The FTC has issued a "Civil Investigative Demand" letter to OpenAI, the makers of ChatGPT apparently over the system's "hallucinations" and defamation of individuals. The letter details the investigation as:

It's the "reputational harm" that seems to be the tip-off. The rest of the 20-page document details how the company can comply and the vast amount of data that the FTC wants. Like all government investigations this won't be quick but may point to sanctions the FTC is willing to impose on AI companies that willfully ignore bad results in their products. 

GWI has a new report on social media usage based on data in Q1 from a massive global sample of 241,138 respondents. There are a lot of insights here for social marketers, we're picking just three to highlight.

Citizens around the world are already spending as much time as they possibly can on social media. The numbers fluctuate a bit but remain around 2-3 hours per day. 

* Yes, that's a song by the Guess Who.

For marketers who love bright, shiny objects we have bad news. Facebook is still the most popular platform, even for Millennials. Only Gen Z has a dissenting opinion, with Meta's Instagram and WhatsApp in the top spots (we sense a trend here).  

The good news is that Threads, the new Meta platform, will eventually use the same ads manager as these other properties (not an official Klick prediction, ask your rep for our POV -Ed.). We look forward to a future report that includes that platform.

Also, when asked about their favorite platform, again the top three are all provided by Meta.

This chart shows the cross-platform nature of social media. In this chart, for example, 78% of Facebook users also use Instagram.

These numbers show that social media users have multiple accounts. Even Gen X has 5.8 different accounts on average. The crossover of the top four though are interesting because they all use the same ads manager ... Meta.

The full report also includes:

This is a must-read for marketers interested in social. Oh, wait, that's nearly all marketers in 2023.

Ever need to counter a "social is dying" argument? This should do it... Social is still growing and is going to cross TV in 2024.

As immortalized by Mark Twain, "the rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated."  

Unsurprisingly, Threads engagement has reduced from the initial highs of its launch two weeks ago. The app grew well past 100-million installs in its first week and "broke the internet" with it's buzz.

Now, Similarweb and Sensor Tower are reporting that engagement has dipped, but that makes sense. First, from Sensor Tower:

And from Similarweb:

Social media users don't have infinite time and will rank their platforms based on the experiences they find there. Twitter traffic seemed to be down 5% on the first weekend of Threads' launch. The next month will be interesting to see what Threads can provide to make these users sticky to the platform. 

Cleardata engaged Harris Poll to conduct a study on 2,000 US adults asking about health data privacy. This study showed that most Americans incorrectly expect all digital health apps to be governed by HIPAA. 

We charted some of the data provided in source Harris Poll tables. We found that more Americans have used a provider app than a non-affiliated digital health app.

The number that agree with these statements are listed below. We reworded them slightly to make sense in the list.

The two final stats in the above list show that a significant number of Americans are more convenience than privacy driven when it comes to health apps. This may because of a false sense of security from not understanding the limitations of HIPAA. 

We charted the results of those final two questions by age group and found the 18-34 demographic much more accepting of data sharing than those 65+.

A full 60% of 18-34 year-olds would still use a digital health app if they knew it would share data with advertising and marketing firms for targeting. Also, 54% said that convenience was more important than data privacy when using health apps. 

This isn't a blank cheque for marketers, especially those with older audiences. However, if you disclose your data usage clearly there is a good chance your service (if valuable) will still be adopted. Just beware the differences as your audience heads over 50.

A new study, conducted by Magna for Nexxen looks at repeating ads on streaming TV services. The company recruited 1,246 viewers to participate in the trial. Participants watched their normal shows on Connected TV and were randomly fed different frequencies of repeated ads (one after the other, no breaks).

The repeated ads with six exposures achieved 92% unaided recall.

While nearly everyone remembered the brand name, they didn't associate that name with positive thoughts. 

Streaming TV has surpassed Cable with 35% share of consumption (to Cable's 34%) and is an important part of the TV landscape. Pharma marketers will want to ensure they know the ad load of the streaming services they are on to manage their viewers' experiences. 

A study on digital pharmacy user experience by Corporate Insight shows that e-commerce features abound. On the pharmacies' home pages:

Six of 20 researched firms got an "Excellent" rating:

Sure, DISH Network wants to sell pharma ad space, but they're not wrong that the 50+ crowd is all-in on technology. Their claim that it's the "scale of linear TV" is just plain wrong, but they are right about the targeting.

In the article an AARP study is quoted so here are two interesting charts based on that source.

The smartphone is ubiquitous in this market just like others. Also, if my last tech support visit to my mother-in-law is any indication, they're all in on streaming—she loves her Netflix, Prime, Crave, and Plex (don't talk about your family -Ed.).

The 50+ audience in the US talks online. Not only do they text and email but three-quarters of them are on social media. Nearly the same as the US average around 80%.

A new academic study funded by a number of parties looks at private equity consolidation of provider markets. This is a situation where private equity purchases provider practices and typically retains the HCPs who perform the work. 

The issues appear when private equity gets enough share in a particular market to the point they can start raising prices with little competition. This chart shows the price difference in standard practices and those owned by private equity:

For marketers focused on different specialties, the top ones for private equity are gastros, derms, and OB/GYNs:

For Wire readers who can stomach some pretty spicy language, this Reddit thread on the experience of junior HCPs in a practice that gets bought is pretty telling. Warning, it's a gloves-off Reddit thread, you've been warned.

A qualitative article in the Journal of the AMA looks at the FDA's Advisory Committee meetings and finds they are reducing over time. NDAs are the top meeting topic, but others are common.

Most of the time the FDA agrees with the Ad Comm recommendation, but not always.

This article is interesting for folks in the industry but not immediately actionable. 

This report is all about patient financial health and how that relates to provider networks. Here, for example is how providers view patient financial engagement. 

Marketers interested in patient financial challenges might like this report.

Digital health has returned to more sustainable funding levels after a spending spree in 2021. If 2023 H2 holds up it could be in the range, or slightly lower, than 2020.