• Meta Platforms Inc. announced it will stop supporting digital collectibles like NFTs on both Facebook and Instagram, less than a year after the feature rolled out to creators on the platforms worldwide. (TechCrunch) The latest product sunset comes as the tech giant prepares to announce its second round of major job cuts on Wednesday, according to people familiar with the matter. (Financial Times)
• Pfizer Inc. agreed to buy Seagen Inc., a biotech firm specializing in cancer-targeting drugs, for $43 billion in cash. Despite a recent wave of antitrust pushback from federal government authorities, Pfizer executives said they expect the sale to earn regulatory approval as Seagen brings complementary capabilities to its portfolio. (The Wall Street Journal)
• PLBY Group Inc. plans to revive its Playboy magazine as a digital publication later this year, hoping it will serve as an entry point to Centerfold, its recently launched online creator platform. Playboy, which stopped printing its magazine in 2020, has marketed Centerfold as an “elevated” and “safe” alternative to content subscription site OnlyFans. (The New York Post)

A Demographic Deep Dive Into the Taylor Swift Fandom

Morning Consult

Walgreen’s Appoints Publicis Groupe’s Epsilon As Its New Media AOR

Steve McLellan, MediaPost

The firm’s annual media expenditures are estimated at $200 million by agency research company COMvergence. The drug store chain, part of Walgreens Boots Alliance, put its media account into review in November of last year. 

Analytics Startup Rayn Is Trying To Make “Digital Twins” A Thing

James Hercher, AdExchanger

The idea of a digital twin is to create personas that function as amalgamations of how different people with similar preferences and online patterns think – or how they shop, to be specific.

Comcast Changes Segment Reporting to Align Sky With Connectivity and Content Businesses

Etan Vlessing, The Hollywood Reporter

The move follows the media conglomerate taking an $8.6 billion non-cash charge for the European pay TV giant in Q3 2022 to reflect lowered future earnings projections.

Spotify’s new ‘DJ’ feature is the first step into the streamer’s AI-powered future

Sarah Perez, TechCrunch

Spotify has bigger plans for the technology behind its new AI DJ feature after seeing positive consumer reaction to the new feature.

BuzzFeed says most of cash and cash equivalents held at SVB

Reuters

The digital media firm said it had about $56 million in cash and cash equivalents at the end of 2022.

ABC’s Oscars telecast scores biggest audience since 2020 with 18.7 million viewers

Stephen Battaglio, The Los Angeles Times

ABC’s telecast of the 95th Academy Awards on Sunday got a post-slap lift in the ratings, according to Nielsen data.

Sean “Diddy” Combs Throws Hat Into the Ring for BET Stake

Alex Weprin,  The Hollywood Reporter

Combs joins Tyler Perry and Byron Allen in expressing interest in the media property, which also includes VH1 and BET+.

Streamers are spending big on sports rights from soccer to MMA, and a surge in Spanish-language viewing has ‘opened up a whole different market’

Claire Atkinson, Insider

Soccer’s UEFA Champions League offers the next big Spanish-language rights opportunity. 

Reddit Hires Ex-Twitter Media Exec Sarah Rosen as Head of Content Partnerships

Todd Spanlger, Variety

Sarah Rosen, who left Twitter last year shortly after Elon Musk’s takeover over the social network, has joined Reddit as senior director of content partnerships.

Amazon, Rivian in Talks to End Exclusivity Part of Delivery-Van Pact

Sean McLain et al., The Wall Street Journal

EV maker seeks to sell to others after Amazon order at low end of range.

Samsung caught faking zoom photos of the Moon 

James Vincent and John Porter, The Verge

A viral Reddit post has revealed just how much processing the company’s cameras apply to photos of the Moon, further blurring the line between real and fake imagery in the age of AI.

YouTube Shorts ad payouts to creators highlights deeper monetization woes

Krystal Scanlon, Digiday

YouTube’s decision to share ad revenue on Shorts last month was intended to help creators make more cash. So far it hasn’t, and creators aren’t sure if (or when) it ever will.

SVB Sends a Chill Through Hot SXSW

Kaya Yurieff, The Information

Silicon Valley Bank’s implosion hung over the kickoff, ranging from panic on Friday as startups and investors scrambled to navigate the collapse, to relief by Sunday when regulators announced they would backstop all deposits. 

Lunchables are going to be rolled out directly to students

Parija Kavlianz, CNN

Kraft Heinz has succeeded in getting its ready-to-eat packaged Lunchables into school lunch programs starting this fall, in a major new initiative. But the company had to reformulate the ingredients to ensure the products meet federal guidelines first.

Pepsi Zero Sugar Asks Fans To Predict March Madness Losers

Steve Ellwanger, MediaPost

The brand describes the initiative as “Pepsi Got Zero Right, Can You?”

How Shein and Temu are approaching expansion beyond the U.S.

Vidhi Choudhary, Modern Retail

Chinese-linked e-commerce giants Shein and Temu are rapidly expanding their international operations to markets like Australia, New Zealand and Latin America.

Agencies are still split on what the future of work looks like

Kelsey Sutton, Marketing Brew

Leadership teams aren’t done figuring out whether the future of work is in an office or on a laptop screen.

What a “balance pledge” can do for your company and employees

Xerxes Cooper, Quartz

One way to get workers to go the extra mile is by encouraging the very thing so-called quiet quitters want—boundaries.

Uber, Lyft Score Victory as California Court Affirms Right to Treat Drivers as Contractors

Preetika Rana, The Wall Street Journal

Ruling preserves gig-economy business model but also paves way for collective bargaining.

Gen Z isn’t ‘quiet quitting’—they’re grappling with a lack of interpersonal connection

Bella Pittinger, Fast Company

A lack of work ethic isn’t to blame.

Y Combinator cuts nearly 20% of staff, scales back growth stage investments

Natasha Mascarenhas, TechCrunch

The accelerator told TechCrunch that Silicon Valley Bank’s failure was not a factor and that they have been strategizing about the shift “well before” the collapse; over 30% of Y Combinator’s startups are exposed to SVB.