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- Digital Pulses Dispatch: The Beginnings
Digital Pulses Dispatch: The Beginnings
Your insider guide to trends, tools and transformations shaping tech, media and marketing.
Alessia Cappello
January 10, 2025 • Time needed: 7 minutes
Good morning from Madrid!
Welcome to the first issue of Digital Pulses Dispatch—a newsletter designed to cut through the noise and bring you sharp insights, emerging trends, and actionable tools at the intersection of tech, media and marketing. This is not just another newsletter, but a curated resource tailored to your professional interests.
A little about me: I’m an International Markets Representative & MarCom Lead for a company specializing in digital advertising benchmarking data. With over seven years of experience, I’ve navigated global markets, led marketing and communication strategies, mentored Master students in the digital sector and explored the intersection of tech, creativity and data-driven insights.
Now that we’re acquainted, let’s dive into what’s shaping the digital world today.
📈 The Big Trend
There’s an AI for That
AI dominated 2024 and is set to play an even more significant role in 2025. Unlike previous tech waves where startups honed in on solving specific problems with tailored innovations, AI has turned the playbook upside down. With the rise of large language models (LLMs) like OpenAI’s ChatGPT, we’ve been handed a powerful, versatile tool with limitless potential—but no universal instruction manual.
The result? Users are left to figure out their use cases, a stark departure from Steve Jobs’ “it just works” ethos.
What we’re seeing now is an explosion of AI tools that cater to increasingly specific niches, such as:
While innovation is booming, mainstream adoption isn’t keeping pace. Businesses are fascinated by AI’s potential but are also cautious, often unsure of how to integrate these tools into daily workflows.
Meanwhile, previous bets don’t disappear. Companies like Meta haven’t abandoned trends like the metaverse (investing $63 billion and counting) while also eager to lead the AI race. Yet, finding practical, scalable use cases remains the ultimate challenge.
So, is there an AI for everything? Almost. While adoption still has hurdles to clear, the real opportunity lies in identifying how these tools can elevate what you do, and that’s a challenge worth embracing.
✨ Platform Watch
TikTok Made Podcasts Discoverable, YouTube Made Them Big
The podcast boom arguably began with Serial’s first season—a runaway success that captivated millions. Yet, for years, podcasts faced a glaring issue: discovery. How do you find something you didn’t know you were looking for?
Two platforms changed that:
TikTok Revolutionized Discovery
At its core, TikTok is a video recommendation engine. Podcasters quickly realized they could clip compelling seconds or minutes of their episodes and post them on TikTok (and later Reels), effectively creating bite-sized ads for their shows. Suddenly, what was once hidden on audio platforms found a massive, engaged audience.YouTube Elevated the Format
As podcasts embraced video, they naturally turned to YouTube—the long-form video giant. Podcasters were already investing in high-quality audio (a non-negotiable for listener retention), making it easy to add visuals. Whether it was a simple screen recording of a video call or a polished studio setup, YouTube gave podcasters a platform to be seen
Together, these platforms transformed podcasts from niche audio content to multimedia powerhouses, bringing them closer to mainstream entertainment.
🧠 Tool of the Month
Feedly (and how I use it)
What to keep up with the news without being overwhelmed? Feedly is the RSS aggregator I swear by (even if I am aware RSS feeds are out of style). Here’s how I use it:
Organize media feeds into folders (e.g., AI, media, culture).
Browse the suggested topics categories and add them to your feed.
Set up keyword alerts for “generative AI” or “digital strategy.”
Spend 10 minutes a day skimming over the latest articles—it’s like your morning newspaper for niche insights.
It’s like having a personalized newspaper for your niche.
🔥 Hot Take
Google Isn’t Killing 3rd -Party Cookies—It’s Passing the Buck
When Google announced in 2024 that it wouldn’t be fully transitioning to a cookieless world, I can’t say I was surprised. While I’ve always been skeptical about the effectiveness of online ad segmentation, the alternatives to cookies still seem inadequate for achieving segmentation at scale.
Here’s the twist: Google is shifting the responsibility to you, the user. The plan? Ensure users make an “informed decision” about accepting cookies.
Living in Europe, I’ve seen firsthand how users interact with cookie walls and how this plays out. Most users hit “accept all” just to make the pop-up disappear—especially when the alternative involves scrolling through an exhaustive list of settings. This isn’t a bug; it’s the system working as designed.
That said, advertisers or platforms operate within the constraints of complex systems, where user experience, legal compliance, and business objectives often clash.
So, will Google’s new informed consent era empower users? Or will it lead to the same outcome: automatic acceptance of the default option, carefully engineered to balance all these competing interests? My guess is the latter.
🛠 Cool Resources
MegaLab: Investigates how the Chrome extension Honey—acquired by PayPal—may be scamming both creators and small businesses. How PayPal-owned Honey (Chrome extension) might scam creators and small businesses.
Sherwood: Taylor Lorenz’s thought-provoking comparison between OpenAI and Visa explores how OpenAI might be positioning itself to build a monopoly in the AI landscape.
👋 Let’s Connect
That’s it for today’s Digital Pulse Dispatch.
Know someone who’d enjoy this? Share the newsletter and help us grow this community of tech-thinkers.
Until next time—keep innovating, one click at a time.
Alessia
Digital Strategist | Tech Enthusiast | Mentor