74% of Adult Broadband Users Can Now Access Broadband Video and Pay-TV Services on a Home Television
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Pretend all you like: You've almost certainly used your phone will sitting on a toilet. Let's just be honest, folks. And if we're being completely honest, let's take that logic a step further: You've probably spent some of that toilet-based phone time playing games. Maybe it was "Angry Birds" a few years back? Or "Flappy Bird"? Or perhaps "Super Mario Run"? Starting in March, Nintendo's new console will enable you to play a full-on "Mario Kart" game while sitting on the porcelain throne: That's "Mario Kart 8 Deluxe," an updated version of the Wii U game. More importantly: Yes, that's a real Nintendo Switch advertisement prominently featuring a man playing a game while defecating. Here's the actual ad: The commercial comes from Nintendo's European arm (hence the bidet), which is headquartered in Germany. And this isn't some aside in a bigger commercial for the Switch, which launches on March 3 for $299 - this is the very first thing shown in a new commercial for the forthcoming console. Talk about brutal honesty. The gimmick with the Switch, if you hadn't already guessed, is that it can be taken on-the-go (wherever that may be, including the bathroom). That doesn't mean it's a dedicated portable game console - it's a home console that can be turned into a handheld. Put more simply, the Nintendo Switch is a tablet game console that can be played on a television at home or as a portable game system. And while much of Nintendo's advertising for the console thus far has people using it, say, while sitting in airplanes, the latest ad from Nintendo's German arm is a bit more realistic with how people will play the Switch in portable form: while sitting on the toilet. What a time to be alive. SEE ALSO: I played Nintendo's new game console, the Switch - this is what it's like DON'T MISS: Forget about that 'Super Mario' game on your iPhone - this is the new Mario game you're looking for Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: We got to try Nintendo's new Switch console - here's what it was like Are you ready for some foot -- just kidding, we know you just watch the commercials.
Each year, The Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas showcases the innovation and technology that is changing the world â and the way companies do business. At CES 2017, Business Insider spoke with advertising and marketing executives from a variety of industries to discuss their challenges, successes, and strategies for navigating the current digital landscape. We sat down with David Roman, Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer of Lenovo to discuss why it entered the crowded smartphone market. Lenovo bought the Motorola Mobility business from Google in 2014 for $2.91 billion and it used the CES show to promote its flagship phone the Moto Z Droid. The snap-on modules won the CES 2017 Best of Innovation award for wireless handset devices. We asked Roman how Lenovo plans to be heard in a very crowded smartphone market and why he thinks this product will succeed. His answer was surprising: Lenovo isn't gunning to displace Apple or Samsung. The company will call it a success by gaining just a fraction of the overall market. "When you think about a market that that's big, where there are 1.5 billion phones sold in a year, even a niche of 2% of that market is a very big market in its own right," he says. SEE ALSO: Lenovo just launched an Amazon Echo clone that also uses Alexa - but costs $50 less Four Neurology Experts Join Advisory Board Following Recent Breakthrough Discoveries Regarding Posiphen Mechanism of Action
Facebook hasn't given up on Trending, its news section that came under fire last year for allegedly suppressing right-leaning publishers. After making Trending less reliant on human editors in August, Facebook announced on Wednesday that it's making changes to give media outlets more control over which stories are surfaced to the social network's 1.8 billion users:
While Facebook fired its human editors after the conservative news fiasco last year, a spokesperson told Business Insider that its quality review team is still responsible for making sure topics "correspond to real-world events and that the product does not contain duplicate topics or spam." The social network's efforts to make Trending more reliable is "at best a marginal improvement," according to Angelo Carusone, the president of media watchdog Media Matters. "While moving in the right direction, these half-measures will not stop the rampant lies spreading on the platform," Carusone said in a statement to Business Insider. "We can't forget that Facebook made the problem of fake news significantly worse when they acted on right-wing misinformation and fired all their human editors over the summer and let their algorithms get gamed." Facebook has been working to rebuild its reputation with news publishers after it was widely criticized for helping spread fake news around the U.S. presidential election. The company recently started working with third-party fact checkers like Snopes to weed out dubious news stories, and it recently hired former NBC anchor Campbell Brown to be its head of news partnerships. Facebook also announced The Facebook Journalism Project earlier this month, a group of initiatives designed to make sure "that a healthy news ecosystem and journalism can thrive." SEE ALSO: Snapchat is cracking down on racy and misleading content as it prepares to IPO Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: I found 9 years' worth of messages hidden in my secret Facebook inbox Avoiding runway shows, the actor is plugging a website hosting service that helps him sell his theatrical, untrendy men's wear directly to the public.
Sweets brand Cadbury has signed a three-year sponsorship deal with the English Premier League, starting with the 2017/18 season. The sponsorship of the sport by a sweets brand angered obesity campaigners. "If the sponsorship meant that a host of kids would be encouraged to exercise and kick footballs to kingdom come, but didn't come near a bar of chocolate, the forum might regard it as money well spent," National Obesity Forum spokesperson Tam Fry told the BBC. It's not the first time Cadbury has sponsored a sport. It was one of the sponsors of the 2012 London Olympics, which also drew criticism from anti-obesity campaigns. The Mondelez-owned brand will join the Premier League's portfolio of sponsors, which includes Tag Heuer and Carling. As part of the partnership, Cadbury and the Premier League will create a tailored version of the existing Mondelez community project Health for Life, which promotes healthy lifestyles in primary schools around the UK. "For over a hundred years Cadbury has been about bringing little moments of joy to people's lives, something that fits well with the joy created by Premier League football every day," Cadbury brand director Francesco Vitrano described the partnership. The deal includes giving Cadbury access to key player events such as the Golden Boot and Golden Glove awards, which the brand hopes to leverage in-stores, on packaging and in the community, according to the statement released by Mondelez. It's not clear what kind of sponsor Cadbury will be. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: 6 'healthy' eating habits you are better off giving up After successfully copying Snapchat with Instagram Stories, Facebook is at it again in its big blue app. The same interface, which Facebook is aptly calling Facebook Stories, is currently being tested in the Facebook mobile app, a company spokesperson told Business Insider on Wednesday. While the test is beginning only in Ireland, the spokesperson said Facebook plans to bring the "new format" to more countries in the coming months. Facebook Stories works identically to Instagram Stories, and by extension Snapchat Stories. You add photos and videos to your personal "story" for your friends to tap through, and everything you choose to share disappears after 24 hours. Whatever you add to your Facebook Story won't be shown in the News Feed or on your profile's timeline, and like Instagram and Snapchat, you can reply directly to someone's story with a direct message. You can also add selfie filters and Facebook's version of Snapchat geofilters to photos and videos. "The way people share today is different to five or even two years ago - it's much more visual, with more photos and videos than ever before," Facebook said in a statement. "We want to make it fast and fun for people to share creative and expressive photos and videos with whoever they want, whenever they want." Facebook is giving Stories prominent placement at the top of its app, like Instagram. The move is part of a broader strategy on Facebook's part to not only curb Snapchat's growth, but also to get people to share more with their phone cameras - a concept that Snapchat pioneered. So far, the strategy appears to be working: 150 million people already use Instagram Stories every day, which roughly equals Snapchat's total user base. Facebook Stories could also provide another way for the company to make money from its 1.8 billion users. It recently started testing full-screen video ads within Instagram Stories with around 30 global advertisers, including Airbnb, Nike, Netflix, and ASOS. SEE ALSO: Here are all the times Facebook copied Snapchat in 2016 Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: WPP CEO Sir Martin Sorrell on Snapchat becoming the 'third force' to Google and Facebook Facebook is running out of room to place ads in the News Feed, so it's turning to Messenger. The social network has begun testing targeted ads in the Messenger app in Thailand and Australia, according to a company blog post on Wednesday. A carousel of ads will be shown below a user's list of recent conversations in Messenger, and advertisers can use the same targeting tools Facebook provides for News Feed ads. Messenger doesn't plan to show ads inside actual conversations, and Facebook is characterizing these new ads as a "test." "We believe this new test for the very small group of people in Thailand and Australia reflects a lightweight, relevant and useful approach to helping people and businesses connect on Messenger," Messenger product manager Eddie Zhang said in a blog post. "For the Messenger community, it may enhance the discovery of new experiences to make it seamless to interact with businesses on their terms. For businesses, it could offer a new way to surface their products and services to current and potential customers." Facebook tried to monetize Messenger's one billion users last year by letting businesses create chat bots, but that effort has yet to produce any kind of meaningful revenue. Facebook's CFO recently cautioned that the company will likely reach the limit of ads it can squeeze in the News Feed this year. And with Facebook set to report its fourth quarter earnings next week, investors will be eager to hear how executives are planning to show ads in more places like this Messenger experiment. SEE ALSO: Mark Zuckerberg explained how close Messenger and WhatsApp are to making money Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: 7 Facebook Messenger tricks only power users know about |
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April 2017
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