Hello
Here’s your Last Week in Digital Media and all the news you may have missed.
GENERAL
- YouTube’s TikTok competitor, YouTube Shorts, now has a US$100MM fund to be shared over the next 12 months, with people who create and share YouTube Shorts content. It works in a similar way to Snap’s Spotlight US$1M a day fund.
- it looks like twitter’s subscription service may be called “twitter blue” with pricing starting at US$2.99 per month. Subscriptions will unlock additional features, including the often requested edit button. It also seems there will be tiered twitter subscription pricing, that includes a news offering.
- Pinterest will be live-streaming a virtual event from May 24-25th, featuring content from creators such as Jonathan Van Ness and Rebecca Minkoff. This is not Pinterest’s first foray into live streaming. If the event is of interest, you can check out Pinterest Live Sessions here.
- Facebook has started testing its Clubhouse-like live audio rooms offering in Taiwan. However, the broader availability is still unknown.
- Facebook-backed blockchain and cryptocurrency offering, Diem, will be shifting its base of operations from Switzerland to the US. A pilot of Diem is still expected later this year.
- TikTok has a few new features in testing or coming soon, including the ability for creators to promote their videos in the “For You Page” and experimenting with TikTok as a job search/recruitment tool.
- useful to bookmark, this website makes it easy to create tweetable charts in a variety of styles.
ONLINE VIDEO
- ViacomCBS’s Paramount+ service will launch internationally, with the first market being Australia. The subscription will be priced at $8.99 in local currency.
- Roku released a trailer showcasing Roku Originals, the content it acquired from Quibi. Roku Originals will go live on the Roku Channel on May 20th, National Streaming Day (don’t forget to send your favorite streaming service an eCard).
- Samsung Ads has inked a deal with Nielsen, bringing Nielsen’s Digital Ad Ratings to Samsung’s Ad-Support Advanced TV offering.
RESEARCH
- Snap released a study on the future of AR and shopping. The full report (PDF link) was built on the research of 15,000 consumers across multiple markets and looked at the potential impact of AR trends in shopping, gaming, media, and entertainment.
- mobile app analytics firm, App Figures, claims Facebook’s core app has lost 23% of downloads in the past 12 months.
- research from eMarketer forecasts that TikTok users will just surpass Snapchat by 2023 and be at parity with Instagram by 2025.
- there’s some research from the local platform NextDoor, showing changing US Consumer Habits. The document is a good read, showing what people are looking forward to most post-pandemic lockdown (pp7), an overall increase in purchase intent (pp15), as well as deep-dives across a few verticals—worth a read.
QUARTERLY RESULTS
- the Walt Disney Co. released its Q2 results. Disney+ has 103.6MM subscribers, and Hulu has 41.6MM, with both up YoY. While subscriber numbers were up, Disney did miss analyst estimates (109MM), but the company believes it’s still on track to reach 230 million to 260 million subscribers by the end of 2024
- Singtel, the owner of ad tech company Amobee, expects to book an SGD$1.2B loss and has flagged that it will conduct a strategic review of the Amobee business that may include divestment.
REGULATORY
- more than 40 US State Attorney Generals, across both sides of politics, have called on Mark Zuckerberg to abandon plans for a version of Instagram for under 13s (PDF link).
- possibly just a coincidence, but on the same day as the letter above, a similar number of US State Attorney Generals wrote to US Congress asking for support of State-led Antitrust efforts (PDF link). The letter does make specific reference to Big Tech.
- the US Senate introduced a bill that would update COPPA, titled the Children and Teens’ Online Privacy Protection Act. The proposal bands targeted advertising at teens, would limit the collection of personal information, and establish a Youth Marketing and Privacy Division at the Federal Trade Commission.
- Facebook lost a challenge to the Irish Data Regulator. The loss could threaten US-EU data transfers and has far-reaching implications for global companies involved in data-driven marketing.
PRIVACY, TRUST. and SAFETY
- following the lead from twitter, Facebook is testing a prompt to encourage people to read an article before sharing it. The test will be conducted across ~6% of the users and only on the Android version of the app.
- warning, distressing content. A lawsuit was filed against Snap over claims a teen who committed suicide was bullied via a Snap-owned app. The legal argument is that building or enabling features that are so clearly dangerous to its users makes a product essentially defective. Snap has suspended the apps at the center of the lawsuit.
- TikTok is launching an initiative called #FactCheckYourFeed with lessons from creators and celebrities on how to detect and avoid misleading information online. TikTok also announced a revamped Safety Center with additional tools for parents and guardians.
- there’s a good read on the Atlantic about the Clubhouse app approach to content moderation and how it uses a black badge to identify potential trolls, and how the blocking feature has been both weaponized and has unintended consequences.
Have a great week.
Joshua
PS. Distraction this week. If you search on Google for DVD Screensaver, wait a few seconds, and you will get a Google logo that bounces all over your screen. A homage to the Bouncing DVD Logo.