A brief heads-up that December 24 will be our last newsletter of 2025! We’ll return to your inboxes on January 5, 2026, right before CES begins. Until then, happy holidays!
Toying With An Idea
Speaking of Christmas, this has been a tough one for the toy business.
President Trump kicked off the holiday season with a missive for parents to buy fewer toys.
To be exact: “Well, maybe the children will have two dolls instead of 30 dolls, you know? And maybe the two dolls will cost a couple of bucks more than they would normally.”
And remember FAO Schwarz? The famed toy shop is reborn and trying to figure out the role of the modern toy store in a world with one-click online shopping, The Wall Street Journal reports.
The idea, which started out as “an Instagrammable store layout and design,” has now grown to encompass more personalized and first-come, first-serve products that can’t be found online.
FAO Schwarz has learned the language of data-driven retail, though. The chain monitors the average time spent in store since introducing new experiences, and says there has been a double-digit gain in its “conversion rate” for customers who take one of the new shopping tours, for instance.
Traffic: Light
More numbers have come in quantifying generative AI’s impact on site referral traffic, and, folks, they are grim. Although there are some bright spots if you squint hard enough.
For one thing, ChatGPT stands head and shoulders above Google Gemini in terms of sending traffic to websites, according to Similarweb data compiled by Digiday.
Between September and November this year, ChatGPT drove 1.2 billion outgoing site visits. That’s up from 799 million during the same period last year.
ChatGPT’s numbers compare favorably to the paltry 287 million site visits driven by Google Gemini between September and November 2025. But Gemini actually increased its outgoing traffic by 388% compared to last year.
While referrals are trending in a positive direction, AI platforms drive just 1% of overall traffic to sites, according to SEO platform Conductor. Again, ChatGPT leads the way here, accounting for 87% of all AI referrals.
Meanwhile, Google’s AI products continue to be a massive drain on publisher traffic.
Most worrying of all, just 1% of users click links included in Google’s AI Overviews, according to Pew Research. And, in cases where AI Overviews are present in search results, users are about half as likely to click other links on the search page.
Back in the Honey Trap
Exactly a year ago, New Zealand-based YouTuber MegaLag uploaded a video examining claims that PayPal-owned browser extension Honey was stealing affiliate credit by removing the link decoration info that attributed the influencer and replacing it with info indicating Honey generated the purchase.
The long-promised part two is finally live. And it’s a doozy, clocking in at 51 minutes, twice the length of the original video. Among other claims, MegaLag alleges that Honey collects all the codes entered into ecommerce sites (like private discounts for employees or military veterans, for example) without the consent of businesses or users, and misled businesses that complained, upselling them on paid affiliate partnerships.
MegaLag also brings up discrepancies in Honey’s marketing. For example, the company frequently tells users that it will not sell or share their data, but it’s also begun touting how that same data can be used for shopping insights. (And, presumably, for PayPal’s newly launched ad network as well. PayPal acquired Honey in 2020.)
Technically, these two ideas are not inherently contradictory if PayPal is being transparent and responsible about what kind of data is being collected. But for the average layperson, it sounds pretty damning – which PayPal knows, and it is going after MegaLag to remove its content.
Makes you curious to see how much wilder part three is going to get, huh?
But Wait! There’s More
Google added more countries to the list of geos that support ads in AI Overviews. [Search Engine Roundtable]
CBS News Editor Bari Weiss defends her controversial decision to abruptly pull a “60 Minutes” segment about the El Salvadoran mega prison where the US sent hundreds of Venezuelan migrants. [The Wall Street Journal]
On the political weaponization of Americans’ personal data, particularly when it comes to gender politics. [Tech Policy Press]
YouTube pulls its data from Billboard music charts in protest of the publication’s new formula, which more heavily weights subscription-based streaming services over ad-supported ones. [TubeFilter]
Meta launches a new suite of podcast features to entice audio listeners to Threads. [Bloomberg]
TikTok Shop now offers virtual gift cards for making purchases directly inside the platform. [TechCrunch]
You’re Hired!
Integral Ad Science appoints Melissa Furze as the new head of data science. [release]
Starbucks hires “collab” specialist Neiv Toledano, formerly of E.l.f. Cosmetics, in a new role as senior marketing manager of fashion and beauty. [Digiday]
