Brooklinen and Parachute push to gain market share: The two D2C home goods brands are opening stores and expanding into new channels to drive sales growth.

Ad revenues for short-video-sharing app TikTok and Chinese sister app Douyin will hit $31.66 billion this year to account for 5.3% of the global digital ad market.

Cash is on the decline everywhere, accounting for at most 44% of point-of-sale (POS) transaction value regionally and just 18% globally in 2021. Its share will drop to 10% worldwide by the end of 2025, with North America, Asia-Pacific, and Europe leading the charge away from physical money.

A digital food supply chain is now in season: Rampant food waste drives up costs and kicks climate change into high gear. Startups like Choco have an app for that.

Meta’s Horizon Worlds features can monetize VR: Creators will be able to sell items “in-world,” with Meta taking up to 47.5%. Will creators balk at the cost of business in the metaverse?

Our analyst Andrew Lipsman is joined by Sara Livingston, head of customer solutions at Rockerbox, to discuss where direct-to-consumer (D2C) brands' Facebook ad budgets are flowing since iOS tracking changes disrupted ad targeting and measurement last year. Find out why Google, TikTok, and connected TV are capturing more spend and how D2C budgets are likely to migrate in the coming years.

The old music you love is more valuable than the latest tunes: Elvis’ catalog is the latest to get scooped up as listening shifts away from newer hits.

Disney+ bets on “Dancing With The Stars” fans to boost subscriptions: Moving the flagship broadcast to streaming shows where Disney’s priorities are.

Meta looks to bring commerce to its Horizon Worlds platform: Creators can earn money from their metaverse products and experiences under a test program.

Once the domain of gamers and young social media users, AR and VR are entering the mainstream. This year, more than a quarter of the US population will use AR and nearly a fifth will use VR. As device-makers improve VR headsets and AR spreads to new use cases, the number of AR and VR users will continue to grow over the next four years, with AR outpacing VR.

Podcasts have Spotify seeing dollar signs. The company’s US podcast ad revenues will hit $191.9 million in 2022 and cross the $400 billion mark in 2024, with growth well into the double-digit percentages. The format will also make up an increasing share of Spotify’s overall ad revenues: 16.7% of its $1.15 billion in US ad revenues this year, before growing to 19.4% in 2024.

“We only detain IT specialists”: As Russia’s tech workforce rapidly flees to other countries where their skills are also in demand, the Kremlin’s belligerent response will only intensify the retreat.