??Creativ Brief: Campaign Convene Recap: Marketing Evolved

We’re in New York today, recapping the last of our launch of Creativ Company.?

The campaign editorial team has energy. A new crop of reporters with fresh ideas and a can do attitude. I enjoyed working with them and their events team to sponsor their latest conference, Campaign Convene, Marketing Evolved.?

We spoke on a panel with Chief Creative Officer and generally smart, creative guy Greg Harrison, on “How Machine Intelligence is transforming the creative and insights industries.” The theme of the talk was demystifying AI.?

As Greg Harrison puts it, there’s no AI - only machine intelligence vs human intelligence.? AI has become a moniker for technology magic. An ephemeral new thing that’s going to change the face of humanity, but only for the select few that understand how to wield it.?

Not true.

Machine intelligence is simply a mathematical predictive model, seeking to predict the answer you are requesting. ChatGPT stands for Chat General Pre-trained transformer - a fancy way of saying a model that predicts what words you want to see based on a prompt.?

Greg and I spoke about the implications of machine intelligence on the creative and insights field. For creatives, the ways of working, iteration, ideation, brainstorming, will be transformed by the rapid advances of generative machine intelligence. No more will creatives have to labor for hours to create rough mock ups for clients. Story boards, aesthetics, and plots can now be easily generated with machine intelligence products.

On the insights side, I spoke how machine intelligence, and specifically our machine-generated insights (MGI) products built on our LLM stack ellain, will replace the time intensive and costly work of collecting survey and focus group data. Now one can ingest real human conversations around any campaign, brand, IP, or topic, organize it, and visualize it using MGI. This will reduce the need for analyst labor.?

In other news from the conference, Janice Min, Editor and Chief of the breakout entertainment publication Ankler, teased upcoming gaming and marketing newsletters. MSC cruises and Pepsi spoke about the brand health metrics they use, which consist of antiquated brand lift studies that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. Soul Cycle is using AI to curate music and hospitality experiences in their studios. Samsung is testing personalized ads across their hardware ecosystem using AI. Reddit is going on a buying spree from their new funding round, buying technology to measure, curate content, place ads, and rank Reddit higher in search results in order to grow viewership. Verizon is going deep into creators and hiring former TikTok executives to do it.?

It was a great day. Feeling blessed to be part of this industry.?

3 Stories Dominating Media and Tech Headlines

Chegg sues Google over its AI Overviews.? Chegg, an online education company, accused the tech juggernaut’s AI summaries of negatively affecting their search results and causing their overall traffic and subsequent revenue to fall. This is allegedly the first ever antitrust lawsuit filed against an AI summary feature via a single company.?

Why it matters: The claim posits that Google maintains a monopoly in the tech space, taking advantage of the informational and educational content of companies like Chegg allegedly without any compensation or credit. This lawsuit is the first to question how AI overviews or summaries affect web traffic.?

Humane's AI Pin is dead, as HP buys startup's assets for $116M. Humane alerted customers via a blog post that their Pin devices will stop working by the end of February. HP is acquiring Humane’s team of engineers and managers, which will form the foundation of a new group in HP labeled HP IQ. HP IQ is being described as an “AI innovation lab focused on building an intelligent ecosystem across HP’s products and services for the future of work.”?

Why it matters: In addition, HP will also acquire Humane’s technology, most importantly Humane’s CosmOS AI operating system, an operating system that Human suggested that the operating system could run on a myriad of everyday consumer devices. Investors are happier as they receive some cash back while HP gets some sexy new AI tech and teams for a steep discount.?

DOGE Is Working on Software That Automates the Firing of Government Workers. Sources have told WIRED that Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is working on developing software for the purpose of mass firing workers across the federal government. If DOGE is able to implement a software that speeds up the process in which federal employees are removed from the government, the effects we already see would multiply exponentially.?

Why it matters: One of the largest government contractors receiving federal dollars, Musk, is increasingly in control of how the government spends our money. He wouldn’t cancel competitor contracts, fire federal workers reviewing his contracts, and award himself more contracts… would he? No way he would… He probably will.?

Creativ Spotlight - SXSW Panel Bonanza!

Get ready Austin - Creativ Company is headed to SXSW 2025, along with our incredible clients! Be on the lookout for not only our team repping the Creativ Company brand, but the events our clients will be taking part in - members of the MOCEAN and Havoc Robotics teams will be speaking on panels, while 1stAveMachine and SpecialGuestX are finalists in the SXSW Innovation Awards.

If you’re headed to SXSW this year, let the Creativ Company team know - we’d love to hear from you and see you there!

Stat of the Week - Top Publishers by Consumer Engagement

Using our patented Machine-Generated Insights, we ranked video game publishers based on consumer engagement on posts, videos, or articles referencing them.

Some companies gained a lot more traction online and stood out from their competitors, especially Roblox, Ubisoft, and Nintendo who all reached double digit percentages of engagement. For brands looking to partner with studios with the most engaged communities, this list serves as a great starting point.?

The future of insights is here!

One Fun Thing - Classic Theatrical Reruns

‘Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith’ Returning to Theaters for 20th Anniversary?

Star Wars fans are having a good week! Lucasfilm just announced that Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, a film considered a ‘fan favorite’ within the Star War community, will be hitting theaters again this April.?

This rerelease is in tandem with the movie’s 20th anniversary - Lucasfilm has been making a point of rereleasing Star Wars films in celebration of milestone anniversaries, most recently rereleasing Star Wars: The Phantom Menace for the film’s 25th anniversary last year. Several indie movie theaters now run classic movies of various genres. An interesting trend as theaters try to get butts in theater seats.