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Sociable is the latest commentary on important social media developments and trends from industry expert Andrew Hutchinson of Social Media Today.

If you follow broader news in the tech sector at all, you have no doubt seen reports about the chaos at OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT and Dall-E, among other AI projects. The company is seemingly now imploding before our eyes, marking what may be the fastest, and most unusual fall from grace that weve ever witnessed.

And while the dust is yet to fully settle, it does seem like a significant shift in AI development is coming, which relates to several social media platforms directly, and could influence their trajectory on this front going forward.

First off, theres the Microsoft angle, which has become a key player in the OpenAI debacle.

Over the weekend, once the OpenAI board decided to fire CEO Sam Altman, Microsoft immediately readied to take him on, and it still seems poised to reposition Altman as the CEO of its own, new AI arm, if the OpenAI board is unable to retain him.

The uncertainty over where Altman will wind up is the current stalling point. Many OpenAI staff have vowed to walk if Altman is not reinstated, while OpenAIs board is still seemingly undecided on the best path forward. Altman has been in talks to potentially return, under certain conditions, but its unclear whether the OpenAI team will agree to such.

Negotiations, as they say, are ongoing.

Microsoft, meanwhile, has invested billions into OpenAI, in order to become a key player in the rapidly evolving AI space. Along with this, Microsoft has also now built generative AI elements, based on OpenAIs GPT system, into virtually all of its tools and platforms, including LinkedIn.

At the same time, Microsoft has reportedly committed $50 billion to AI infrastructure over the next five years, in order to boost its capacity, again largely on the back of its partnership with OpenAI.

Essentially, OpenAI is already Microsofts AI arm, and its deeply invested in securing its future operations on this front, either by facilitating a re-establishment of OpenAIs board and executive, or by taking on as many OpenAIemployees as it can, if things end up falling apart.

In a social media context, theres not a heap more thats immediately on the cards, as LinkedIn has already crammed AI elements into almost every aspect of its platform as it is. But Microsoft will no doubt be looking for new angles and tools as time goes on, which is where these negotiations are relevant.

Will the changes at OpenAI derail Microsofts broader AI plans? That seems unlikely.

If anything, a full ouster of Altman will likely expedite Microsofts own AI development, by handing it a number of key staff, though it could change the development trajectory of AI tools more broadly, in terms of safety versus development. Which has reportedly been at the core of the conflict within OpenAI, with board members and staff in disagreement around fundamental approaches on these grounds.

We dont have all the details on this as yet, but essentially, Microsoft looks well-placed to move forward with its AI plans, regardless of the final outcome.

Another AI player is Meta, which is developing its own generative AI models, and has even partnered with Microsoft on some projects.

Meta could also stand to benefit here, if OpenAI does indeed fall apart, which is still possible, based on the number of staff pledging allegiance to Altman, and vowing to quit OpenAI unless hes reinstated.

Those employees will be in high demand for other AI projects, and Meta could snap them up, while it may also see Microsoft increase its reliance on its partnership with Meta for future AI development, if it ends up seeking more stability, depending on whats left of the OpenAI team.

X, via its xAI project, has also opened the door to any OpenAI staff that may want to come on board to help it develop its AI tools. It now has its own chatbot, in Grok, and internal knowledge of OpenAIs systems would be of great benefit to its evolving projects.

xAI still remains a smaller player, in comparison to Meta, Google, and Microsoft (via OpenAI). But Elon Musk is keen to be a leader, and hes also super keen to destroy OpenAI if he can, given his past relationship with the company.

Salesforce has also put the call out to OpenAI staff looking for a new project, while others will be putting out feelers to see what they can get.

Essentially, a full breakdown of OpenAI would shake-up the AI development landscape, and ultimately benefit the remaining players, while OpenAI itself fades out.

The alternative is that OpenAI can come to an agreement with its former leaders, and establish a new way forward, but negotiations remain ongoing, and its hard to know exactly where things will end up at this stage.

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Sociable: Will chaos at OpenAI benefit social media's AI projects? - Marketing Dive

Big Bang Social, the premier creator ecosystem under the umbrella of Collective Artists Network, is excited to announce a innovative collaboration with Comscore, a renowned authority in media measurement and analytics. This partnership aims to reshape the realm of creator marketing by offering creators profound insights into the efficacy of their campaigns and a wealth of valuable resources to enhance their success.

In a time when social media and digital content creation are undergoing unprecedented growth, having a comprehensive understanding of media consumption and audience intelligence is more crucial than ever. Big Bang Social is committed to offering brands the most optimized experience when it comes to designing campaigns while simultaneously empowering creators and influencers within this dynamic ecosystem.

At the core of this collaboration is the BigBang.Social App, a super-app designed to serve brands in multiple dimensions, including discovery, curation and customization of campaigns. Comscore's expertise in cross-platform measurement and digital audience insights will equip brands on the platform to make informed decisions, fine-tune their content strategies, and achieve superior results.

In response to the collaboration, Anurag Iyer, CEO of Big Bang Social, remarked, "We are thrilled to join forces with Comscore to provide brands with a distinctive, all-encompassing platform that will transform their marketing journey. With the BigBang.Social App and the added advantage of Comscore's analytics, brands will have unparalleled tools and resources to bolster their success and develop outstanding campaigns."

Geet Lulla, Vice President-Sales for Asia-Pacific, Comscore, also added, "We take pride in our collaboration with Big Bang Social to assist creators and influencers in realizing their full potential. Our expertise in social media measurement using first party data from the platform will equip creators with actionable and competitive insights, enabling them to make data-driven decisions and elevate their campaigns to the next level."

The partnership between Big Bang Social and Comscore promises to be a game-changer for the both the brand ecosystem and the creator community, offering a comprehensive solution for commerce, collaboration, skill enhancement, and analytics. Creators and influencers can anticipate a future brimming with new opportunities and growth as they navigate the digital landscape with confidence.

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Big Bang Social & Comscore Partner to Revolutionize Creator ... - Adgully

By: Cassidy Delamarter, University Communications and Marketing

A team of engineers and public health experts from the University of South Florida is helping Toamasina, Madagascar, residents reduce their exposure to lead a major global environmental pollutant that causes more than 1 million premature deaths each year. By combining efforts to replace water pumps and educate city technicians, USF researchers helped decrease the blood lead levels of 87 percent of the children tested during their study.

They were taking old car batteries and melting them down to make check valves in the pumps, said James Mihelcic, professor and director of USFs International Development Engineering Program.

Mihelcic made the discovery when visiting the East African country with students to study Toamasinas water and sanitation. We brought back water samples to USF to test them and we learned the locally manufactured pumps had really high levels of lead.

The lead concentrations of the water from the pumps exceeded the World Health Organizations recommended limit of lead in drinking water 10 micrograms per liter. In some cases, the water contained more than 10 times the recommended limit.

The families and children are drinking this water and using it to cook their meals, said principal author Adaline Buerck, a USF civil and environmental engineering doctoral alumna. In low- and middle-income countries, there is a lack of regulations and understandings of the harmful effects of lead, as well as other comorbidities, such as improper nutrition, that can increase childhood lead absorption.

The pumps are the primary source of water for more than three-quarters of the coastal area of Madagascar, where there are about 9,000 pumps because tap water is not always affordable or available for the citys 280,000 people. After receiving a small grant to replace lead components in 500 of the pumps, Mihelcic and Buerck knew it would be a challenge to remediate all of the remaining pumps. They decided to collaborate with Mahmooda Khaliq Pasha, USF associate professor of public health and social marketing.

Khaliq Pasha used social marketing a process that focuses on changing behavior to improve health using strategies from the commercial marketing world to create a faster, more cost-effective plan to directly educate the people responsible for the manufacturing and repairing of the pumps.

We knew we couldnt replace all of the pumps, so we provided training to the technicians about the dangers of lead and why they could have an improved product if they make a lead-free pump, Khaliq Pasha said. Now, when they manufacture a new pump or repair existing ones, they will use these new strategies, and with that, we're impacting the larger population rather than just the small sample that we work with.

Khaliq Pasha and Buerck worked with local staff to build the capacity and skill set of technicians, while overseeing and facilitating work on the pumps to ensure they understood how to remove and replace the leaded pump components. Additionally, to understand the impact of this intervention, they worked with local health practitioners to measure blood lead levels of small children who drank water from the pumps before and after the leaded pump components were replaced.

Of the 55 children tested, 87 percent experienced a significant decrease in blood lead levels once leaded components were removed from the pumps. For example, one child had an initial 11.3 micrograms of lead per liter of blood. Following the intervention, that level dropped to 4.7 micrograms per liter. The team believes these findings point to a need for greater consideration of lead in drinking and cooking water as an important exposure route in low- and middle-income countries.

This study really puts into perspective the social aspects of public health, Buerck said. For me, it really linked engineering to the real world and the impact you can have.

Through a National Science Foundation grant, USF students are working with Khaliq Pasha, Mihelcic and USF Professor Jeff Cunningham to continue visiting Madagascar. They will work with families to further purify their water by removing disease-causing pathogens. Khaliq Pasha and Mihelcic hope to secure additional funding to continue working with the technicians and scale the work to impact the larger population.

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USF researchers help reduce lead levels in Madagascar drinking ... - University of South Florida

What happens when you unite the biggest pop star in the world and a two-time Super Bowl champion? A whole lot of excitement, as the romance of Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce has shown.

But amid all the cheering, canoodling andInstagram flirting, the situation lends some useful insights into marketing and as an expert in sports marketing, I know that this is a topic worth focusing on.

Here are five lessons the NFL and other experiential marketers can consider to enhance their brands and reputation.

Cause you know I love the players And you love the game! Blank Space, 2014

Great entertainment marketers know how to fill a blank space. And Swift has given the NFL a unique opportunity to expand its appeal to a demographic young women that may not have been interested in football before. Swifties, as Swifts fans are known, are eager to see the pop icon embrace being in love. So whenever she visits a stadium to cheer on her new lover, Kansas City Chiefs star tight end Kelce which she has done four times in the past two months and may well do again soon a media frenzy follows.

While serious football fans want the focus to stay on football, the NFL is smart to capitalize on this opportunity. After all, Swift is a mega-popular star: She has more charted songs (212), top-10 hits (42) and No. 1 song debuts (five) on theBillboard Top 100than any other female musician in history.

The Chiefs remain known for their winning ways and star power, and theyre still drawing and satisfying their traditional fans. Yet Swifts presence has brought a more playful tone to the games. The ordinarily serious Chiefs coach Andy Reid has taken to jokingabout the pair (I set them up), while memes about Swift having to leave the stadiumin a popcorn machineare a next-level combination of participatory pop culture, celebrity and sports.

Audience expansion is an effective tactic for businesses, as long as marketers dont alienate old fans by opening up to new ones. And so far, this is paying off for the NFL:Ratings soarwhen Swift attends a game, and Kelcejersey saleshave also skyrocketed. This new interest in the sport is welcome, especially since NFL television ratings among18- to 35-year-olds had previously shown some declines.

Say youll see me again/Even if its just in your wildest dreams. Wildest Dreams, 2014

An entertainment or sports marketers wildest dream is to be able to bring in all sorts of fans and deliver on their personal reasons for being there. Thats why marketers are wise to think about psychographics in addition to demographic appeals. This means that instead of just segmenting audiences by demographic such as younger women or college students marketers tailor their appeals to lifestyles, interests, activities and the way consumers think.

My co-authored research shows thatengaged sports fans are motivated by psychological desires such as escape and building self-esteem everyone wants to be associated with a winner as well as social motives such as wanting to strengthen in-group bonds and participate in traditions and rituals.

Football is known for intense strategies, masculine bravado and violent hits. So the Swift crossover gives NFL sport marketers an opportunity to attract new fans with different motivations. A good example is when the NFL changed its X (formerly Twitter) bio toNFL (Taylors version) a nod to Swiftie in-group identity and humor. New fans who are drawn in by such appeals may become more serious about the sport later.

If you could see that Im the one who understands you, been here all along so, why cant you see? You belong with me. You Belong With Me, 2008

When it comes to sports, and especially football, some people think that the game isnt for them. The NFL and the Chiefs now have a unique opportunity to leverage sudden interest from a group of people not known for being football superfans. But to convert them into regular viewers, theyll need to make sure the newcomers feel a sense of belonging.

A subtle example of this sort of outreach happened when the Chiefs used social media towelcome Swift and by extension, her loyal fans to Chiefs Kingdom. Similarly, the league has made it abundantly clear that Swifties are welcome in the stands, even if a small yet loud cohort of NFL fans wouldrather they stay away. This open-mindedness is good for business.

Youll be the prince, and Ill be the princess/Its a love story, baby, just say yes. Love Story, 2008

I studyhuman brands the people, well known or emerging, who are the subject of marketing, interpersonal or interorganizational communications. In this age of social media, human branding has never been more important. Having a strong personal brand is associated with more endorsements, Google searches, merchandise sales and ticket sales. So Swift and Kelce are reaping the benefits of human co-branding.

What makes these particular human brands so compelling? Many Swifties are invested in Taylors romantic life and are cheering for her to find love and one day pick out a white dress. This interest and fantasy takes the form of a parasocial or one-sided relationship, where one party invests emotional energy and time, while the other person is unaware of the first persons existence. While these can potentially become harmful, in most cases parasocial interactionsare a source of escape, fun and fantasy.

In an era of negative news and doomscrolling, a story thats fun and entertaining can be powerful. And research in our advertising and branding book shows that sport marketers are eager tocapitalize on positive appeals.

Youre not my homeland anymore/So what am I defending now? Exile, 2020

A final insight for brands and marketers is to not be constrained by geography. With digital commerce and social media, researchers have become increasingly interested in faraway fans who travel long distances to events. In a recent study about professional cycling fanship in sporting-event sponsorship, my colleagues and I found that sport event attendees that traveled from farther awaywere more investedin the event and more willing to buy merchandise. This has big implications for new fans who may travel to Kansas City to catch a glimpse of Taylor Swift.

The Swift/Kelce relationship and the NFLs highlighting of it is one example of why it is important not to be hemmed in by geography. As one cardboard sign at a recent Chiefs game in Kansas City proclaimed, I traveled here to see Taylor Swift!

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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5 marketing lessons from the Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce romance - Kansas Reflector

Advertisers have been skittish about X since Mr. Musk bought the social media service last fall and said he wanted more free speech and would loosen content moderation rules. That meant the platform could theoretically place brands ads next to posts with offensive or hateful speech.

Many companies, including General Motors and Volkswagen, have balked at various points over the past year at having their promotions appear alongside a heavily documented surge in hate speech, misinformation and foreign propaganda on X. In April, Mr. Musk said nearly all advertisers had returned, without indicating whether they were spending at the same levels; he later noted that ad revenue had fallen 50 percent.

Mr. Musk also swung from threatening any advertisers that dared to pause their spending with a thermonuclear name & shame to wooing them by choosing Ms. Yaccarino, a former top ad executive at NBCUniversal, to replace him as chief executive. He picked public fights with major spenders like Apple and churned through sales executives given the task of maintaining relationships in the advertising industry. Top advertising companies, such as IPG, urged their clients to step back from X.

Advertising had long been about 90 percent of Twitters revenue before Mr. Musk bought the company. Last month, X told employees that the company was valued at $19 billion. That was down from the $44 billion that Mr. Musk paid.

The heightened sensitivity around antisemitism, Mr. Musks penchant for public squabbling and general fatigue after months of fuss over X left many advertising professionals hesitant to weigh in on Friday.

Clients have always had to make decisions about content they will or will not be associated with, Renee Miller, the founder of the Miller Group advertising agency in Los Angeles, said in an email. We generally counsel our clients to not take an openly public political stand.

IBM, which cut off about $1 million in advertising spending that it had committed to X for the rest of the year, said on Thursday that it had zero tolerance for hate speech and discrimination. The tech company acted after a report this week from Media Matters for America, a left-wing advocacy group, which said ads from companies including Apple and IBM were appearing on X next to posts supporting white nationalism and Nazism.

Mr. Musk posted late Thursday that Media Matters is an evil organization.

Angelo Carusone, president and chief executive of Media Matters, said Mr. Musks calling us evil for pointing out what was on X was not dissimilar from any right-wing account who we highlight.

He added that X was not just going to just lose money with Apple, but also the cornerstone of their strategy to woo back advertisers.

Kate Conger contributed reporting.

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Apple and Disney Halt Ads on X After Musk Endorses Antisemitic Post - The New York Times