Business Insider, which blends business news and pop culture coverage, has registered 30% growth in revenue for 2020, generating over $150 million. The growth was attributed to the company’s reliance on programmatic advertising, which unlike directly sold ads did not see a big decline during the pandemic, and to the expansion of its subscription business to an estimated 100K paying members.
2. Taboola’s Plans IPO Via SPAC to Raise $545 Million (Business Insider)
Content recommendation engine Taboola merged with special-purpose acquisition company ION Acquisition Corp to go public. According to Business Insider, the deal is expected to value Taboola at $2.6 billion.
3. Twitter launches Birdwatch, a Fact-Checking Program intended to Fight Misinformation (NBC News)
Twitter unveiled a new feature called ‘Bird Watch’ to strengthen its efforts against misinformation. This feature allows users to discuss and provide context to tweets they believe are misleading or false. The feature is currently available for selective users that have an account tied to a real phone number and email address.
4. NBCU-Twitter Multi-Year Partnership Aims to Target Global Audience (AdExchanger)
NBCUniversal and Twitter have inked a multi-year partnership that enables marketers to reach global audiences with social inventory and integrated premium content. The deal that began as a national partnership in 2013 will be extended to deliver NBCU’s premium digital content to Twitter worldwide, allowing marketers to target global and local audiences. The deal honors the existing advertising and content partnership by covering global Twitter markets across the NBCUniversal Sky worldwide.
5. Facebook Users’ Phone Numbers are for Sale Through a Telegram bot ( Vice )
A hacker has gotten access to a database full of Facebook users’ phone numbers and is now selling that data using a Telegram bot, according to Motherboard. The security researcher who found this vulnerability, Alon Gal, says that the person who runs the bot claims to have the information of 533 million users, which came from a Facebook vulnerability that was patched in 2019.
6. Publishers Now Have An Opportunity to Change Google and Facebook ( AdExchanger )
Ten US States have collaborated with top publishers and sued tech giants Google and Facebook for allegedly indulging in monopolistic practices. Kargo COO Mike Shaugnessy argues that this lawsuit along with other similar suits provides digital publishers a window of opportunity to change the behavior of these tech giants.
7. Google to Open COVID-19 Vaccination Sites ( USA Today )
Google to open up select facilities for use as vaccination sites and improve search results to provide better information on finding vaccines for COVID-19. Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and parent company Alphabet, said the company will partner with a medical provider and public health authorities to open up sites in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York City, and Kirkland, Washington, near Seattle.
