Mike's Industry View - Issue #135
AI / Creativity
Ikea's Slow and Steady Plan to Save the Smart Home — www.wired.com A new set of connected blinds shows that Ikea's approach to the smart home still makes perfect sense.
Liquid Death and the Nonsense of Packaged Water — www.newyorker.com Helen Rosner writes about the new packaged-water brand Liquid Death, which was created by the entrepreneur Mike Cessario and donates five cents from each can purchased to ocean recovery.
Business/Marketing/Adv
Forget The Trade War. TikTok Is China’s Most Important Export Right Now. — www.buzzfeednews.com Silicon Valley may have begun the era of social media, but its future could be in China.
Are U.S. Malls Dead? Not If Gen Z Keeps Shopping the Way They Do — www.bloomberg.com The next generation of U.S. buyers isn’t shopping like their parents.
Interestingness
London Marathon Runners Were Handed Seaweed Pouches Instead Of Plastic Bottles — www.forbes.com London Marathon runners were given a surprising thirst quencher during their run: edible seaweed pouches filled with a sports drink.
Abokado Adds Insects to the Menu with Roasted Crickets — london.eater.com
Abokado is now offering roasted crickets from Eat Grub as a topping for its products, after Sainsbury’s supermarket started selling the same company’s crickets in November last year.
Wellness
Health-conscious Britons boost alcohol-free drink sales to record high — www.standard.co.uk
Sales of non-alcoholic beer, wine and spirits are at a record high in the UK with increasing numbers of London producers looking to make the most of the £100 million industry.
Why You Need a Network of Low-Stakes, Casual Friendships — www.nytimes.com Weak ties can offer strong rewards.
Platform News
YouTube Unveils a Tool to Take the Pain Out of 6-Second Ad Production — www.adweek.com
“Producing a six-second video requires additional time and resources that not every team has,” it reads. Bumper Machine organizes several six-second packages that advertisers can pick from in minutes"
A Digital Artist’s Honest Renderings of Social Media — mellbe.com A beautiful presentation of social media signs by artist Mike Campau, see his artwork here to boost your creative inspiration :)