CDP Institute

CDP Redpoint Global is launching its Data Readiness Hub, which packages its data quality and identity resolution tools in a real-time environment to automatically update customer profiles as new data becomes available. The aim is to solve quality problems before the data enters critical activation systems. Continuous updates also reduce data preparation time.

ChatGPT has taken one more step towards selling ads, by delivering product recommendations when users display shopping intent (according to OpenAI, anyway). Products are displayed in visual carousels, providing additional product information and links to sites where purchases can be made. OpenAI emphasizes that products are selected independently by the LLM and are not ads. Yet.

Researchers from Duke University say that workers using genAI tools like ChatGPT and Gemini are likely to be seen as lazy and incompetent by their co-workers. The finding is based on experiments with over 4,400 participants. But, as the researchers point out, labor-saving technologies have always raised alarms when first introduced: educators worried that calculators would deplete math skills, and Plato was opposed to that new-fangled memory aid, writing.

How sane is it to think WordPress will easily be conquered? Sanity is all set to try, maintaining the traditional content management system is broken and should be replaced by one that unites content and data in one solution, accessible to marketing, developer and other teams (explained at much greater length here). They just raised $85 million in a Series C funding round to help things along.

MasterCard, PayPal and Visa may be ahead of the curve in believing that shoppers will allow AI agents to make purchases on their behalf, but a gentle wind of change is blowing. Salesforce’s latest Connected Shoppers report shows that “purchase recommended products on your behalf” is the least trusted action an AI agent can perform. Nevertheless, 19% of those surveyed are “very interested” in the possibility and 28% “somewhat interested” — that’s almost 50% leaning in that direction.

A survey of 2,000 CEOs by IBM finds 37% saying it’s better to be “fast and wrong” than “right and slow” when adopting technology in general. Specifically on AI, a striking 64% admitted adoption was prompted by the “risk” of falling behind rather than clear understanding of what it would bring to the business. But CEOs look on the sunny side, with 85% expecting positive ROI on AI by, oh, 2027.

If you still think that MCP stands for Male Chauvinist Pig, well, the 1970’s want their disco ball back. Today’s hep cats know that MCP stands for Model Context Protocol, a new-but-widely supported standard that lets large language models access structured data as context for their prompts. Early adopters include Salesforce and Adobe, and search platform Algolia is now using it to feed their data to customer-facing real-time AI agents.

Today’s frontier in AI-land is agents reading external data (MCP) and cooperating with other agents (A2A). So it’s almost charmingly retro to see digital experience vendor Optimizely proudly announce that its upgraded Opal AI tool lets users create embedded agents with access to data across the Optimizely One platform. Users also get a new interface, prebuilt tool library to tackle tasks like creating presentations and analyzing web pages, and agents that specialize in specific marketing tasks.

Game developers once feared that players would resent seeing ads, but, well, money. Leading game engine Unity, which released its first ad platform in 2021, just replaced it with a new version that will ingest gamer data from across the Unity eco-system. The new system uses an adaptive model to teach itself how to make ads more effective for certain audiences.

Israel-based Sett has raised $15 million in Series A funding to further develop its game-related agentic AI platform. The platform machine-learns from live campaign data and competitor behavior to generate high-performing marketing content for retention and acquisition. Near as we can tell, it doesn’t produce the games themselves…yet.

Damn the anti-trust rulings, full speed ahead seems to be the motto at Google these days. Their latest extensions include new CTV partnerships allowing ad placement across more streaming services, a new partnership with Roblox to reach gamers, and more ad placements within high-profile live and sports events. Google says its display and video ads are now reaching 98% of CTV households, not least thanks to the enormous reach of YouTube.

When did you last Skype someone? Come to that, when did you first Skype someone? The app, precursor of FaceTime, Zoom and all the rest is bidding farewell after 23 years, with Microsoft rolling it into Microsoft Teams. Sic transit gloria mundi.