The New York Times unveiled a new Watch tab in its flagship app on Tuesday, a mobile-native destination for vertical video that marks a significant expansion from the publisher into visual journalism.

The swipeable video feed, which has been available to a small cohort of users for several weeks, will feature short-form clips spanning The Times’ portfolio—News, Opinion, Cooking, Wirecutter, and The Athletic—curated and refreshed throughout the day. 

The product marks the first time a major publisher has introduced a dedicated tab for vertical video within its own app, signaling how seriously The Times is treating the medium as a core storytelling format rather than an off-platform experiment.

“We’ve transformed our journalism to be multimedia,” said Joy Robins, global chief advertising officer of The New York Times, “and the Watch tab is the next evolution of how we provide users a destination to engage with our video.” 

The launch caps a period of rapid transformation for The Times, which has spent the past three years recasting its newsroom as a multimedia engine. 

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After years of investing in audio, visuals, and documentary work, the publisher now produces roughly 75 hours of professionally made video each month, according to the company. Video consumption across its platforms has more than doubled year over year, and viewers now stream hundreds of millions of minutes of Times-produced clips monthly.

The new tab arrives seven months after the company introduced a Listen tab and just weeks after announcing the shutdown of its standalone Audio app, the features of which are being folded into the main News app experience. 

Together, the updates turn The Times’ app into a single home for text, video, and audio—an integrated ecosystem that mirrors how audiences already consume content across devices and platforms.

Engagement before monetization

Unlike TikTok or Instagram Reels, Watch will launch without advertising or algorithmic personalization, according to Robins.

For now, the goal is to learn how users interact with short-form video—what they watch, finish, and return to—before introducing marketing opportunities. 

The unique combination of a vertical video feed without an algorithm will offer an interesting case study into how engaging the format is without the machine learning of TikTok and Reels. The feed also lacks signal providers, such as likes or comments, that social platforms use to gauge user interest. 

For videos that are previews of full-length content available elsewhere on the app, like stories, podcasts, or full-length videos, users can click through the text at the bottom of the vertical video to discover the original content. In this way, the feed serves as a recirculation and content discovery engine, in addition to a means of engagement.

The Times plans to open the format to a small group of beta advertisers in 2026, Robins said. That rollout will build on lessons from its Games app, where vertical interstitial ads have achieved 80% to 90% viewability and significant brand-lift improvements, according to the publisher.

The content format, combined with The Times’ editorial capability, could make an enticing pitch for marketers, according to Digital Remedy chief revenue officer Matt Fanelli, whose company helps publishers monetize vertical video.

“As audiences spend more time in immersive, short-form environments, marketers are seeking formats that deliver both engagement and performance, not just reach,” Fanelli said. “For publishers, it opens a new avenue for monetization, pairing storytelling with inventory that’s native, high-impact, and built for how people actually consume content today.”

NYT Advertising expects to bring those learnings to Watch, offering brands an environment where they can reuse social assets and launch campaigns within 48 hours, without custom builds or lengthy approval cycles. 

The ad strategy mirrors The Times’ broader product philosophy: move slowly, learn deeply, then scale, according to Robins.

A curated feed built for discovery

The Watch tab will rely on human curation rather than algorithmic ranking, reflecting The Times’ preference for editorial judgment over machine-driven personalization. 

The feed will surface a mix of investigations, visual essays, cultural commentary, and lifestyle coverage, designed to expose users to the full breadth of The Times’ journalism rather than confine them to familiar topics.

That approach differentiates the product from social platforms and underscores the publisher’s focus on discovery and editorial range.

It’s also the latest development The Times has made to build its own controlled environment rather than rely on services like TikTok, YouTube Shorts, or Instagram Reels to reach audiences. It previously launched Listen to make audio native to its app.

Together, these changes illustrate a strategy that prioritizes owned distribution, immersive formats, and a premium user experience over reach on third-party platforms.

“What’s exciting for us is that our advertising business is doing really well without video,” Robins said. “This represents a disciplined opportunity to grow, one that follows our product evolution and gives both consumers and advertisers a quality place to watch.”

On Tuesday, the French news publisher Le Monde launched a cross-offer initiative with The New York Times, an arrangement that will allow Le Monde—as well as its sister publications Courrier International and Le Nouvel Obs—to offer their subscribers a one-year New York Times subscription for no additional cost.

The deal is not a partnership, per se. The bundle will not be available to all Le Monde readers; instead, the French outlet will selectively present it to those with a high propensity to respond to it, such as readers who engage with the international section, according to Le Monde’s chief digital operations officer Lou Grasser. It also only goes one way: The New York Times will not be offering its readers an opportunity to subscribe to Le Monde. 

“We have seen encouraging results from other bundles, but this is fundamentally a test,” Grasser said. “The philosophy is the same that guides our deals with OpenAI and Perplexity, in that the faster we go with testing the sooner we will know what works.”

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The bundle includes The New York Times’ full digital subscription, which includes products like Cooking and Games. It is also meant to complement Le Monde in English, a translated version of Le Monde that the publisher debuted in 2022, to entice European readers who do not speak French. 

For Le Monde, the initiative is part of a larger effort to scale its subscription business. The French news publisher, the largest in the country, now has 665,000 total subscribers, 600,000 of which are digital-only, according to Grasser. (Le Monde in English has brought in around 13,000 subscribers, Grasser said, a fraction of the 150,000 English-speaking customers it had set as its 2025 goal.)

More broadly, the outlet had set for itself the ambitious goal of netting 1 million subscribers by 2025, a mark that it is also bound to miss. But it continues to work diligently toward its stated aim, and has made ample use of innovative partnerships to do so, including tie-ups with Spotify and HBO in the last year.

Overall, Le Monde Group generated €310 million ($360 million) in 2024, roughly half of which, around €150 million, came from Le Monde alone, according to Grasser. Subscriptions accounted for approximately 50% of that business, or around €75 million, which breaks down further into digital (35%) and print (15%). By the end of 2025, Le Monde anticipates generating around €70 million ($81 million) from digital subscribers, a growth of 33%.

For The Times, the initiative accomplishes several objectives. It nets it a cut of the generated revenue, for one. But more critically, it provides the news publisher, which itself aims to have 15 million subscribers by 2027, a valuable source of data about the international appetite for its subscription product. It also gains access to this data at virtually no cost, as the structure of the Le Monde deal does not require The Times to manage the infrastructure of the bundle.

“This provides The New York Times with exposure to a new market without any customer acquisition cost,” according to Felix Danczak, a subscription marketing analyst who is now head of AI and growth at venture firm Pembroke VCT. “They also get behavioral and engagement data on international readers for free, which will tell them whether or not it makes sense to do this expansion elsewhere.”

Indeed, the tie-up with Le Monde is not the first such arrangement the Gray Lady has inked. 

Last fall, four European news publishers—El País (Spain), Politiken (Denmark), the Irish Times (Ireland), and Corriere della Sera (Italy)—sweetened their subscription deals by offering complimentary access to The New York Times. The Times has these deals with more than 20 publishers, according to Nieman Lab. 

The tie-ups are part of a broader strategy for the publisher, which in March 2022 set itself the goal of becoming “the essential subscription for every curious, English-speaking person seeking to understand and engage with the world.”

All the news that’s translated to print

Lately, even a goal as lofty as serving “every curious, English-speaking person” has begun to feel limited. 

Crucially, instantaneous language translation has become more widespread. The technology has been gradually improving for years, and AI has only accelerated that rate of growth. 

Le Monde in English, for instance, became economically feasible only because AI could do the bulk of the translation work (although the final copy is reviewed by a team of editors), according to the company, which is majority owned by French billionaire Xavier Niel. (Niel is also an investor in several AI startups.)

So far, The Times’ forays into international markets have come in the form of untranslated products. Enough people speak English worldwide that it has not yet been a materially limiting factor. 

But with nearly costless translation now readily accessible, The Times could soon begin to evolve its international expansion strategy, offering its product in consumers’ native language and dramatically increasing its total addressable market, according to Danczak.

A spokesperson for The New York Times declined to comment.

The company has also faced pressure from activist investors to increase its use of the technology. In August, investment firm Fivespan announced it had built up a position in The Times, pushing the publisher to more aggressively embrace AI. Fivespan founders Dylan Haggart and Sarah Coyne pointed to AI-enabled translation as a key growth accelerant that The Times has left underutilized. 

“AI is a clear tailwind for The New York Times,” Fivespan said in a letter obtained by Bloomberg in August. “Our work shows it can more than double the company’s long-term revenue and profit potential: enhancing growth by reaching broader audiences, converting more readers into paying subscribers, and unlocking new, lucrative profit pools.”

If The Times believes it can generate 15 million English-speaking subscribers by the end of next year, imagine how much larger its potential market could be once language is no longer a barrier, Danczak said. Translation, properly handled, could dramatically balloon The Times’ subscriber base, transforming its business into a truly international resource.

The benefits extend even beyond subscribers. Translation renders not only new reporting more valuable, but archival content as well, according to Jeff Kaloski, managing director and partner at L.E.K. Consulting. 

A similar phenomenon is playing out right now in the entertainment industry, Kaloski said. Backlogs of content going back decades—more than a century in some cases—can now be localized at next to no cost, unlocking intellectual property that was once cost-prohibitive to translate.

As AI firms work to secure licensing deals with trusted information providers, The Times’ ability to translate its archive into other languages could make its data exponentially more valuable. Rather than limit its utility to English-based queries, Times content could be used to inform answers in any language, according to Danczak.

Of course, this all remains hypothetical at the moment. 

The Times, alongside Le Monde and others, has moved slowly in its embrace of AI-enabled translation in order to ensure that its quality of reporting does not suffer. Automated translation tools still produce errors particularly in less-popular languages, and competitors that have moved more quickly, like Bloomberg, have hit snags trying to inject AI-generated summaries and localization into their coverage. 

For The Times to be “the essential subscription” for the non-English speaking world, it will first need to be trusted in other languages.

Grubhub is entering the Big Game for the first time.

The food delivery service announced on Wednesday that it will air its inaugural Super Bowl commercial in 2026, marking its first national campaign since being acquired by Marc Lore’s Wonder Group last November. 

The company offered few details about the creative concept or timing of the spot but positioned the move as a signal of renewed investment in its brand.

“For over 20 years, the brand has pioneered food delivery,” Grubhub said in a statement. “And now, as part of Wonder Group, it’s ready to take on the biggest stage in advertising—and football.” 

“Twenty years ago, we connected diners to their favorite local eats, and now we’re entering a new era,” said Marnie Kain, Grubhub’s vice president and head of brand. “Our first-ever national Big Game spot is the most definitive signal of our renewed investment in the Grubhub brand and a massive brand refocus for the category we helped build.”

A renewed push under Wonder

The ad will represent Grubhub’s first major brand investment under Wonder, which has snapped up a flurry of food and media holdings in quick succession. 

Lore, an ecommerce pioneer who sold Diapers.com to Amazon and Jet.com to Walmart, founded Wonder in 2021. 

In addition to acquiring Grubhub, Wonder bought meal-kit service Blue Apron for $103 million in September 2023 and digital media network Tastemade for $90 million in March, signaling its ambitions to build a vertically integrated food ecosystem spanning content, delivery, and commerce.

Grubhub joins its primary competitors, DoorDash and Uber Eats, in embracing the Super Bowl as a vehicle for raising brand awareness. Neither DoorDash nor Uber Eats has confirmed Super Bowl advertising plans for next year, but both companies have made consistent appearances during the game in recent years.

The two firms have used their Big Game spots to cement cultural relevance—Uber Eats with its celebrity-packed Century of Cravings and DoorDash with comedic, product-driven campaigns like DashPass Math.

Grubhub’s long-awaited debut suggests Wonder sees the Super Bowl as the perfect platform to reintroduce the brand to consumers and reclaim ground in a crowded category. According to a March 2024 report from Bloomberg Second Measure, DoorDash leads the category with roughly 67% market share in the U.S., followed by Uber Eats at 23%. Grubhub captures just 8%.

Details about game-day activations, promotions, and the ad’s creative team will be released closer to Super Bowl LX, which will air Feb. 8 on NBC.

“The Big Game is where brands make their biggest statements,” Kain said. “We can’t wait to remind America why we are the authority in food delivery.”

At the IAB Podcast Upfront in Midtown Manhattan on Tuesday, scores of media executives, celebrities, audio creators, and adtech vendors graced the stage to extol the virtues of podcasting.

In a series of presentations interspersed with frenzied networking breaks, panelists hit all the classic talking points: the intimacy of the medium and the efficacy it affords for advertisers; the challenges and opportunities in measurement; the need to embrace a multipronged commercial strategy; and, of course, the embrace of video that’s begun to transform the entire medium.

One topic, however, was conspicuously absent: artificial intelligence. If the technology came up at all, it was as a tool to achieve backend efficiencies, such as creative optimization, audience targeting, and streamlined editing—not as a threat to the industry, nor in any way part of the actual process of creating the podcasts themselves.

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As an unfortunate regular of the conference circuit, I can hardly overemphasize how unusual this is. Nearly every media industry event I attend immediately devolves into a parlor game of AI bingo, with the audience and panelists all waiting patiently for the subject to arise and subsume the rest of the conversation. In every other part of publishing, there is no more pressing subject matter and no greater object of hyperfixation than AI.

To compound the oddity, news of a controversial startup in the audio space has recently worked the industry into a lather. Called Inception Point AI, the company has made headlines by championing a strategy predicated on using AI-generated personalities to create podcasts, with the broader goal of turning the personalities into influencers.

The Hollywood Reporter article introducing the startup—“5,000 Podcasts. 3,000 Episodes a Week. $1 Cost Per Episode”—set off a firestorm of indignation, with thought leaders and executives in the audio industry decrying the output as “slop.” 

Set against the backdrop of this uproar, the exclusion of AI from any of the Upfront programming was particularly baffling. Clearly the barbarians are at the gates. Just as ChatGPT transformed text-based production when it was introduced two years ago, the debut of Inception Point, and the launch this week of both Meta’s and OpenAI’s AI-generated social video feeds, feels like an inflection point. 

‘Carbon-based’ creators

Just like its predecessor, the mission and methodology of Inception Point have been roundly criticized. Several audio executives I spoke with insisted that the intrusion of AI into the world of podcast creation would be limited to the fringes, if at all.

Their arguments border on the sentimental. If you’ve ever spoken with anyone involved in professional podcasting, the craft can be discussed with the kind of reverence that most people reserve for houses of worship. The words authenticity, connection, intimacy, and even magic come up frequently. It can get very woo-woo.

And yet, do you have a favorite podcast? As treacly as it sounds, the medium does yield a sense of intimacy unlike any other, one often rooted in a sense of connection that the listener has with the host. As a result, its practitioners are confident—adamant, almost—that it will be largely spared from the ravages of AI. 

“It’s obvious that creators need to be carbon-based organisms,” said Greg Glenday, CEO of the podcast company Acast. “We use AI around the edges, but our pitch to advertisers is authenticity. That is our moat and our five-year plan.”

Others echoed the sentiment that AI poses less of a threat to podcast hosts than it does to writers or even video creators. 

“As long as podcasting remains something people think of as an authentic experience,” said Matt Shapo, the director of digital audio and video at the IAB, “I’m not sure we’ll ever have the same level of disruption when it comes to content production.”

There are exceptions, of course. 

Certain genres of podcast are likely to be outsourced to AI, the same way commodity text content has been replaced by ChatGPT. Podcasts recapping sports games, detailing the weather, or offering a synopsis of a news article are already popular use cases for the technology. In these cases, according to Glenday, listeners have a connection to the content, not the creator. 

“Commodity podcasting—news, weather, daily rundowns—could be replaced,” said Alison Tucker, an associate director of audio investment at Omnicom Media Group. “But basically everything else? That’s much harder.”

The divide is reflective of a wider trend reshaping digital media. As AI dramatically reduces the effort required to create generic content, publishers and consumers are increasingly gravitating toward creator-led content, where personality can distinguish it from the deluge of information now inundating the web.

Robot callers

Still, the confidence among podcasters is disorienting, as AI has engendered existential dread into nearly every other sector of the economy. 

That optimism—misplaced or otherwise—is also exactly where Inception Point sees its opportunity, according to CEO and cofounder Jeanine Wright. 

The idea for the company came from the pandemic, when cofounder William Corbin created a popular podcast, called Covid 411, simply by reading the daily CDC update into a mic. The series spurred Corbin to think about other ways to make timely content that people want with low production costs, Wright said. 

While the ambitions of the startup are broader than podcasts, the company started with the medium because the technology surrounding synthetic audio is already advanced enough that it’s difficult to tell the difference between a real and artificial voice. 

By combining that capability with timely subject matter, the company aims to produce quick, low-lift audio products that only need to find a small audience to recoup their minimal costs. Already, Inception Point has more than 4,000 of these AI-generated shows, publishing thousands of episodes a week on platforms including iHeartMedia’s Spreaker. (Some of the flash-published series include biographies of zeitgeist subjects including Austin Butler, Ozzy Osborne, and Charlie Kirk.) 

The strategy positions the company specifically for the niche of commodity audio content that podcast executives have conceded is already susceptible to bot-sourcing. The larger question is whether audiences will embrace its entertainment output, which the company plans to expand to feature a cast of AI-generated personalities in conversation with one another, discussing real and fictional subjects through the filters of their lab-designed personalities. 

“Most of the pushback is because people have not stayed on the cutting-edge of AI development,” Wright said. “If people say that AI creators will never be able to get to the emotionality of a human creator, I think they don’t understand the capabilities of the tools today and where they will be in the future.”

That such a product could ever take off admittedly feels like a stretch. And yet, by now I am loath to bet against the steady advance of AI into every crevice of creative output. 

So who is right: the podcast professionals betting on their moat of authenticity, or the Hollywood startup farming out its editorial to bots? 

“I do have a bit of anxiety,” Glenday said. “Sometimes, you get nervous when everyone agrees.”

TikTok knows its platform is a popular destination for travel-related content. To help brands connect to potential travelers during both the discovery and booking phases, the app is introducing Travel Ads powered by Smart+.

This new ad solution offers advertisers the ability to automatically promote their hotels, flights, and destinations at scale using personalized, catalog-integrated creatives.

“Travel on TikTok goes beyond the For You feed, unlocking real-life travel experiences,” said David Hoctor, TikTok’s head of US verticals, travel, and gaming. “With TikTok Travel Ads, advertisers can leverage dynamic ad creatives and travel-first intent signals to seamlessly guide the TikTok community from discovery to booking—making every swipe a step toward conversion.”

TikTok Travel Ads feature optimization models that identify high-intent audiences and match them with travel offerings based on their in-market activities and preferences. Advertisers can also combine TikTok’s travel intent model with their catalog data to deliver relevant, personalized travel ads at scale across the entire journey, and then use Smart+ AI tools to automate parts of their campaign, including setup, creative generation, and delivery optimization.

Advertisers can also tap into an enriched travel format that showcases hotels, flights, and destinations through visually engaging, dynamic ad formats, boosting engagement and driving incremental conversions.

TikTok Travel Ads offers brands a choice of three creative formats, including single video, catalog video, and catalog carousel.

Using single video, a hero video can be made shoppable with personalized travel cards that display details such as hotel name, flight route, destination, or price. If they opt to use catalog video ads, they can be built from catalog content, paired with relevant travel cards and calls to action to promote a property, destination, or experience.

While using the catalog carousel, a scrollable carousel will automatically pull images from a catalog, turning them into interactive ads with a strong call to action.

TikTok knows it has a big base of travel enthusiasts on its platform with 66% of users saying it’s their most helpful source of travel inspiration. In addition, users noted they are 2.6 times more likely to book an experience after searching on TikTok.

Reddit is introducing a new set of tools making it easier for media outlets to share and track content across the popular social media platform.

Reddit Pro tools for publishers is built with features designed to help publishers find and engage directly with knowledge seekers on Reddit.

Now in beta mode, the platform is opening a test waitlist for its suite of three new tools featured within Reddit Pro, which it expects to be available to all users sometime in 2026.

Located within the new Links tab, the new tools include obtaining article insights, which allows publishers to track which of their stories are being shared on Reddit. They will also be able to see the specific communities their stories are shared in, and monitor key metrics like views, upvotes, and clicks.

Publishers will now also be able to sync their RSS feeds and automatically import their articles to Reddit Pro, making them instantly shareable across the social media platform.

What is a set of new features without artificial intelligence? The surging tech function will also be part of the featured tools, giving publishers AI-powered community suggestions for where to post their articles. Reddit said this ensures that their content finds the right audiences and generates meaningful conversations.

The Atlantic, The Hill, NBC News, and The Associated Press are some of the publishers that have already been alpha-testing Reddit Pro tools for publishers.

Also coming soon for Reddit users will be an improved way to read articles on the platform. Articles posted directly on the application will now be enabled with a swipe-up feature to view comments and join in the conversation.

This feature should be of great benefit to Reddit as it ensures continuous engagement on the platform.

Google must pay a €2.95 billion ($3.5 billion) fine after the EU’s executive branch, the European Commission, determined that the tech giant breached antitrust law by impeding competition in the display advertising market. 

The commission said in a statement published today that Google abused its dominance in the space by giving preference to its own ad exchange, thereby blocking out competitors and harming advertisers, publishers, and other adtech companies. 

As part of the decision, Google has been ordered to put an end to some self-preferential practices and “cease its inherent conflicts of interest along the adtech supply chain” within 60 days, the regulatory body said. 

“Digital markets exist to serve people and must be grounded in trust and fairness,” said Teresa Ribera, the Commission’s top antitrust enforcer. “And when markets fail, public institutions must act to prevent dominant players from abusing their power. True freedom means a level playing field, where everyone competes on equal terms and citizens have a genuine right to choose.”

Ribera added that the Commission would “not hesitate to impose strong remedies” should Google not comply with the order to change its business practices. 

Some activists are already celebrating the decision. Timothy Cowen, co-founder of the advocacy group Movement for an Open Web, said in a statement: “It’s great to see that the European Commission is standing up for consumers, and for fairness. This should be seen as a signal that the EU will not be intimidated and understands that the rule of law is important.”

Google plans to appeal the decision. 

In a statement shared with ADWEEK, the company’s vice president and global head of regulatory affairs Lee-Anne Mulholland called the decision “wrong,” arguing that “[i]t imposes an unjustified fine and requires changes that will hurt thousands of European businesses by making it harder for them to make money.” She added: “There’s nothing anticompetitive in providing services for ad buyers and sellers, and there are more alternatives to our services than ever before.”  

While Google battles the decision from Europe, it is facing a similar challenge on its home turf. In a landmark antitrust decision in April, a federal judge in the U.S. ruled that the company operated an illegal monopoly in both ad exchanges and ad servers. The U.S. Department of Justice has urged the court to require a breakup of Google’s adtech stack. 

The case is set to enter the remedies phase later this month, when Judge Leonie Brinkema of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia will rule on the appropriate penalties.

Earlier this week, Google was hit with an order from a different U.S. federal judge to share some of its search data with rivals and limit exclusive deals with device makers—remedies in a separate antitrust case against the company.

Instagram launched a dedicated application for the Apple iPad Wednesday. 

Taking advantage of the bigger screen, Instagram said its iPad app was designed for “lean-back entertainment.” Reels will be the prominent feature when the app is launched, with Stories still positioned at the top.

New for the Instagram for iPad app is a Following tab, which the Meta-owned social media platform said enables users to keep up with the accounts they follow. The app provides multiple viewing options in the Following tab, including All, Friends, and Latest.

All lets users see recommended posts and Reels from the accounts they follow. Friends allows users to see recommended posts and Reels from accounts they follow and follow back. And Latest displays posts and Reels from followed accounts in chronological order.

Taking advantage of the additional real estate, Instagram for iPad allows users to view messages and notifications with layouts that display both tabs. Additionally, when watching Reels, the comments section can be accessed while the Reel stays at full size. 

Instagram joins WhatsApp in launching dedicated apps for the iPad. WhatsApp’s app for the tablet launched in May, with users able to enjoy the same features commonly available on the iPhone or desktop version. 

This includes making video and audio calls with up to 32 people, sharing screens, and using both front and rear cameras.