The U.S. ad recovery is looking better with each new ad industry forecast update, but this weekend's revision by GroupM offers the most bullish adjustment to date, with total U.S. ad spending now projected to expand 9.1% this year, or nearly 15% after factoring out the effects of incremental political ad spending during 2020.

"It's Amazon's world, and other rights holders are living in it," GroupM Business Intelligence Global President Brian Wieser wrote in an analysis of the new NFL rights deals he sent over the weekend.

If you want to understand what institutions people truly trust, pose an existential threat. That, more or less, is what a year of the COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated, and now that it is being brought under some semblance of control, some of those institutions are seeing their role as trusted information providers erode along with it -- especially media and brands.

The traditional ad value exchange -- trading free, ad-supported content for consumer attention -- is no longer good enough, concludes a new IAB/PwC report being released today.

2020 was a banner year for consumer spending despite -- or perhaps because of -- the pandemic, as homebound consumers boosted spending on media content and technology to stay in touch and stay informed and entertained.