Edition #537
On Siri and how it changes the LLM landscape, Substack is keeping media fun and Ritz Carlton floats some boats.
I had to double check that I hadn’t done a newsletter titled Siri before. And really, what could I have said? We’ve always been disappointed by Siri.
However, way back, when Google Home launched, I did note. If you turned on the privacy settings on Google Home, to match that of Siri. Google Home was just as useless. Apple had then (and always has) held itself to a higher standard of privacy, which they’ve been unwavering on.
This week at WWDC Apple unveiled the new Siri and their approach to AI. And it is stellar.
So on device AI, is the ultimate privacy preserving aspect of AI. And with the launch this week, and the quiet (but bubbling) hype on Twitter. It seems Apple have done it well. I’m looking forward to playing with it.
A big difference though is, many (myself included) had thought this would be a Gemini wrapper, but a better framing is it is Gemini informed.
Apple has a selector, which will pick which of their models to use. And they used Gemini to help ensure their models were to a certain quality. Like an evaluation.
So, most of your interactions, will be with Apple only models, some of which I’ve shared in the newsletter, as Apple has been releasing some over time.
Now Apple is upstream of every interaction on the iOS. The last time they did such a thing, with Apple Maps, they gained about 30% market share (within iOS). Google is doing the same on Android, baking in Gemini more. If the same thing eventuates, that’s 800m users.
(And 800m users doing more consumer focused tasks, read: for brands & publishers, you’re going to want coverage here, and the types of queries on this, will be more akin to search, than early adopters of AI)
So a year ago, it was, if you don’t exist on ChatGPT, buyers won’t find you, then it was Gemini, and soon it’s going to be Apple. At least we have over summer, to preview how we show up and what to do about it.
A sub narrative, which I thought was neat, any app developer with less than 2m installs, get use of the AI for free. This democratization between, being on device, privacy first AND in the hands of the creative developer class. We’re going to see some interesting use cases.
Hey Siri, what about Knicks in 5?
Notable stories this week
- At the Substack House, media is still fun.
- Apple’s new ad campaign takes aim at adtech?
- Google’s AI opt out leaves publishers with a choice they can’t safely use.
- BBC Studios sees branded content boom, names new growth executive.
- How agencies are betting on entertainment to survive.
- LinkedIn is stepping up its pitch to creators with a new marketplace.
- How automation and AI is reshaping the traditional upfront marketplace.
- Sound check: Is your omnichannel plan missing a beat?
- Home Screen Ads on Samsung TVs will soon be viable programmatically.
- As the web splits in two, your human site must get more human.
- Better attribution makes Live Sports a performance play.
- Augury launches Sona, an agentic solution to improve consistency between audience planning & campaign execution.
- Criteo cuts ChatGPt ad minimums, offers incentives to woo retailer brands.
- Storytelling hierarchy is starting to flatten: Tribeca Enterprise CEO on why brands are making the festival a must stop.
- AI ‘girlfriend ads’ are fueling a new wave of MFA sites.
- Reuters and Time adopt bot blocking whitelists to rein in AI crawlers.
- Woo launches a world first global measurement tool.
- Meet the CMO trying to make nuclear fusion cool.
- Agency AI pitches are starting to face harder questions.
- Confessions fo an AI lab rat.
- Newsweek bets on audience engagement amid traffic collapse.
- Ads in New York must now label AI-generated ‘synthetic performers’.
- The revenge of the publicists: how comms execs stormed the C-suite.
- Why Accenture buying Whalar is a coming of age moment for creator marketing.
- What the new AI-powered Siri really means for Apple and for OpenAI.
- Waymo readies First National Ads as rivals and critics proliferate.
- The revenue of the Publicists: How Comms Execs stormed the C-Suite.
- How paid influencers hype Polymarket’s odds.
- Infinite long tail.
Deals/M&A
- Accenture to acquire leading creator and social agency Whaler from Whalr Group.
- Havas acquires culture and sports marketing agency Archrival.
- Creative artists, TPG back $250m fund for YouTube talent.
Campaign of the week
- Ritz Carlton in the Park, promoting SailGP. Love.
Smartest commentary
- “We have abundance – books nobody reads, apps nobody downloads, newsletters that go unopened, podcasts nobody listens to, and videos without viewers.” –Brian Morrissey.
Datapoints of note
- YouTube processed 2.5b content ID copyright claims in 2025.
Events
- If you’re in Cannes and want to touch base, let me know.
That’s it for this week.
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