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Cannes Briefing: Creativity is moving beyond the agency model

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Cannes Briefing: Creativity is moving beyond the agency model

Invalid Ad Traffic From Deceptive Serving Down 40%

Google cites a 40% drop in invalid ad traffic from deceptive serving, helping protect budgets and keep billing clean for advertisers. Google reports a 40% reduction in invalid traffic from deceptive or disruptive serving. Google now reviews content, placements, and interactions more precisely. Advertisers are not charged for invalid traffic, with credits applied after detection.

The Trade Desk holds its own against Amazon’s growing, but still distant threat

When The Trade Desk’s CEO Jeff Green waved off Amazon as a threat, he wasn’t entirely wrong. But he wasn’t entirely right, either. On last week’s earnings call, he told analysts the retail giant is “not a competitor”, arguing it’s “hard for “for them to buy across the open Internet in a truly objective way”.

Apparently the OnlyFans logo is too raunchy for the cricket pitch

What kind of content do you associate OnlyFans with? Well, it isn’t all about that, apparently. A steady trickle of sports personalities have been signing up of late, offering content related to their sport and lifestyle. One such sports star is Southern Brave bowler Tymal Mills, who signed a partnership with OnlyFans earlier this year.

Vulnerability In 3 WordPress File Plugins Affects 1.3 Million Sites

An advisory was issued for three WordPress file management plugins that are affected by a vulnerability that allows unauthenticated attackers delete arbitrary files. The three plugins are installed in over 1.3 million websites. Outdated Version Of elFinder The vulnerability is caused by outdated versions of the elFinder file manager, specifically versions 2.1.64 and earlier. These

How FX Created an Immersive Marketing Campaign for Alien: Earth

Earth to Alien fans, there’s another entry in the franchise, and FX wants to make it the most immersive experience possible. Today, FX and Hulu debuted the Alien prequel series, Alien: Earth, which takes place two years before the original 1979 film. Leading up to its premiere, FX created an expansive and immersive marketing campaign

This plantable photobook was designed to grow out of the ground

Over the years this has led the artist to travel back to her hometown to capture the feeling of home in an ongoing documentary series Motherland, which asks questions: “How can a home be defined through images? How can I make projects that deal with home, migration or memory?” Upon each return to Poland the

The Metrics That Matter For Content Strategies

This week’s Ask an SEO question comes from Zahara: “What metrics should small businesses actually care about when measuring content strategy success? Everyone talks about different KPIs, but I need to know which ones truly matter for growth.” The metrics to measure for growth with a content strategy change by company and industry, and the

3 GTM principles to help emerging products gain traction

Emerging tech products often launch with early excitement but soon hit a wall. Early adopters may embrace the innovation, but mainstream buyers hesitate. This is the gap Geoffrey Moore describes in “Crossing the Chasm.” Early adopters are motivated by potential and experimentation. Mainstream buyers look for clarity, trust and clear business value. Crossing that gap

Google’s AI Nighthawks painting misses the point of art

Another week, and someone’s found another new use for applying AI to classic artwork. But is is really an upgrade? Three years ago, famous paintings were being used to showcase so-called outpainting or generative expand tools that could ‘uncrop’ paintings, and then we had AI video adding animation to masterpieces of art. Now someone’s discovered

Google Says AI-Generated Content Will Not Cause Ranking Penalty

Google’s Gary Illyes recently answered the question of whether AI-generated images used together with “legit” content can impact rankings. Gary discussed whether it had an impact on SEO and called attention to a technical issue involving server resources that is a possible outcome. Does Google Penalize for AI-Generated Content? How does Google react to AI

Reddit’s big bet on becoming a discovery engine

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts • Spotify The through lines between search and social are more blurred than ever, and perhaps no platform is more aware of that than Reddit, which has been pushing to become a “go-to search engine” as CEO Steve Huffman put it on the company’s latest earnings call. Back in April, the social

Julian Glander’s first feature film Boys Go To Jupiter is his goopy, neon magnum opus

Boys Go To Jupiter channels the same loveable dorkiness as Adventure Time and also features impromptu, lo-fi musical numbers alongside a budget-savvy animation feel – like Dr Katz Professional Therapist, it makes the best of the limitations of indie animation. Like the way cult favourite animator Jonni Phillips features female voices in male roles and

Why Semantic HTML Matters For SEO And AI

tags, it’s much easier for an AI agent to misunderstand what actions it should perform. When you use semantic HTML for things like buttons, links, and forms, the chances of an AI agent failing its task are much lower. The meaning inherent in proper HTML tags will tell the AI agent where to go and

AI Scandals, Scam Ads, Cannes Lions, DM9 and Creative Integrity

While TechMagic hosts Cathy Hackl and Lee Kebler are on vacation, we’re spotlighting a must-hear episode of Adspeak by ADWEEK. This week, Adspeak host and editor in chief Ryan Joe speaks with brands editor Rebecca Stewart and agencies reporter Audrey Kemp to unpack the fallout from this year’s Cannes Lions, where AI-manipulated case studies led

These might be the most pretentious headphones ever (but I need them)

CASETiFY embraces the Dutch Golden Age of art.

Reshaping The SERP And What It Means For Your SEO Strategy

For decades, the digital world has been defined by hyperlinks, a simple, powerful way to connect documents across a vast, unstructured library. Yet, the foundational vision for the web was always more ambitious. It was a vision of a Semantic Web, a web where the relationships between concepts are as important as the links between

How to turn marketing attribution from a black box into a growth engine

Marketing attribution often feels like a black box. Budgets go out, deals come in — yet the connection between the two remains frustratingly unclear. This lack of visibility forces marketing teams into a defensive posture, spending more time justifying their existence than demonstrating their impact. Over time, this erodes credibility, sparks budget battles, and makes

Us breaks down the design-heavy process behind its tear-jerker Black Mirror episode, Eulogy

Chris Barrett and Luke Taylor are the directing duo behind the studio Us. One of the pairs most recent directorial endeavours is Eulogy, a gripping TV episode on memory, desire, and acceptance, from the seventh instalment of Charlie Brooker’s hit TV show, Black Mirror. The episode’s main character, Phillip, portrayed by Academy award-nominee Paul Giamatti,

6 AI Marketing Myths That Are Costing You Money

Stop letting AI drain your budget. Learn how to make it work for you. Think AI can fully run your marketing strategy on autopilot? Or that AI-generated content should deliver instant results? It is time to bust the AI myths that are slowing you down and costing you money. Join Bailey Beckham, Senior Partner Marketing

With all this AI skill, at what point are clients looking for payback?

Generative AI continues to steadily infiltrate more corners of the media business, creating efficiencies and saving time across content, production, research, data crunching and even planning and buying. Holding companies and independents alike are collectively investing billions in architecture, tools and processes that leverage AI in ways that go far beyond simple machine learning. So

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