Author: Geek Planet

Uncertainty around TikTok’s future in the U.S. led many advertisers to slam the brakes on their advertising there. Others treated the turmoil as a green light.  Walmart, Coca-Cola, Comcast, PepsiCo, Warner Bros Discovery, Google and Amazon have increased their U.S. social media spend on the platform by two percentage points, on a year-over-year basis in the first quarter of 2025, according to Sensor Tower.  Those seven brands were also some of TikTok’s top spending U.S. advertisers in 2024, per the market intelligence firm. However, PepsiCo and Amazon declined to comment on this, while the other five companies did not respond…

A fresh Windows 11 bug is causing serious headaches for some PC owners, and Samsung laptop users appear to be bearing the brunt of it. Microsoft has confirmed reports that certain devices running recent Windows 11 builds can suddenly lose access to the system drive after installing a February 2026 security update. When the issue triggers, users see the error message “C: is not accessible – Access denied”, effectively locking them out of the drive where Windows and most applications reside. The company says it is actively investigating the issue and working with Samsung to determine the root cause. For…

Unilever may be investing billions of dollars into influencer marketing, but marketers aren’t necessarily copying their playbook just yet.When one of the world’s largest advertisers says it will now invest half of its ad budget (some $8.5 billion globally in 2023, per Statista) on social media with plans to work with 20 times more influencers, it can make waves — enough that small and medium-sized marketers rush to follow suit. But before marketers consider doing so, they need to remember that the creator economy isn’t just another media channel but an ecosystem all its own with potential hazards along the…

Samsung’s next clamshell folding phone could end up being a disappointment in the battery department. Despite the Galaxy Z Flip 7 seeing a humble battery bump, its successor might not bring a similar upgrade. This is quite the bummer for anyone expecting Samsung to improve the battery life on its flip phone. What’s in the leak? According to a GalaxyClub report, the Galaxy Z Flip 8 may use two battery cells rated at 1,150mAh and 3,024mAh. This gives it a total rated capacity of 4,174mAh, which will likely be marketed as 4,300mAh. If the leak is true, this would mean…

Brands that are closely tied to public figures are tricky. If a public figure does something that changes the public’s perception of them, be it positive or negative, perception of their brand often follows. This looks to be the case for Tesla: Elon Musk has become a polarizing figure given his role in President Donald Trump’s administration and it looks like the ripple effects of that polarization are affecting the Tesla brand.On Wednesday, Tesla’s first-quarter results showed a 13% drop in vehicle deliveries year over year, with the carmaker delivering almost 337,000 cars, down from roughly 387,000 cars during the…

Artificial intelligence chatbots are facing growing scrutiny after several recent cases linked online conversations with violent incidents or attempted attacks. Legal filings, lawsuits, and independent research suggest that interactions with AI systems may sometimes reinforce dangerous beliefs among vulnerable individuals, raising concerns about how these technologies handle conversations involving violence or severe mental distress. Alarming Cases Spark Concern One of the most disturbing incidents occurred last month in Tumbler Ridge, Canada, where court documents claim that 18-year-old Jesse Van Rootselaar discussed feelings of isolation and an escalating fascination with violence with ChatGPT before carrying out a deadly school attack. According…

Apple just dropped the fourth developer beta of iOS 26.4 — and historically, that’s the point where a stable release stops feeling hypothetical. Worth getting excited about, too; this update is full of features that actually matter in daily life. A few of them, frankly, should have shipped years ago. But here we are. The security fix Apple should have made sooner Previously buried deep enough in Settings to qualify as a hidden feature, Stolen Device Protection now activates automatically when you update. It forces Face ID or Touch ID before anyone can access your Passwords app, trigger Lost Mode,…

Marketers’ calls for more granular insights from retail media networks have reached a fever pitch as of late. Last January, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and Media Rating Council (MRC) finalized retail media measurement standards, to which retailers like Instacart and others have aligned themselves with. Still, marketers question measurement, specifically: Would that sale have happened regardless of the ad?In response, The Home Depot is pitching a new acronym: ROMO, or return on marketing objectives, in addition to return on ad spend (ROAS) to help marketers paint a more holistic picture of their campaign efficacy.  Zach Darkow, senior director of…

A fresh supply chain shock may be brewing for the tech industry, and it could eventually affect the price of PCs, smartphones, and other consumer electronics. According to a new report from DigiTimes, semiconductor manufacturers are facing sharp increases in the cost of key materials used in chip production. The spike is being driven by geopolitical instability and tightening supply chains, particularly for metals used in compound semiconductors. One metal drawing particular attention is gallium, a critical element used in advanced semiconductor technologies. Market data show gallium prices have surged dramatically in recent months, reaching roughly $2,100 per kilogram in…

Advertisers are looking again at the use of probabilistic data for audience targeting, and, in some cases, are seeing it as a potential solution to addressability concerns.It’s the latest installment in marketing’s tug of war between precise targeting and broad reach — and an indirect consequence of third-party cookie deprecation. “It’s not an either-or scenario. There’s no favorite child,” said Kumar Amrendra, head of digital marketing at U.K.-based pay-TV broadcaster Sky. Deterministic data — information that can be used to directly refer to an audience or customer — is often first-party data (for example, an email address). By contrast, probabilistic…