Edition #516
The rise of TBPN, Taika’s Christmas Ad and Agentic AI everything.
I haven’t mentioned TBPN this year, but does feel like they’re worth a shout.
They’ve exploded into the Twitter timeline, with their clips of tech folks. And then set up shop around events, getting scoops from guests like Nadella, Marc Andreessen, Larry Ellison, Benioff.. the list goes on.
If you’re not familiar, BI has ‘Aura Farming with TBPN‘.
What is nice is – they’re having fun. It’s content they want to be part of – and so do their guests. And that means the audience do too, they feed off that.
They’re playing in a lane – and it’s paying off. Axios reports they’re on the cusp of selling out their 2026 ad inventory. Hats off to them!
Friend of the newsletter David Berkowitz has a new note over at Marketecture – AI Brief, looking at what brands & agencies are doing with AI. And just that. Neat. Read his inaugural edition here.
It was thanks to him, I caught the Disney ad, which is campaign of the week.
Also, a little adjacent – but Bloomberg’s Jealousy list for 2025 – the stories they admired the most this year – that they wish they’d written.
Notable stories this week
- Meta strikes multiple AI deals with news publishers.
- Nexxen is latest programmatic player to widen TV’s live sports window.
- How Criteo is turning LLMs into its next big advertising channel.
- Inside Time Magazine’s AI Overhaul.
- ‘A trader won’t need to leave our platform’: PMG builds its own CTV buying platform.
- Shopify rolls out ad network for millions of merchants.
- ^ Very smart.
- Platforms measurement transparency moves into view.
- Nexxen Introduces Measurement and Optimization to Nexxen Health.
- PubMatic Strikes Deal With Startup Kontext to Inject Ads Into AI Chatbots Via Programmatic Auctions
- Do AI agents have a place in programmatic advertising?
- Brands hope for reach, brace for high CPMs in tug of war over Warner Bros. Discovery.
- Google is testing AI-powered article overviews on selection publications Google News pages.
- Substack begins testing sponsorship ads in limited newsletter pilot. Broken by Emily Sundberg.
- Equativ launches their Agentic AI Programmatic Suite.
- McDonald’s pulls down AI-generated Holiday Ad after deluge of mockery.
- Google tells advertisers it’ll bring ads to Gemini in 2026.
- Uber’s latest play for ad dollars: turning data about your trips and takeout into insights for marketers.
- Bloomberg Media COO to join Microsoft, Lead AI News product.
- YouTube Shorts algorithm changes to promote newer uploads.
- Ad spending forecasts rise as tariff fears fall.
Deals/M&A
- Disney makes $1b investment in OpenAI.
- Pinterest to acquire CTV ad company tvScientific.
- Samba TV raises up to $60m venture debt.
Campaign of the week
- Taika’s A Disney Holiday Short: Best Christmas Ever. ❤️
- McDonald’s AI-generated Christmas Ad. It did get pulled though!
Smartest commentary
- “You don’t have a monopoly on the guests that come to show, right? They go on other podcasts. They go on TV. The only thing we have a monopoly on is like ourselves,” –Jordi Hayes, TBPN.
Datapoints of note
- WPP Media, one of the world’s largest ad-buying agencies, now says it expects the global advertising market to grow by 8.8% this year (excluding U.S. political advertising), up from 6% in June.
- Prime Video Channels generated 10m+ subs for Paramount+. Peacock, 1m.
- Bilt rewards sitcom Roomies got 28m views.
- Gemini crosses 1b downloads on the Play store.
- ChatGPT nears 900m weekly active users.
- Advertisers who prioritize data integrity and make a point of buying impressions from high-value publishers with better data practices see a 33% lower cost per action, a 32% reduction in CPMs and a 5% higher return on ad spend.
- Advertising created purely by AI already outperforms human advertising experts (19% higher ad click through) but only if people don’t know that the ads were created by AI. Disclosure results in a -32% drop in performance.
- TBPN on cusp of selling out 2026 ad inventory.
- At Nexxen, ad requests increased by 300% and bid requests by 200% year-on-year in the first three quarters of 2025. The company also logged 29% growth in linear live sports bookings in the same period according to a spokesperson, who didn’t provide dollar estimates.
Events
- I’ll be at CES if you’re around!
That’s it for this week.
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