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.
Brand Health Metrics: The Marketing Industry’s Latest Magic Trick to Mask Falling ROI
Marketers are fleeing hard performance data for brand health metrics, propped up by AI tools that promise more than they deliver. It's a retreat from real accountability.
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How AI Content Detectors From Turnitin to GPTZero Destroy Creativity and Trigger False Alarms
Since 2023, AI content detectors have flagged up to 30% of human-written essays as AI-generated, fueling needless censorship and chaos in education and publishing.
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Applebot Crawling: Why Apple’s Search Is Still a Ghost to Publishers
Despite Applebot’s expanded crawl announced in 2023, publishers see zero transparency or actionable data from Apple’s search indexing.
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Rank Math’s AI Slogan Is SEO Grift—Here’s What Actually Moves the Needle in 2026
Rank Math's flashy AI marketing launched in 2023 misleads users; real SEO gains today come from technical rigor, not AI autopilot.
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The GSC Discover Traffic Attribution Scam: How Google Tricks Publishers with Fake Metrics
Google Search Console’s Discover traffic metric inflates impressions and clicks for over 70% of publishers, creating a phantom traffic bonanza.
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IndexNow Is a Lie: Why Microsoft’s Ping Protocol Adds Zero Real Value to Your SEO
Microsoft launched IndexNow in 2021 claiming instant indexing benefits. Yet, evidence shows it barely moves the needle for real-world traffic or rankings.
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Applebot-Extended Visibility: The Mirage Behind Most Site Invisibility
Despite Apple launching Applebot-Extended visibility in late 2023, over 80% of tested sites remain unseen in Apple Search results as of June 2024.
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Why Yahoo and Dow Jones Are Making the Sports Business Beat Their Next Cash Cow
Yahoo and Dow Jones are doubling down on sports business coverage, targeting high-value audiences and advertisers with specialized verticals that go beyond generic game recaps.
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Samsung’s AI Living Push: More Than Hype, But Still Trapped in Device-Centric Narratives
Samsung’s AI living push claims to go beyond devices, but it’s mostly repackaged ecosystem marketing with familiar pitfalls. Real AI innovation demands more than flashy gadgets and data-driven buzzwords.
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Brand Health Metrics: The Marketing Industry’s Latest Magic Trick to Mask Falling ROI
Marketers are fleeing hard performance data for brand health metrics, propped up by AI tools that promise more than they deliver. It's a retreat from real accountability.
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The Myth of Unified CTV Measurement: Why Independent Metrics Are Still a Pipe Dream
The CTV measurement hype cycle is spinning out of control, but the dream of a truly independent, unified system is still a farce. Marketers deserve better.
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Incrementality Measurement Isn’t Magic — Stop Treating It Like It Is
Marketers drown in data but starve for truth on incrementality. The grift of lazy attribution models and SEO plugin hype must end — clean measurement demands rigor.
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Why Data-Driven Audience Connections Are Still Mostly Marketing Bullshit
Marketing’s fetish with complex data to decode purchase intent is mostly a lazy narrative that confuses correlation with genuine audience connection. Here’s why.
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Fox News Still Tops April 2026 Cable Ratings Despite Viewer Slide—The Rest of Cable News Is Still Chasing Shadows
Fox News still leads cable ratings in April 2026 despite ongoing viewer losses, while CNN and MSNBC flounder without growth or innovation.
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Fox Sports’ World Cup Promo Is a Celebrity Circus, Not a Strategy
Fox Sports’ new World Cup promo is less about strategy and more about star-studded spectacle—a celebrity circus masking a lack of digital savvy.
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Stuck in the Grind: Why Marketers Are Trapped in Career Limbo and Who’s to Blame
Most marketers are stuck in career limbo, crushed by lazy agencies and hollow metrics. The industry’s obsession with fluff over real impact is soul destroying.
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AI Data Brokers: The New Middlemen Who Swipe 100% of Publishers’ Content—and Profits
Publishers are facing a new breed of middlemen: AI data brokers who scrape 100% of their content without paying a dime, far worse than the old ad tech tax.
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AI Is Not Magic — It’s the Retail Media Wake-Up Call Brands Desperately Needed
AI isn’t a magic wand for retail media — it’s a brutal efficiency tool forcing brands to finally link ad spend with real sales. CVS Media Exchange shows how lazy legacy models get disrupted.
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