_Industry_ updates

Ad Vendors / Platforms / Data

• Getty Images is banning AI-generated art, including images produced by OpenAI’s DALL-E and Meta AI’s Make-A-Scene, from its platform. The decision stems from concerns that copyright laws are currently unsettled with regard to imagery created by those tools. (Art News)

• Google is bringing its multisearch feature, which lets users search using both images and text, to India. (Tech Crunch)

• Google has unveiled Courses, a feature designed to bring structured learning experiences to YouTube. The feature is currently in beta and will roll out to users in India “soon." (Tech Crunch)

• Shopify has partnered with Bridgeline to power analytics and prescribe new revenue strategies for its base of more than 4M users across 175 countries. (Global Newswire)

• The number of people in the United States who speak a language other than English at home, mainly Spanish, has nearly tripled over the last 40 years. (Axios)

• Google and Meta accounted for a combined 48.4% of US digital-ad spending in 2022, and that number is expected to drop to 44.9% this year. Meanwhile, TikTok and streamers like Amazon are steadily gaining share. (WSJ)

Awards / Festivals

• One of the companies behind text-to-image AI system Stable Diffusion is hosting a film festival exclusively for shorts made with AI. FThe grand prize winner will win $10K. (Engadget)

• The first string of presenters for the 80th Golden Globe Awards includes Ana de Armas, Ana Gasteyer, Billy Porter, Colman Domingo, Jamie Lee Curtis, Michaela Jaé Rodriguez, Natasha Lyonne, Nicole Byer, Niecy Nash-Betts, Quentin Tarantino and Tracy Morgan. (Deadline)

• Sundance Film Festival added several new titles, including a documentary about NBA star Stephen Curry and A24's sentimental drama Past Lives to its 2023 lineup. (Variety)

Cinemas / Theatrical

• AMC is no longer in talks to acquire theaters from Regal parent company Cineworld, which had filed for bankruptcy protection earlier this year. The disclosure comes after AMC reported another quarterly loss last month despite an increase in revenue. (CNBC)

• 58% of US adults ages 65 or older said they did not go to the movies in 2022, compared with 21% of Americans between 18 and 34. Over half (54%) of moviegoers in 2022 were men, and 46% had a household income of under $50K. (Morning Consult)

• Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, due out in June, is 2023’s most anticipated film among US adults, followed by March’s John Wick: Chapter 4 and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, which will also be released in June. (Morning Consult)

  

• Disney was the No. 1 studio at the global box office for the seventh straight year with $4.9B, including $2B at the domestic box office and $2.9B overseas. Universal Pictures took second place with $3.9B globally, with $1.6B in domestic sales and $2.3B overseas. (Deadline)

• Despite cinemas being closed for 104 days of 2022, Hong Kong’s box office staged a remarkable comeback, thanks to a succession of locally-made hit films. (Variety)

Gambling / Casinos

• Through November, Las Vegas Strip casinos took in more than $7.5B in gaming revenue, smashing 2021's record of $7.07B in just 11 months. (News3LV)

• India has recognized esports as part of multi-sports events and has changed its regulations. The country’s Department of Sports is now the government body in charge of overseeing esports. (Gambling News)

Live Events / Attractions

• The sale of The Mirage Hotel & Casino to Hard Rock International has closed for more than $1B, marking the official change in ownership of Las Vegas's first mega-resort. (News3LV)

• Funny Girl broke the all-time box office record at Broadway’s August Wilson Theatre. The revival collected $2.005M over eight performances during the week ending on Dec. 18th. (Variety)

• The world’s largest tech trade show, CES was held last week. More than 3K exhibitors and 100K attendees hit Las Vegas for the event as it tries to bounce back to its pre-pandemic popularity. (AdAge)

Music / Audio / Podcasts

• SZA’s SOS ruled the Billboard 200 chart three weeks in a row. It sold 128K equivalent album units in the US in the week ending Dec. 29th alone. (Billboard)

• Spotify may sync with health data on users' iPhones to generate personalized music playlists for workouts. Spotify will choose specific songs for specific exercise routines, designed to match users' pace, intensity, and distance. (Yahoo)

• Author and podcast host Brené Brown has released the final episodes of her Spotify-exclusive podcasts Unlocking Us and Dare to Lead as her deal with Spotify has come to an end. She has no current plans to launch another podcast. (THR)

Crypto / NFT / Metaverse

• Otherdeed for Otherside collected the most significant revenue of any NFT in 2022 ($49.9M). Yuga Labs‘ total royalty income from Otherdeed for Otherside, Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), and Mutant Ape Yacht Club (MAYC) collections total $108M. (Crypto Slate)

• Sales of virtual reality headsets in the US declined 2% YoY to $1.1B as of early December. Worldwide shipments of VR headsets as well as augmented reality devices dropped more than 12% to 9.6M in 2022. (CNBC)

• Coinbase agreed to pay a $50M fine after financial regulators found that it let customers open accounts without conducting sufficient background checks, in violation of anti-money-laundering laws. (NYT)

OTT / Streaming

• 100M+ Netflix viewers watch the service using passwords they borrow. Netflix has said that it will end this practice in 2023, asking people who share accounts to pay to do so. (WSJ)

• Netflix’s new ad-supported plan was the least popular tier of its service in November, the first month in which it was offered. The plan accounted for 9% of new Netflix sign-ups in the US during the month. 57% of subscribers to the ad-supported tier were people re-joining the service or signing up for the first time, while 43% downgraded from pricier plans. (WSJ)

• Netflix will begin offering fitness content from Nike as part of its efforts to attract subscribers and keep existing members engaged. The workouts will be available across all of Netflix’s subscription plans and will be offered in 10 languages. (THR)

• fuboTV has dropped nine AMC Networks-owned channels including AMC, BBC America, WEtv, BBC World News, IFC, SundanceTV, el gourmet, AMC Premiere, and Mas Chic. (Streamable)

• Disney+, Imax, and audio technology company DTS will bring Imax sound by DTS to some Disney+ titles in 2023. Imax’s expanded aspect ratio, offering up to 26% more picture for select sequences, is currently available with no additional cost or equipment. (Streamable)

• Roku is launching its first-ever series of smart TVs designed and built internally. The Roku Select and Plus TVs will be available to US consumers in Spring 2023 with retail prices ranging from $119 to $999. (TechCrunch)

• Local content is dominating premium online video viewing in Asia, with 75% spent on content from the region, led by Korean dramas at 29%. (TV Asia)

• YouTube will get new ad inventory as it won the rights to NFL’s Sunday Ticket. YouTube will stream the ads that come through the national TV broadcaster, and it will fill the percentage of ad slots that otherwise would go to the local network affiliates. (AdAge)

Retail / Lifestyle / Travel

• 45% of US Gen Zers have purchased clothing because an influencer or celebrity sponsored it, while 43% said the same of books and games. Male Gen Zers were more likely to purchase books and games (48%) than female Gen Zers (38%). (Morning Consult)

  

• 54% of US adults cite a lack of comfort with making purchases through social media as a major reason why they would not participate in live shopping events. A large majority (78%) have never participated in a live shopping event. (Morning Consult)

  

• Delta Air Lines is expected to begin rolling out free wireless internet for its passengers as soon as early 2023. The move is likely to intensify competition over in-flight offerings as airlines rebound from the pandemic. (WSJ)

• Comfort with several activities, including flying domestically and moviegoing, has reached highs since Morning Consult began tracking. A majority of Americans are now comfortable with several other activities, perhaps signaling a year of growth for key industries. (Morning Consult)

  

Social Media

• TikTok is expanding its audience controls feature, letting creators restrict their videos to adult viewers. Until now, the feature was only available for TikTok Live. (Tech Crunch)

• Twitter has rolled out priority tweet ranking and the ability to upload longer videos of up to 60 minutes to Blue checkmark subscribers. (Social Media Today)

• TikTok is licensing data from IMDb to power a new feature that will make it easier for users to search for content related to a specific film or TV title and see relevant data about the work, such as its cast and release date, on a dedicated, in-app page. (THR)

Sports

• 62% of US Gen Zers have never heard of New York Yankees star Aaron Judge, who recently signed a reported 9-year deal worth $360M after breaking the American League’s single-season home run record in 2022. (Morning Consult)

• The World Cup final was the second-most-bet sporting event in the US this year, after the Super Bowl. Approximately 7.9M individual transactions were made on the FIFA World Cup Final at US sportsbooks. (CDC Gaming)

Video Games

• Epic Games, maker of Fortnite, agreed to pay a total of $520M to settle US government allegations that it misled millions of players, including children and teens, into making unintended purchases and that it violated a federal children’s privacy law. (CNN)

• Amazon and Best Buy are bundling a 12-month Switch Online family plan with a 256GB model of SanDisk's Switch microSD card for $50. A 12-month family membership normally costs $35, so the actual discount here is on the microSD card. (Engadget)

• Hasbro's Wizards of the Coast, best known for the Dungeons & Dragons tabletop games, has cancelled at least five video game projects as it scales back its ambitions in the industry. (Bloomberg)

_And now_ the good stuff

• The UK government published its national AI strategy, which outlines its long-term vision for the technology and its impact on society.

• Rodney Brooks, the creator of the Roomba, throws cold water on the idea that AI will surpass human intelligence in the near future.

• A unique look behind the curtain at how one VC fund increased returns.

• How Peloton uses design and gamification to keep people on the exercise platform.

• If you think gentrification is about new coffee shops and high rents, you are missing an essential aesthetic element.

• Watch out for the Trisolarians! Scientists might have found the first-known planet orbiting three stars at once.