In Today's Issue

Older Marketers Actually Use AI More

ChatGPT is Getting a Brain Update

Amazon Prime’s Ads Have Arrived

TweetDeck for Bluesky Now Available

X’s AI Bots Are Stuck in an Endless Loop Because O …

Older Marketers Actually Use AI More

In case you’re starting to feel old at the Monday marketing meetings — you know, the interns rolling their eyes at you because you use “finsta” as a verb — consider this: You might be using technology better than them.

According to a new study by Ernst & Young, older workers are more accepting of using AI-based tools in the workplace compared to Gen Z employees.

The study surveyed 1,000 Americans across different age groups and found that 74% of millennials and 70% of Gen X respondents have used AI tools like OpenAI's ChatGPT at work.

In contrast, only 63% of Gen Z respondents reported using AI in their jobs.

One possible reason — the younger generation seems to have a more well developed skepticism of AI's value and effectiveness. Younger workers may be less convinced that AI can provide real benefits.

Gen X workers may feel more compelled to learn and adapt to AI as they strive to keep up with rapid change, while Gen Z workers, who grew up with AI tools, may quickly move on if AI fails to meet their high expectations.

The study did not conclusively determine whether AI improves workplace performance.

Either way, marketing tools and content generation have changed dramatically in the last year, and AI has its hands in pieces of our world you may not even be aware of: With the exception of this sentence and the opening paragraph, this story was written by ChatGPT 3.5 Turbo.

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ChatGPT is Getting a Brain Update

So if you’ve tried your hand at ChatGPT and found it lacking, you’re not alone. Some marketers say the tool was great at copywriting when it first came out, but lately, it seems to have been getting “lazy” — worse quality content, and sometimes it just times out.

OpenAI this weekend rolled out an update to reduce incomplete tasks. The fix applies to the GPT-4 Turbo model in limited preview. While users of GPT-3.5 and paying users of GPT-4 may still face limitations, it is expected that the upgrade will eventually extend to these models.

Back in December, OpenAI acknowledged the lack of updates and unpredictable behavior affecting their chatbot’s performance. This latest release lets it complete complex tasks with fewer prompts.

ChatGPT now has its own app store for third-party developers to showcase customized bots. Certain types of chatbots, like virtual girlfriends, are prohibited.

Our chatbot — the Snarky Marketing Intern — is there. If you have a paid plan, you can chat with your very own dismissive, condescending intern at https://b.link/snarkyintern

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Amazon Prime’s Ads Have Arrived

Today’s the day Amazon has switched over to running ads on its Prime Video streaming service.

The company sent out an email to users after Christmas, detailing the introduction of ads and the option to pay an additional $2.99 per month for an ad-free plan.

While the exact number of ads to be shown on the ad-supported tier remains unknown, Amazon claims there will be fewer ads compared to linear TV and other streaming providers.

CPMs look to be very competitive — sometimes half of what streaming giants Netflix and Disney Plus have been offering. Their Preferred Deal placement is $26 CPM and you can use Amazon’s incredibly valuable in-market audiences to reach people who are actively looking for a kind of prodcut.

Prime Video was one of the last major services to adopt ad-supported streaming, with Apple TV Plus being the sole major player which still has not made the change.

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TweetDeck for Bluesky Now Available

When Twitter self-imploded, one of the things that went down in the fire was TweetDeck. That’s not entirely accurate — TweetDeck still exists, but it has a new name and it’s locked behind a monthly plan.

Previously, TweetDeck was a great tool to let people create columns based on searches, mentions, lists, and so on.

Mastodon, for its part, has a Tweetdeck-like interface already built in; they call it the Advanced Mode.

But until now, brands and marketers who had jumped to Bluesky — another Twitter competitor — were stuck with just the slightly clunky web interface it has.

Now, it too has a column-based tool called Deck.blue. This lets Bluesky users view their home timeline, notifications, likes, lists, and custom feeds in the familiar format. It is a web-based app and supports multiple accounts and post scheduling.

So if you’re active on Bluesky and are looking for the old-school TweetDeck, you’ll find it at https://deck.blue

While you’re there, follow us! We’re @todayindigital@bsky.social and I am @todmaffin@bsky.social

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X’s AI Bots Are Stuck in an Endless Loop Because Of Course They Are

If you’ve spent any time on Twitter or X, no doubt you will have run into the replybots — which have been programmed to reply automatically when you use a certain phrase. Mention crypto, and you could get pummelled with bots replying to your post telling you about the latest drop or danger to your wallet, or some other nonsense.

For a while now, there have also been bots which have taken a page from product marketers, using AI to create products based on something someone said, and trying to sell them. The products don’t exist, of course, and in theory if you order one, it’ll spit out a drop-shipped mug or whatever it was.

Or maybe it’ll just keep your money.

Now, what was once irritating, has turned into a hilarious piece of performance art with AI bots replying to AI bots.

One example found on X was someone who posted “May the coffee be with you,” and some bot generated an image of Princess Leia holding a mug reading “Help Me Coffee, You’re My Only Hope!” Though it being AI, they mis-spelled “You’re.”

Then, a different bot — which claimed to sell products under the brand GoodShirts, but spelled “GoodSirtss” — replied to that the first bot’s post with another AI-generated image of a mug, this time reading “Help Me Coffee You’ryre My Only! Hop!” (mis-spelling “you’re” even worse this time, and putting an exclamation mark after “only” and after “hop.”

THE WORLD IS A DEAD THING, WITH NOTHING INSIDE IT.

— BEATSKELTON.BSKY.SOCIAL (@BEAT_SKELTON)
Jan 24, 2024

There were more replies below, with the bots caught in a feedback loop like the old game of telephone — with each iteration getting slightly worse and worse.

One commenter added to the thread: “The world is a dead thing, with nothing inside it.”

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