British Columbia-based marketing software company Redbrick has acquired Paved, a newsletter advertising platform that connects publishers and advertisers. Redbrick says the acquisition underscores the importance of e-newsletters, which allow publishers and creators to take ownership of their audiences and gather first-party data.
According to Paved, its marketplace connects advertisers such as Uber, DoorDash and Salesforce with 253 million newsletter subscribers from more than 3,000 publishers, including The New York Times, NBC News, Bloomberg and TechCrunch. Aside from placing native ads in email, the platform’s technology allows advertisers to customize each ad, including font, colour and images. It also provides real-time publisher performance, click-through and impression information based on verified publisher data.
Redbrick focuses on the development of software solutions and cloud services. The company has a variety of products and services, including content creation platforms, digital marketing tools, e-commerce solutions and web and cloud hosting services. It has been acquiring other companies to expand its product and service offerings in the content creation and digital marketing space. Other companies in its portfolio include Animoto for easy video creation and Delivra for email and SMS marketing.
Pinterest tags AI-generated content
Pinterest is now testing tags on AI-generated content to provide users with relevant context for what they view on the social network, including in Canada.
The platform is displaying a foreground tag of an image pin when it detects that it has been generated or modified with AI. The new policy will not affect paid promotion. For ads, the app will only display a disclosure in the “Why am I seeing this ad?” section, which indicates whether the ad includes AI-generated or modified content, as detected through metadata.
The new labels have been visible in the app for the past few months on a limited selection of pins, and will be fully rolled out in the coming months.
According to a Pinterest spokesperson, impressions on generative AI content make up a small percentage of the total impressions on Pinterest. However, “as people continue experimenting with generative AI content, we are working to provide users with more control and context over the content they see on Pinterest.”
“Pinterest will continue intentionally leveraging AI, such as our inclusive AI features, to enhance the experience for our users and creators,” the spokesperson said. Launched in March 2024, the inclusive AI features give users the option to select the body type they want to see in their search results.
According to Pinterest’s latest financial report, the company’s Q4 2024 revenue had a year-over-year growth of 18%. The app closed the year with $3.6 billion, doubling its growth rate from 2023. And its monthly active users increased 11% to 553 million.
