Breathe — November 12, 2018

Humanity beats technology (until it doesn't); A.I. isn't magic dust for your business; the variations in ethics of self-driving cars around the world; tech consultants are putting ad agencies on notice; why virality is less effective than word of mouth; Amazon's slow-growth grocery strategy has sparked competition; Yelp is yelping; Twitter and Facebook continue to battle trolls and suspect accounts; the cord-cutting continues, with 1.1 million households dumping cable in Q2; strong areas of growth ahead for podcasting; companies may be held to account for data privacy violations, and agency executives may be on the hook; mo data, mo problems; food innovation origins; tips on being well-liked and irresistible; plus the podcast pick of the week and so much more in the Breathe edition of The Full Monty for the week of November 12, 2018.

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Top Story

To-do lists, apps, pop-up notifications, reminders, calendars...the list goes on and on. We have scores of tools at our disposal to make life easier and less cluttered.

We use technology to help segment our lives, follow news and sports, give us weather predictions, play fantasy football, browse through friends' photos, share memes, have debates...

But technology doesn't solve our problems. It has given us additional problems to address, such as how to stop wasting time on the Internet.

Instead, how about stepping away from or putting away the screen? We might just observe something. Or reconnect more deeply with a loved one. Or learn a little patience along the way.

Breathe. Smell the flowers. Enjoy each other. It's something technology can't do or help you to do.

About this week's image: On May 12, 1863, in the company of the journalist and explorer Fitz Hugh Ludlow, Albert Bierstadt departed on his second trip to the West. They camped in the Yosemite Valley, where Bierstadt captured a number of scenes of natural beauty. This painting depicts the huge jagged naturally occurring peaks that dwarf the figures in the foreground. Once again, nature towers over man.

Speaking Engagements

Always looking for recommendations for venues to share my stories. I connect our digital selves with classical influences, pointing out the universal human truths that can unlock the secret of retaining and growing customer relationships. Feel free to contact me to discuss speaking to your organization or at an event you've been to recently where you think I might stand out.

IDEA: if you're looking to save some of your training and development budget and don't feel like sending multiple members of your team to a conference (high prices, time away from the office, questionable content), I've got an option for you: bring me in for a roundtable experience with your team for an hour or a half day.

Artificial Intelligence / Autonomous

The latest in AI, machine learning, bots, and blockchain, mobility, and autonomous everything.
Aʀᴛɪꜰɪᴄɪᴀʟ Iɴᴛᴇʟʟɪɢᴇɴᴄᴇ / Mᴀᴄʜɪɴᴇ Lᴇᴀʀɴɪɴɢ

According to a new report by Deloitte Insights, the industry is moving from an era of connected A.I. to "pervasive" A.I. The report said that the number of devices with embedded A.I. is expected to increase from 79 million last year to 1.2 billion in 2023. With the embedded devices, A.I. will no longer need internet connectivity to function, according to the report, which will open up new opportunities for industries. (TechRepublic) The machines are getting smarter. Are we?
The head of Google's Cloud A.I. business reminds us that A.I. is not 'magic dust' for your company. (MIT Technology Review)
"With a few adjustments, autocracy is quite compatible with the internet age…In today’s digital world, in China and the West alike, power comes from controlling data, making sense of it, and using it to influence how people behave." The A.I. Cold War with China Threatens Us All. (Wired) Just think how a few tweets control us now...
New Chinese gait recognition technology identifies people based on the way they walk. (AP)

China now has its first A.I. news anchors. (Engadget) You stay classy, Xinhua.

Related: Microsoft's president says we need to regulate facial recognition before "the year 2024 looks like 1984." (Recode)
A study pitted twenty top corporate lawyers against LawGeex AI to see who could spot flaws in non-disclosure agreements faster and more accurately. Who do you think won? (LawGeex) Hint: your hourly fee will be dropping.
20th Century Fox researchers are using machine learning to analyze the content of movie trailers. (The Verge) In a wooorld where researchers are robots and humanity is trapped in front of screens...

Aᴜᴛᴏɴᴏᴍᴏᴜs / Mᴏʙɪʟɪᴛʏ

A global study on the 'trolley problem' indicates that the ethics of self-driving technology varies across geographies. (MIT Technology Review)
Fully autonomous vehicles are decades away, but there are technology advances now that are making advances in autonomous driving. (Axios)
Ford is putting its mobility money where its mouth is with the acquisition of Spin, a dockless scooter company. (Quartz) Car companies buying scooter companies? It makes sense, as it can inform how and where autonomous vehicles get deployed.
Data from millions of smartphone journeys prove that bicycles are faster in cities than cars and motorbikes. (Forbes)
China technology giant Tencent Holdings is recruiting self-driving car engineers in Palo Alto, the latest in a crowd of Chinese companies flocking to Silicon Valley. Of the 60 companies that have permits to test autonomous vehicles in California, 14 of them are from China. (Reuters)
Researchers argue that self-driving cars will have an unforeseen impact on the hospitality industry. Traditional hotels could see a decline in customers as travelers opt to sleep in their cars, restaurants could go mobile and yes, even brothels could take advantage of autonomous vehicle technology. (TechSpot) It’s a good thing Dennis Hof didn’t live to see his election victory in Nevada.

Communications / Marketing / Business Strategy

Industry developments and trends, including advertising & marketing, journalism, customer experience, content, and influencer relations.
Sᴛʀᴀᴛᴇɢʏ / Mᴀʀᴋᴇᴛɪɴɢ / Cᴏɴᴛᴇɴᴛ

Tech Consultants Are the New Mad Men: why the shift from ads to digital marketing is setting up a fight between ad agencies and management consultants. (WSJ)
Marketing's next battlefield: your camera. (PR Week)
If you want to stand out, you need to understand your audience. How to use social listening to improve your marketing. (Convince and Convert)
Orbit Media's 2018 Survey of 1000+ Bloggers is out. It shows an increase in the length of posts and an increase in results, among other things. (Orbit Media)

Jᴏᴜʀɴᴀʟɪsᴍ / Cᴏᴍᴍᴜɴɪᴄᴀᴛɪᴏɴs / Rᴇᴘᴜᴛᴀᴛɪᴏɴ

Vice Media is cutting its workforce by up to 15 percent. Growth has stalled and the company is losing money. (WSJ)
A great viral marketing case study and why it is not a word of mouth strategy. (Convince and Convert) Word of mouth must be sustainable and repeatable. Stunts are one-offs.
Your secret customer score may determine how long you're on hold for. (WSJ)

Retail Apocalypse

Humans are a transactional species, and the practice — if not the very notion of what retail is — is undergoing a historical metamorphosis.

Walmart is building what it's calling an Intelligent Retail Lab inside one of its stores, using A.I. to test both associate and customer experiences. (TechCrunch) Done at scale, this has the potential to quickly transform elements of Walmart's business.
Amazon's slow growth defense strategy in grocery has sparked industry-wide competition from other retail grocers. (Digiday)
Instacart is also following a trend: it has introduced Instacart Pickup, giving consumers an option to avoid delivery and the associated fee and instead pick up their own groceries. (VentureBeat) This hybrid model has seen lots of uptake from the likes of Walmart, Kroger and others and serves as a gateway to online grocery shopping.
Facebook has developed pop-up stores with Macy's in nine cities. It's called The Market and offers 100 "digital-native" brands. (Engadget)
Eight retailers that could go bankrupt in the next year. (Retail Dive) Look out, Sears. You may have company.
Amazon's HQ2 con ended in two additional headquarters — one in northern Virginia, the other near New York City. But it also netted Amazon something more valuable than a tax break. (Business Insider) Hint: it has to do with data.
Five Below has used a formula to insulate itself from Amazon: it has created products from scratch and made it a place where kids want to hang out. (WSJ)
Take this test to determine what your secret shopper score is. It determines a customer's lifetime value to a company. (WSJ) Mine is $71.68.
One neat thing: I've been trying out Ibotta, which gives you real cash back on items you buy at a number of stores, from Whole Foods to CVS, Amazon, Kroger and more. You can scan a receipt, use the mobile app, or link it with your loyalty cards. Check it out.

"Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others." – Cicero

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Platforms

News to know about relevant social, virtual, and augmented reality platforms that may affect your business.

Fᴀᴄᴇʙᴏᴏᴋ / Iɴsᴛᴀɢʀᴀᴍ / WʜᴀᴛsAᴘᴘ

Facebook says that it has improved at removing terrorist content. In the second and third quarters of 2018, it removed 12.4 million pieces of content endorsing or promoting groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda. (CNBC)
The ingredients of a weaponized social media platform are features shared by every such platform from WhatsApp to Facebook to Twitter, and whatever catches on next. (Wired) They all trade on how the human brain is built. In some ways, it's not the social networks that are weaponized, it's humans.
While Facebook retains the largest share of audience, Instagram's engagement numbers mean that it is on its way to become Facebook's crown jewel for advertisers. (Content Standard)

Tᴡɪᴛᴛᴇʀ

Twitter removed thousands of accounts that tried to dissuade Democrats from voting. (TechCrunch)
Twitter also removed millions of suspicious accounts last Friday, causing a drop to many users' follower counts. (Reuters)
Co-founder Ev Williams says that in retrospect, showing how many followers you have "wasn't healthy." (Recode) But it did touch that part of the brain that loves competition and public preening.

Oᴛʜᴇʀ

An analysis of videos suggested by the YouTube's recommendation engine finds that users are directed toward progressively longer and more popular content. (Pew Research Center)
Yelp stock is at a 52-week low after disclosing zero net new advertisers. (CNBC) At this rate, how feasible is Yelp's business model?

Media

The latest in the world of streaming video, audio, and the advertising, pricing and bundling models related to them.
Vɪᴅᴇᴏ

Cable and satellite TV providers lost roughly 1.1 million subscribers between July and September 2018, the largest quarterly loss for the industry. (USA Today)
Disney's new Netflix rival is called Disney+ and will debut in late 2019. (CNBC) Disney has the ability to create a strong offering, including navigation that is unique to Disney+, thanks to the vertical and horizontal nature of its content.
As Netflix plunges deeper into originals, its Hollywood wing is doing the once-unthinkable: overriding the metrics and making decisions based on experience and intuition rather than algorithms. (WSJ) One mustn't offend the sensibilities of its stars.
In its latest annual study of TV viewing habits, Hub Entertainment Research found that more people seek out their favorite shows on Netflix than on live TV. (Deadline Hollywood)
YouTube Premium is no longer in the top 10 streaming services in the U.S. (The Wrap)

Aᴜᴅɪᴏ

Podcast listening is rising. Particularly strong areas of growth for podcasting: Android devices and cars. (Sydney Morning Herald)
Spotify is losing $1 billion a year. Could podcasts be an answer to its woes? (Rolling Stone)
Red Bull Radio announced that it struck a deal to stream worldwide via the smart speaker brand Sonos. (Variety)
Spotify debuted its first analytics tool aimed at publishers. The tool will offer daily streaming stats, including playlist performance, and view data across all the songwriters on their roster. (TechCrunch)
Program of the Week: Our pick this week is Imagined Life from Wondery. An immersive journey through the surprising moments and challenges that shaped someone’s life before they were famous. Clues are dropped along the way, but only at the end will you discover who 'you' are. A longer variation on our opening stories of The Full Monty podcast.

And don't forget about The Full Monty podcast, our own 5-minute weekly business commentary. Try this: "Alexa, play the latest episode of The Full Monty."

Privacy / Security / Regulatory

Business disruptions in the legal, regulatory, and computer security fields, from hacking to the on-demand economy and more.
Pʀɪᴠᴀᴄʏ / Sᴇᴄᴜʀɪᴛʏ / Hᴀᴄᴋɪɴɢ

Yahoo has agreed to a $50 million fine in connection with the 2013 data breach that exposed information from all 3 billion of its user accounts. (Digital Trends) That's only 1.6¢ per user, for those of you doing the math.
Company executives could go to jail for misusing data under proposed U.S. data privacy law. The GDPR-style federal legislation also provides penalties of up to 4% of a company's annual income. (MarTech Today)
Marketers are responding to new data-privacy rules by pressuring agencies to accept millions of dollars in liability if violations occur, adding yet another layer of tension in client-agency relationships. (WSJ) Because who wouldn't go to jail for their clients for a price, right? RIGHT?!?
What do third-party trackers know about us? 5,300 rows and 46 columns of data for a single user in one week. (Privacy International) But there's a lot of messy data, and without structure or cleaning, it's a bunch of useless information. And that's another challenge for companies.
Your privacy is at risk if you use restaurant reservation apps such as NoWait and OpenTable. (CNET) You’re giving up your data everywhere. Patience is truly a virtue.

Rᴇɢᴜʟᴀᴛᴏʀʏ / Oɴ-Dᴇᴍᴀɴᴅ Eᴄᴏɴᴏᴍʏ

Amid the wildfires in California, Airbnb is offering free shelter for victims. (Heavy)
UberEats is so popular, it's reshaping the food industry. (The Hustle)
Uber and Lyft are on pace to reach 31 million rides in Seattle next year. (SeattlePi)

Measurement / Analytics / Data

The future is not in plastics, but in data. Those who know how to measure and analyze it will rule the world.

Integrating disparate systems is a challenging barrier in developing a successful strategy for utilizing marketing technology. (eMarketer)
When it comes to big data, analytics and A.I., the value does not come from collecting the data, or even from deriving some insight from it — value comes from just one thing: action.
Attribution remains a priority for marketers, but is most frequently held up by one thing: poor data quality. (eMarketer)
Facebook is rolling out analytics for Instagram and expanded Page analytics. (Marketing Land)

Mental Nourishment

Other links to help you reflect, improve, or simply learn something new.

Every state's most important food innovation. From lobster rolls to burgers to M&Ms, they all had their origin somewhere. (Thrillist)
Did you know that the 1950s had its own version of the duckface? It's the Oooo Face — that puckered look that women had in advertising. (Design You Trust)
Most people waste spare minutes on activities that give them no greater sense of accomplishment than if they had skipped them. Here’s how to change that.
Ten CEOs have suggestions on how to get people to like you. (TIME)
The three keys to becoming irresistible are fundamental traits that emotionally intelligent leaders possess. (Medium)
Charm elevates the spirit, widens our lens on life, heightens its color, intensifies and sweetens it. Charm is one of life’s lovely luxuries. (Weekly Standard)
We all know the Disney Princesses. But you haven't seen them reimagined as noir femme fatales before. (My Modern Met)

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Top image credit: Merced River, Yosemite Valley by Albert Bierstadt, 1866 (Public Domain, via The Met)

Monday, November 12, 2018