What we are thinking about.
Notes from running 8 publications and building tools for them. Restaurant SEO, local marketing, the boring parts that move the needle.
While Holdcos Bail, Stagwell Doubles Down on The Trade Desk’s AI Dream — Betting Big on a Fading DSP Star
As major holding companies sour on The Trade Desk’s programmatic platform, Stagwell bucks the trend with a risky bet on AI-powered ad buying. But is it a savvy move or fool’s gold?
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Adobe Bets Big on Firefly to Lock Down the AI-Native Creator Market
Adobe is pushing Firefly to become the Photoshop moment for AI-native creators, but can it escape its legacy and truly innovate in a crowded AI tool market?
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Allica Bank’s TV Blitz Is a Spotlight on the B2B Marketing Vacuum No One Wants to Admit Exists
Allica Bank’s bold TV campaign targeting underserved SMEs exposes fintech marketing’s lazy reliance on digital hype and the urgent need for real brand-building.
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Cable News Ratings Crash as Slow News Week Exposes Industry Fragility
The week of April 13, 2026, exposed cable news’s brutal dependency on nonstop breaking stories as every major network saw viewership plummet during a slow news cycle.
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Netflix’s Running Point Season 2: Branded Content or Just Blatant Ad Infiltration?
Netflix’s Running Point Season 2 turns from espionage thriller into a billboard for State Farm, DoorDash, and Lexus, exposing the streaming giant’s shameless brand infiltration.
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Inside CNN’s Control Room Chaos: How the WHCD Broadcast Pivoted from Banter to Breaking News
CNN’s control room transformed from casual commentary to crisis command during the White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting, revealing the raw reality behind live breaking news coverage.
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Adthena’s ChatGPT AdBridge: A Half-Baked Attempt to Fix ChatGPT Advertising Chaos
Adthena’s new ChatGPT AdBridge promises to convert your Google Ads campaigns into AI-driven ChatGPT ads, but it’s a lazy repackaging that misses the real challenges of AI advertising.
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Pinterest’s CTV Audience Extension: Another Overhyped Play in the Streaming Ad Gold Rush
Pinterest’s new CTV audience extension via TV Scientific is less innovation and more ad tech catch-up, promising cross-platform targeting that won’t deliver the ROI marketers hope for.
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The Ugly Truth Behind AI Disclosure and Social Media Harm — Stats That Should Scare Marketers
AI disclosure is a mess, social media is fueling mental health crises, and World Cup traffic spikes are mostly worthless. Here’s why marketers need to wake up now.
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Dentsu’s North America Revival Plan: New Leadership to Fix a Flailing Empire
Dentsu’s latest leadership shuffle in North America is a desperate bid to fix years of client neglect and operational inertia. But will new client-experience roles be enough to revive the flailing empire?
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Marketing’s Age of Opinion Is Dead: Why Data and Knowledge Are Taking Over
Marketing has been drowning in opinion-driven nonsense. The future demands real knowledge, data-driven strategies, and a ruthless rejection of lazy SEO grifts.
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TelevisaUnivision Drops Ad Sales Boss Weeks Before TV Upfronts, Swaps Tim Natividad for John Kozack
TelevisaUnivision just swapped out its ad sales chief weeks before the crucial TV upfronts, signaling panic and instability at the worst possible moment for advertisers.
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VaynerX’s Tamara Group: A Production-Led Agency or Just More Buzzword Bullshit?
VaynerX’s new Tamara Group bets on a ‘production-led’ agency model—a repackaged content factory dressed as innovation that prioritizes volume over creative strategy.
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Purga Films’ AI Experiment: 3,000 Images, No Dialogue, and a Creative Reckoning
Purga Films and Gut’s AI-generated shorts prove that real creativity with AI demands relentless editorial control, not lazy reliance on algorithms.
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Marketing’s Dirty Little Secret: Succession Planning Is a Graveyard No One Wants to Visit
Brands’ failure to plan marketing succession isn’t just bad HR—it’s a strategic disaster waiting to explode when key talent leaves. Ignoring this is corporate malpractice.
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Channel 4 and Lloyds Double Down on Black-Owned Businesses With £200K Advertising Jackpot—But Is TV Exposure Enough?
Channel 4 and Lloyds Bank’s Black in Business initiative boosts its ad prize to £200K, but TV exposure alone won’t fix the systemic gaps Black entrepreneurs face.
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Royal Ballet and Opera’s Rebrand: Why Restlessness Beats Legacy Complacency Every Time
The Royal Ballet and Opera’s rebrand isn’t just a facelift; it’s a brutal wake-up call for legacy brands clinging to complacency. They prove restlessness and measurement beat dusty heritage every time.
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Hendrick’s Gin’s AI-Theater Mashup Is Marketing Bullshit Dressed as Innovation
Hendrick’s gin’s latest launch leans on AI and theater for buzz, but it’s marketing fluff disguised as innovation. The industry’s obsession with surface-level AI is producing flashy yet hollow spectacles.
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