As Online Video Surges, Publishers Turn to Automation (The New York Times, 7/10/16)

This is so awful I barely know what to do with it. Automating content is bad enough since you lose the heart and soul of the producer, but how these companies are talking about cobbling together videos from existing wire service photos and videos means they’re going to seem even more generic than it otherwise would. Not only that, but these videos are going to become less enticing to the public which, coupled with the way the publishers are talking about flooding the zone with them, means the lucrative revenue publishers are counting on is going to get watered down quickly. Plus, they’re going to get dinged by Google and Facebook algorithms just like content farms – which is what we’re talking about here – have in the past with previous automation efforts.

Warner Bros. Settles FTC Charges Over Payments to PewDiePie, Other Influencers to Promote Game (Variety, 7/11/16

This should make it abundantly clear, if it already wasn’t, that disclosure is essential not just from a “don’t be dishonest” perspective but also a regulatory one. Not only will your company get slapped with a fine for failing to do so but you’ll get a nice round of negative publicity about how you tried to pull one over on the public.

In Less Than a Week, Pokémon Go Has More Than 6 Million Mentions on Twitter (Adweek, 7/11/16)

Pokemon Go racking up 6 million Twitter mentions in so short a time is impressive, that’s for sure. And hey, brands getting in on the action shows a bit of cultural awareness. I want a study in two weeks, though, showing the drop off in conversation volume.

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Twitter Will Live Stream the Republican and Democratic National Conventions (The Verge, 7/11/16)

This is a big get for Twitter, to be sure. But I’m really interested to see what kind of unofficial streams pop up both on Twitter and Facebook, and which winds up being the preferred platform among attendees. Not that you’ll be able to intuit much from that, but it will to some extent show which tool is making more of an impact.

You Can Now Schedule Instagram Posts Ahead of Time (Fortune, 7/12/16)

The ability to schedule Instagram posts has been on many a social manager’s wish list for a long time. This Buffer integration is a good first step but doesn’t quite get to where it needs to be. I still think native scheduling would be a solid paid feature for brand publishers.

Twitter Signs Another Live-Streaming Deal, This Time With Bloomberg (Fortune, 7/12/16)

Twitter signs another big livestreaming deal, this time with Bloomberg. This should provide a real test for what kind of video people want to see via livestreams and whether Twitter is best positioned as a second screen experience, not a first screen outlet.

Twitter will tell brands more about people who see their tweets, visit their sites (MarketingLand, 7/12/16)

Twitter opening up its Audience API through Gnip means brand publishers will be able to see more (anonymized, generalized) data on the people who are actually reading the Tweets it’s putting out there, which should help publishers tailor voice, tone and content.

Email Newsletters Hit a Speed Bump: Inaccurate Open Rates (AdAge, 7/13/16)

What exactly goes into open rates is coming in for more scrutiny now that email newsletters are the latest format that will save media. While 100% consistent tracking is certainly problematic, it’s not unique to email as just about every medium has its own issues with accounting for readership.

Emerging Demographics Are the New Emerging Markets (HBR, 7/13/16)

With man markets tapped out, sales growth is going to come from reaching different members of existing demographic groups who may not have been in the target market previously.

Vine isn’t growing and most of its top executives have left (Recode, 7/13/16)

Vine is having some issues as executives leave, growth stagnates and more. Oddly, it doesn’t seem to have a big role in Twitter’s overall strategy, which is strange considering it has such a passionate userbase. But maybe that’s a symptom of Twitter’s emphasis on growth, not retention.

Warner Brothers Says Creative And Performance Need To Come Together (AdExchanger, 7/13/16)

A really interesting look into how Warner Bros. is taking the data from one ad or marketing initiative and feeding that into the decision making process for the next one, as well as how they’re working to extend the marketing throughout the theatrical to home video cycle.

Instagram’s Box-Shaped Videos Are Influencing Facebook Marketers (Adweek, 7/13/16)

Facebook has changed its recommendations on video ad production to be more in line with Instagram’s 1:1 ratio. So that’s the standard (for now) on those two platforms, Twitter is still 16:9 and Snapchat still emphasizes vertical video. That means there are still lots of headaches for video producers.