Snapchat Teams Up With Foursquare; Facebook And Google Take On Fake News

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GeoSnap

Snapchat will refine its location-based targeting and geofilters with Foursquare data. The location analytics provider (this ain’t your grandfather’s Foursquare) will power Snapchat geofilters with data about where ads were served, the company wrote in a Medium post. Snapchat had location targeting for geofilters before, but Foursquare will pull in GPS, device, location and Bluetooth information to make those filters more specific (like identifying a specific store within a mall). The partnership is expected to multiply Snapchat’s location-based inventory. And in case you missed it: Snap has reportedly filed confidentially for its IPO.

Monetizing Misinformation

After taking flak for amplifying fake election news, Facebook and Google have instituted policies meant to undercut ad revenue for such properties. The companies will expel fake news sites from their respective ad networks, AdSense and Audience Network, but it’s a meager solution. Neither company has banned bilge news – only forced it to find other ways to fill inventory. And a quick Ghostery tour of fake news sites reveals plenty of exchanges and networks willing to source demand. More.

Fake Out

The promulgation of fake crap online goes way beyond news. Amazon is preparing for the holiday season by bringing its first lawsuits against sellers allegedly pushing counterfeit products in its marketplace, per Bloomberg. Amazon’s legal moves come a week after Apple was taken to task for allowing a legion of fake retail apps through App Store security. Last month, Apple also sued an Amazon vendor it said was distributing fake Apple products. There isn’t much room for optimism. The Amazon counterfeiters will likely just resurface with new accounts (as Amazon acknowledges), and Google/Apple/Facebook have even less power over their particular parasites since untraceable online identities can’t be brought to court.

Funding Better Ads

Ad quality continues to be a huge focus. A new startup helmed by digital ad vet Scott Moore called Ad Lightning will “give digital publishers the insight and control needed to manage programmatic advertising creative, eliminate ads that hamper site performance and consumer experience and maximize return on investment.” The company raised a $2 million round led by Sinclair Broadcasting to get the job done. Moore held senior media jobs at Microsoft and Yahoo before becoming CEO of Cheezburger, which was acquired in April. Release.

Monetization Train

Former ChartBeat CEO Tony Haile is launching Scroll, a subscription service meant to bundle news from different publishers. Axel Springer, The New York Times and News Corp. are early investors, but haven’t yet agreed to participate in the program. Scroll will help publishers “make more money sharing subscription revenue … than they do with those crummy ads,” Haile told Recode’s Peter Kafka. The goal is to find stable revenue among regular newsreaders who aren’t interested in single-publisher subscriptions – an idea that’s not without precedent. Rupert Murdoch’s Alesia unsuccessfully tried to aggregate news properties behind a paywall, and Blendle (which also counts Axel Springer and the Times as investors) is seeking a niche for publisher micropayments. More.