AnalysisLatest
Rakuten has paid shoppers $3.6 billion, and bought a map of their buying lives
The shopper who thinks she is being paid to buy something is, in a strict sense, working.
The complete file
All stories
Reporting, analysis, and human patterns, ordered by publication date and built to be read beyond the headline.
Analysis
EEOC signs indefinite settlement shielding qualifying Christian employers in some…
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Christian Employers Alliance signed their settlement agreement on August 12, 2026.
News
Bulloch County, Georgia did not reject a data center ban on August 4: commissioners…
Bulloch County commissioners have now answered one part of the data center debate: they will not impose the permanent ban presented to them.
Analysis
Cutting social media for one week dropped depressive symptoms 24.8 percent in 373 young…
A schoolteacher in Ohio now has a bio, an aesthetic, and a niche.
Analysis
Federal judge blocks New York’s $75 billion climate superfund law, ruling the…
The ruling, issued from the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York, reads as a jurisdictional exercise.
Psychology
Adults who describe their childhood as ‘fine’ often aren’t in denial…
Someone asks about childhood and the answer comes back before the question fully lands: fine.
Digital
Meta is about to pass Google in worldwide ad revenue — the identity-data trade finally…
Healthcare marketing is a clean illustration of how that argument resolves in practice.
News
The Ohio Supreme Court just ordered Trenton to put a citizen data center ban on a…
The court's answer decides not only whether Trenton votes, but how high any Ohio charter city can set the bar on its own residents.
Analysis
73% of marketing teams used generative AI in Gartner’s 2024 survey — and 45% of CMOs…
More than a decade later, the prediction looks less ridiculous than incomplete.
Analysis
Google’s spam update isn’t broadly targeting AI content — reports point to…
In August 2026, Google rolled out another spam update against a search market already being reshaped from several directions.
Analysis
Snap’s $2,195 Specs bet the billboard will become a stackable AR surface
Static vinyl now exists alongside LED displays, sensors, sound, scent, and digital layers delivered through phones or wearable devices.
Psychology
There’s a difference between loving animals and preferring them to people — one…
The dog gets soft eyes, a smile, a story about the way he tilts his head when the kettle boils.
Digital
Google Analytics’ bot filter only catches the bots polite enough to identify…
Google Analytics' bot filtering setting was never going to solve the problem it was named for.
Analysis
Falling renewals, more emails: the doom loop inside subscription engagement dashboards
Renewal rates fall, the dashboard shows weakening activity, and the company responds by increasing email volume or adding more automated touchpoints.
Analysis
The postal meter on the counter is a loss leader — the software subscription behind it…
The invoice increasingly describes something else.
Digital
ABM’s 2026 reckoning: AI tools compound returns only when the account list is…
When revenue misses its target, each side can point to activity that appeared successful inside its own system.