_Agency_ work highlights

• Our Multicultural team recently hosted a mixer in New York City at Bar Chrystie of Public Hotel for our existing and prospective entertainment clients to introduce our team and showcase what we've accomplished in the last year. More than 60 guests from studios including Paramount Pictures, Amazon Studios, HBO, and more, along with multicultural influencers and notable media partners, joined us for a night with food, vibrant music, specialty cocktails and a photo booth.

  

• Check out this recent Knowledge Post by

  Check out these recent Knowledge Posts by agency leaders. Jamie Crick, Managing Director - APAC, discusses managing successful influencer activations under challenging conditions and Jose Leon, Managing Director - LATAM, details why it's important for subscriptions services to understand payment preferences in LATAM.

_Industry_ updates

Ad Vendors / Platforms / Data

• Apple is building an advertising network for live TV as part of its deal to stream Major League Soccer games next year. (Bloomberg)

• With support from Amazon, Mojo Vision has added Alexa Shopping Lists to its smart contact lens. (Progressive Grocer)

• TikTok lowered its 2022 internal ad revenue forecast to $10B from its previous target of $12B. (The Information)

• Google is getting rid of similar audiences segments for new campaigns starting in May. In August, similar audiences segments will be removed from all existing campaigns. (Search Engine Land)

Awards / Festivals

• Jimmy Kimmel will host next year's Oscars, making it his third time in the role. (THR)

• The Maryland Film Festival will go on hiatus in 2023 as organizers reassess the business model. (Fox)

• Luke Combs won entertainer of the year at the Country Music Association Awards for the second year in a row. (AP)

Cinemas / Theatrical

• AMC Theaters is partnering with Zoom to let audience members video chat from the comfort of their local multiplex beginning next year. (Variety)

• AMC Theaters saw 53M attendees in Q3, up 32% YoY, and total revenue of $968M. (THR)

• Black Adam topped the US box office for a third weekend in a row with $18.5M in ticket sales, bringing its domestic total to $137M. (AP)

Gambling / Casinos

• California voters rejected sports betting despite initiatives by Native American tribes and the wagering industry. (ESPN)

• Wynn resorts will open Gulf Arab's first casino at Ras Al Khaimah resort. (Reuters)

• US commercial gaming set a new record in Q3 with revenue topping $15B for the first time. (Yogonet)

Live Events / Attractions

• Bruno Mars added 10 more dates to his Las Vegas residency in January and February. (Billboard)

• A Dancin' revival will hit broadway in March. The show has been reimagined by the daughter of original creator Bob Fosse. (NYT)

• U2 will perform the first concert at the new MSG Sphere in Las Vegas on September 29th 2023. (LV Review Journal)

Music / Audio / Podcasts

• Conan O'Brien is launching a radio channel called Team Coco Radio on SiriusXM this month. (THR)

• YouTube’s Music and Premium services have 80M+ paying subscribers combined, up 30M YoY. (Variety)

• Spotify revamped its Apple Watch app, adding larger artwork and new features like direct downloads. (Tech Crunch)

• Podcast listener growth is expected to slow globally in the post-pandemic climate. (Insider)

  

• Amazon Music users can no longer select individual songs to play unless they upgrade to the $9/mo unlimited plan. (Insider)

Crypto / NFT / Metaverse

• Binance pulled out of a deal to acquire rival FTX after FTX failed initial due diligence checks. (Gambling News)

• The UK parliament started an inquiry into NFTs and will also study blockchain technology in general. (Bloomberg)

• OpenSea will enforce creator royalties on all collections following community backlash. (Coin Telegraph)

OTT / Streaming

• Squid Game is on track to become Netflix's most valuable title if it adds two more seasons. (Axios)

  

• Netflix launched Triviaverse, a new interactive trivia experience. (Tech Crunch)

• Amazon launched a new annual subscription tier in India, giving users access to Prime Video Mobile Edition for $7.30. (Tech Crunch)

• Hulu will raise the cost of its live TV bundle by $5/mo beginning in December. (Tech Crunch)

• YouTube will soon roll out its Go Live Together co-streaming feature to select creators. (Tech Crunch)

• Peacock Premium Plus customers will soon have 24/7 streaming access to their local NBC affiliate in each of NBC’s 210 affiliate markets. (Streamable)

• Disney+ added 12.1M subscribers in Q3 to pass 235M. Hulu also added 1M subs while ESPN+ added 1.5M. (THR)

• FuboTV reached a record high for its North American subscriber count in Q3, ending the period with 1.23M. (Fierce Video)

• YouTube Shorts are making their way to TV screens following months of development and new feature roll-outs. (Tech Radar)

• Lionsgate+ has left Spain and plans to leave Germany, Belgium and more to focus on LATAM, Canada and the UK. (Gearrice)

• Disney+ has passed Hulu to become Japan’s third largest SVOD, though its 3.6M subscribers are still less than Prime Video’s 16.5M and Netflix’s 7M. (TV Asia)

• Warner Bros. Discovery moved up the launch of its new platform, which will combine the HBO Max and Discovery+, to Q2 '23 instead of Q4. (TTVNews)

Retail / Lifestyle / Travel

• London is the top holiday travel destination for Americans this year, with bookings up 20% from 2019. (Forbes)

• US households will shell out an average of $1.5K on holiday gifts this year, in line with 2021 spending. (CNBC)

• 20% of US adults are planning to shop on Black Friday, while 17% are waiting until after Thanksgiving weekend to shop for the holidays. (Retail Dive)

• US millennials plan to spend the most this holiday season across gifts, travel, and entertainment. (PWC)

  

Social Media

• Twitter fired more than 90% of its employees in India, depleting its engineering and product staff. (Bloomberg)

• Instagram rolled out an in-app scheduling tool to all professional accounts. (Tech Crunch)

• Meta will lay off 11K employees, about 13% of its workforce. (Tech Crunch)

• Elon Musk told Twitter staff to prepare for "difficult times ahead" and ended remote work. (The Verge)

• Decentralized social network Mastodon has reached 1M active monthly users in the wake of recent Twitter drama. (Tech Crunch)

• Instagram wants to take advantage of large screens and is updating its web interface to do so. (Tech Crunch)

• Meta released new creator monetization tools, including subscriptions on Instagram and new NFT options. (Social Media Today)

Video Games

• Netflix is releasing a new game, Stranger Things: Puzzle Tales, based on content from Season 4 of the show. (Tech Crunch)

• AirConsole game developer N-Dream is bringing thousands of games to the company’s car dashboard screens in a partnership with BMW. (The Next Web)

• Roblox's Q3 daily active users were up 24% YoY to 58.8M while its revenue grew 2% YoY to $517.7M. (Tech Crunch)

Live Sports

• Brazilian influencer Casimiro will livestream one match per day from the FIFA World Cup in a broadcasting deal with FIFA including all matches of the Brazilian National Team, the semi-finals and the final. (PR Newswire)

• The average on-screen Quality Index Media Value of a sleeve patch for the full regular MLB season is projected to exceed $12.4M, more than any other professional sports jersey sponsorship in the US. (Nielsen)

  

• In the US, 98% of the 50 most-watched broadcast programs from Q1 '21 - Q3 '21 were sports programming. (Nielsen)

• Roku is adding sports directly to the homescreen to help users see which games are on and quickly start watching with a supported streamer. (The Verge)

Interesting Campaigns / Creative

• British Airways launched a series of relatable billboards that center around a question travelers are often met with: what is the purpose of your visit? (The Drum)

  

_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.