time Spent With Media Reaches ‘Saturation,’ Declines First time since Great Recession.
- Creator and influencer trends brand marketers need to know about right now.
- YouTube’s gender gap. Male creators earn 40% more than women.
- Google loses online advertising monopoly case.
- EDO’s latest data pairings challenge Nielsen’s hold on TV outcomes measurement.
- American culture still matters for global brands.
- Meta is ramping up its AI-driven age detection
- Nexxen launches NexAI.
- OpenAI testing a Shopify integration.
- Jeff Bezos Washington Post inks OpenAI licensing deal for ChatGPT Search.
- [Smart take] Signals and noise.
- Temu slashes US ad spending.
- Two lawsuits allege The Trade Desk secretly violates consumer privacy laws.
- Facebook is just Craigslist now.
- Lyft partners with StackAdapt for programmatic in-app advertising.
- How brands are getting into the TV and movie game as they try to combat ad fatigue.
- OpenAI is building a social network.
- Google Chrome will now continue to use third-party cookies.
- Netflix tests new search engine with OpenAI.
- TikTok is introducing community notes.
- This startup just raised $6 million to put ads in your AI chats.
- Jimmy Fallon to Lead NBC’s new marketing competition reality series.
- Apple says it maybe can’t trust Meta after incompetent redaction.
- Zuckerberg suggested wiping everyone’s Facebook friends and making users start again to boost the platform’s relevance.
Deals/M&A
- Inside WPP’s $150m InfoSum purchase.
- Futureverse acquires NFT startup Candy Digital.
- Marketecture acquires Adland.
- Speculation that xAI could be raise upwards of $25b at a $150b valuation.
Campaign of the week
- Campari + Highsnobiety during Milano Design Week.
View all 2024 best campaigns.
Smartest commentary
- “We want to work with kind of great creators across all kinds of media that consumers love and podcasts, to your point, have become a lot more video forward. … As the popularity of video podcasts grow, I suspect you’ll see some of them find their way to Netflix,” – Ted Sarandos
Datapoints of note
- The percentage of publishers who said they make a lot of money from branded content is seeing an upward trend. This year, more than a third (35%) of publisher pros said they get a large or very large portion of their revenue from branded content, up from 31% in 2024 and one-quarter (25%) in 2023.
- Temu ad spend on TikTok sponsored videos and Google shopping ads went to zero.
- Back in 2018, IG was generating ~30% lower revenue than Netflix but by 2021, its revenue was ~10% higher than Netflix.
- Gemini has 350m MAU.
Events
- Media breakfast coming up in May, let me know if you want to join.
View all 2024 datapoints of note.
That’s it for this week.
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