Immortagen, Inc. Completes Series A Financing for Personalized Medicine
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'The 9/16 Report: Firearm Casualties and Solutions' is Released
Twitter is relaxing its 140-character limit. The social network announced on Monday that links to media like photos, GIFs, polls, and videos will no longer count toward the 140-character limit Twitter has had since its inception. Along with media attachments, a Twitter spokeswoman said the company is also testing not counting "@" replies toward a tweet's character limit. Here's a graph from Twitter that explains the old structure of tweets and the new format: Twitter announced these changes in May, and The Verge reported last week that they would be implemented on Monday, September 19. Here's Twitter's own tweet on Monday announcing the news:
SEE ALSO: Jack Dorsey explained why Elon Musk has one of the best Twitter accounts Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: Apple just accidentally leaked this iPhone 7 video on Twitter South Florida-Based Web Design, Development and Internet Marketing Firm Awards $1,000 to UCLA
You're wearing your favorite Nike sneakers and Lululemon pants when you head to the mall to do some shopping at the Gap. On your way there you grab a latte at Starbucks. After a few good hours of shopping, you head to Panera to meet a friend for lunch. You Venmo her for the meal and then you both decide dessert is in the cards: Next stop, Häagen-Dazs. All these brands are staples in our lives. But do you have any idea what their names actually mean? We're here to help. Panera is a portmanteau of the words "pan" and "era."![]() According to Panera's Facebook page, the sandwich chain's name "has Latin and Spanish roots." In Spanish, "pan" means bread and "era" means age or time. So put together, Panera means "age of bread." Ron Shaich, the founder of Panera, also told Fortune the name comes from the Latin word for breadbasket. Adidas isn't an acronym for "All Day I Dream About Soccer."![]() If you, like me, thought Adidas stood for "All Day I Dream About Soccer," you're wrong. Turns out it, the athletics apparel brand is named after its founder Adolf Dassler, who started making sport shoes when he came back from serving in World War I, according to the LA Times. The name combines his nickname, Adi, and the first three letters of his last name.  Lululemon means nothing at all. And it's intentionally hard to pronounce.![]() Lululemon founder Chip Wilson came up with the yoga wear brand's name because he thought Japanese people wouldn't be able to pronounce it. It was thought that a Japanese marketing firm would not try to create a North American sounding brand with the letter âLâ because the sound does not exist in Japanese phonetics. By including an âLâ in the name it was thought the Japanese consumer would find the name innately North American and authentic. In essence, the name âlululemonâ has no roots and means nothing other than it has 3 âL'sâ in it. Nothing more and nothing less. A representative for Lululemon told Business Insider that the brand's name was chosen from a list of 20 brand names and 20 logos by a group of 100 people. See the rest of the story at Business Insider The head of Google Glass is now leading the company's efforts to design an expanding collection of hardware products whose appeal extends beyond the techie crowd. Ivy Ross, who previously served as head of Google's computer glasses effort, is now overseeing the design and user experience for all hardware products, according to her LinkedIn page. The new title reflects Google and parent company Alphabet's efforts to build new businesses that complement its internet services stronghold. Google is ramping up its efforts to build its own hardware devices, with a new home-speaker device that will compete with Amazon's popular Echo, slated for release in the next few months. In April, Google hired former Motorola executive Rick Osterloh to helm the hardware group, which includes the Nexus line of phones and tablets, the Chromecast TV dongle and other products. Ross, a fashion industry veteran, will focus on making sure the various gadgets are easy to use and have a look and feel that appeals to consumers. That's something that Google has struggled with in the past, particularly with the Glass device that Google launched a few years ago and for which Ross was hired to oversee. The futuristic-looking Glass product initially wowed the techie crowd, but was quickly criticized for being difficult to use and for its geeky appearance. Google stopped selling Glass to consumers in 2015 and renamed the Glass division Project Aura, as Business Insider reported at the time. Google declined to comment on Ross's new role.  SEE ALSO: The head of Google Doodle says he sees 'Google' in everything Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: How to see everything Google knows about you
Google announced a couple new features for its ad products at the DMEXCO digital media conference. These include an upgrade to its Universal App Campaigns to let all advertisers target app-install ads based on users' in-app activity, and the new ability to add call-to-action (CTA) buttons in YouTube TrueView ads. The latter update will boost Google's yield from TrueView ads, while the former will expand Google's client base in the app-install space:
Google also said that it had generated over three billion app installs from ads â up from the two billion installs announced at I/O in May, when Facebook announced that it had driven two billion app installs. The numbers show how quickly Google has caught up to Facebook â which was a long head start in the app install ad market â reflecting the success and effectiveness of Universal App Campaigns, as noted by Marketing Land.  To receive stories like this one directly to your inbox every morning, sign up for the Digital Media Briefing newsletter. Click here to learn more about how you can gain risk-free access today. The CEO of FanDuel explains why there won't be another blitzkrieg of advertising this year9/15/2016 The first week of the NFL season has come and gone. And along with the absence of Tom Brady, perhaps the biggest noticeable difference between this year and last is the relative dearth of advertising by the daily fantasy apps FanDuel and DraftKings. A lot has changed in a year. Last year at this time, FanDuel and DraftKings were each valued at over $1 billion. Their logos were emblazoned on billboards, buses, and subway cars. Combined, the rival apps poured $750 million into TV commercials focused around the start of the NFL season. They were inescapable. At one point last fall, Legal Sports Report estimated that a commercial for either FanDuel or DraftKings appeared on TV once every 90 seconds. These commercials were not exactly met with glowing remarks. Digiday reported that 76% of people reacted negatively to the commercials - in large part because of their frequency alone. "Negative mentions don't generally concern themselves with the quality of the ads, or the messages within them, but just seeing them repeatedly," a Brandwatch analyst told Digiday. Then things took a turn. After The New York Times reported a DraftKings employee had made $350,000 on FanDuel, New York's attorney general began to investigate the companies, and eventually ordered cease-and-desist letters. Several states followed suit, which led to complex legal battles and arguments over whether or not daily fantasy sites constituted gambling or, as the apps argued, games of skill. On August 3, following a lengthy summer lobbying effort by the companies - which included the presence of former quarterback Vinny Testaverde on the New York State Senate floor - New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed into law a bill that granted daily fantasy to be played in New York. Seven other states have signed similar laws allowing, and regulating, daily fantasy sports. After a whirlwind of a year, it seems that FanDuel and DraftKings aren't going anywhere - at least anytime soon. "We're really excited about the start of the NFL," FanDuel CEO Nigel Eccles told Business Insider in an interview. "We think it's going to be bigger than ever this season. When users come by they're going to see a lot of changes. The site looks completely different." Another difference, Eccles said, would be the company's advertising strategy. He admitted that last year, his company overdid it with the commercials. "What I would say about last year was that [the commercials were] really driving awareness," Eccles said. "Prior to last season very few people had heard of us, so we really wanted to get out there and get people to know us. That was successful - maybe too successful." And it wasn't just the frequency of airtime, Eccles said - the content of the ads were also regrettable. Think back on those commercials: What stands out more than anything is the bro in the backwards hat, oversized check in hand. According to the commercials, the everyman getting rich - and getting rich quick - was precisely what daily fantasy apps like FanDuel were all about. "I think last year we probably focused too much on money," Eccles said. "I think we probably were too narrow in what we were marketing." He added: "We really struggled - we knew players were saying, 'Hey, this product is really exciting, it's a lot of fun, that's why I play it.' And we said, 'OK, how do we put that in an ad?' I don't think we were successful there last year. The other reason people loved playing was the prospect and the excitement of winning money, and we focused too much on that. That was definitely a mistake." The problem with focusing so narrowly on money, of course, was that the everyman wasn't winning as easily as the ads portrayed it. Rather, the skilled players - many of whom were setting dozens of lineups based on complicated algorithms - were winning the big prizes in large part by preying on the inexperienced players. Although scripting - the automated way professional players were able to set dozens of lineups concurrently - has since been banned, Eccles knows this type of "sharks vs. minnows" dilemma is a big one in the industry. He said it presents a challenge when it comes to growing his product. "It's something that we've been concerned about for a long time. We want to be a fun, entertaining product," he said. "We want it to be a game of skill, so we accept that the better players are going to win more often, but we also want new users. We want there to be a level playing field." He added: "One of our marketing guys likes to say that if I'm a nine-minute miler, I want to go in against other nine-minute milers, not a five-minute miler. So what we've been doing is putting things in like beginning leagues, where only beginners can play. We've also been clearly marking the experienced players so you can identify them. If you want to play against them, sure. But we're also doing a lot of research and education so that if you're a new player, we want you to get better. That's a key part of the product." Instead of focusing on winning money, Eccles said that FanDuel's commercials this year will focus on the other reasons that make people use the app. "We know people play FanDuel for the bragging rights, the camaraderie, they love the research, the high scoring. You see that coming through in our ads this year. Given that we have the awareness, we won't have the frequency [of ads] we had last year." This change in approach was visible during Week 1 of the NFL season. FanDuel's ads boasted something called "SportsRich" - a new, trademarked phrase FanDuel describes as "the experience of having all the great stuff sports has to offer." In the new ad, fans drink beer and taunt each other from the couch. Gone are the oversized checks, or any mention of winning money whatsoever. Though, yes, there are still plenty of bros in backwards hats. Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: Here's the diet and workout routine LeBron James uses to stay in insane shape
Pandora Plus is one of two new plans Pandora has been prepping for months. The other will cost $9.99 and let you pick from millions of songs on demand, like Spotify and Apple Music. That one hasn't been released yet, probably because Pandora is still locking down its final deals with music labels. Earlier this week, Pandora announced it had finalized its on-demand deals with Universal and Sony. Of the big three music labels, all that remains is Warner, and once that's done, expect to see the on-demand plan make its grand entrance. But for the time being, Pandora Plus offers to features fans have been begging for. ReplaysThe first is âreplays,â which allow you to go through your listening history and pick any song you want to play. That song will move to the front of your queue, and you can keep playing it as many times as you want. If this sounds dangerously close to on-demand, that's because it is. âI wouldn't call it on-demand,â Pandora VP of product Chris Becherer told Business Insider. But he did admit it's beyond the basic functions of internet radio. That's why those direct deals with the major labels were so important - without them, Pandora wouldn't have been able to launch this feature, Becherer said. But some songs might not be available to replay - namely ones that don't have their licensing deals nailed down. You can also replay songs on Pandora's ad-supported free tier, but you have to listen to a 15-second video ad first. When you do so, Pandora will give you a âhandfulâ of replays, which you can use until they run out. Pandora is testing different bundle sizes. OfflineThe second feature Pandora is rolling out is "offline listening." One of the great things about services like Spotify and Apple Music is that you can save songs on your phone to listen to when you don't have service - like when you're on the subway, for instance. Pandora didn't have that, but now you can get it for $4.99 per month with Plus. Becherer said Pandora wanted offline listening to be simple and effortless, but that also means you don't get a lot of choice. Pandora will save four stations for you, including your âThumbprint Radio,â and other ones its algorithm thinks you will probably want to listen to. The Pandora app will work in the background to keep these stations âfresh,â but only over wifi, so it won't drain your data plan (unless you specifically set it to work on cellular as well). The big gripe with this feature is going to be that you can't choose exactly which stations you want to save for offline, and that it won't automatically save the station you're listening to currently. Becherer said the team was concerned about the data drain of that, and he contends that most people use Pandora in more of a lean-back way. SkippingThe other feature Pandora is introducing is unlimited skipping on Pandora Plus, well as the ability to receive a âpackageâ of skips by watching a 15-second video ad on the free version (similar to the replay feature).  Pandora hopes the Pandora Plus âmid-tierâ product will grab people who love Pandora, but want added functionality. The service does have over 100 million users to pitch this to, the vast majority of which use the free service today. The company will roll these changes out gradually over the next month. SEE ALSO: How Pandora could turn a profit where Spotify hasn't been able to
YouTube has confirmed the launch of YouTube Community â a social networking feature that gives video creators new and expanded ways to engage with their subscribers. The new feature appeals to video creators, who now have more ways to engage with their fans. This will encourage the creation and consumption of videos on its platform, and shore up YouTube's position against rival social apps that are becoming increasingly video-centric. The Community feature is available in a new tab on video creators' channels, alongside Videos, Playlists, and other tabs. The Community tab is essentially a wall, where video creators can create posts in text, GIFs, images and more, while viewers can engage with these posts by commenting, upvoting and downvoting. Viewers will see posts in their "Subscriptions feeds" in the YouTube mobile app, and can opt in to receiving push notifications from video creators. This new feature plays into YouTube's strategy by:Â
YouTube has been testing Community for several months with a subset of creators, and the feature has now launched in public beta with a wider group of early testers. The roll-out will continue to ramp up in the months ahead. To receive stories like this one directly to your inbox every morning, sign up for the Digital Media Briefing newsletter. Click here to learn more about how you can gain risk-free access today. |
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