Digest: Sharp Decline in News Ad Spend; Meta to Train AI Models on Public Social Content in the EU

In today’s digest, we explore the decline in news ad spend, Meta’s decision to begin training its AI models on public content in the EU, and Barb’s beta launch of overnight commercial spot ratings.

Sharp Decline in News Ad Spend

According to WARC’s latest Global Ad Trends report, ad spend on news content is in steep decline across multiple channels, with brands shifting investment away from professionally produced journalism in favour of user generated content and creator journalists.

The report forecasts that global ad spend on newsbrands will fall to USD$32.3bn (£24bn) this year, marking a 33.1% drop since 2019. Globally, only 51% of ad spend now goes to professionally produced content, down from 72% in 2019.

News content often faces demonetisation due to the use of keyword blocklists, which exclude ads from appearing alongside stories deemed controversial or distressing. As a result, brands are favouring softer content, such as sport and lifestyle over hard news. According to Nielsen, just 3.7% (£177m) of total UK TV ad spend in 2024 went to news programming. 

Meta to Train AI Models on Public Content in the EU

Meta has announced that it will begin training its AI models using public content, including posts and comments on Facebook and Instagram, in the EU. The move comes after Meta previously paused these plans in response to regulatory pressure surrounding data privacy concerns. The announcement follows the recent EU launch of a limited version of Meta AIMeta has stated that only publicly shared content will be used for training, as it works to bring its AI offerings in line with regional privacy standards.

Barb Unveils Overnight Commercial Reporting

Barb has launched reporting overnight commercial spot ratings in beta. It provides overnight programme logs to generate provisional programme ratings, which are then updated after eight days once broadcasters provide their own logs.

This beta phase will  allow Barb to provide overnight ratings for individual commercial spots, offering more insights into ad performance beyond the programmes in which they aired.