MSFT Microsoft Corporation

By Steven Perlberg 

SNAP MOVES: A year ago at the Cannes advertising festival, Snapchat announced that it was open for business, letting big brands have access to the disappearing messages app's coveted young audience. Now Snapchat wants marketers to know that doing business with them will be more seamless, thanks to a new application programming interface, or API, that lets a handful of third-party ad tech firms buy Snapchat ads in an automated fashion (the way they are accustomed to doing across the web and on rival social networks), Adweek reports. The long-rumored API should, in theory, drop the price for video ads on the platform, good news for marketers who were priced out of more expensive Snapchat products (like sponsored lenses or geofilters). As Digiday notes, the change also means a pretty huge tweak in the user experience: people will now see video ads in between stories from their own friends.

LINKED UP: Just when Microsoft thought it was out of the advertising business, LinkedIn might pull it back in. As CMO Today reports, Microsoft all but ditched its advertising business about a year ago when it outsourced ad sales on its properties to AOL, but the question now is whether the software giant's $26.2 billion acquisition of LinkedIn will reignite its ad offering. LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner, in his note to employees, suggested that advertisers using LinkedIn for sponsored content might distribute that across Microsoft's other holdings. Maybe there's some larger ad play Microsoft can make thanks to LinkedIn's data. Or perhaps this had nothing to do with advertising at all, and Microsoft just wanted a better foothold in the business world.

DRAFTDUEL? FANKINGS?: When we last left DraftKings and FanDuel, the duo were under siege in U.S. states that ruled "daily fantasy sports" constitutes illegal gambling or were considering doing so. Now the two companies are in early talks to merge, Bloomberg reports. Observers have long thought a deal between the two makes sense, considering that they both spent a small fortune in a game of advertising one-upsmanship. As WSJ notes, teaming up would give the combined company more than 95% of an admittedly very uncertain industry. The companies' valuations each topped $1 billion last year, but Bloomberg says they've been cut in half. Their backers include media giants like Comcast and 21st Century Fox.

TRUMP VS. POST: Donald Trump yanked campaign press credentials from the Washington Post after the paper's "phony and dishonest" reporting on the presumptive Republican presidential nominee's comments about the Orlando shooting, WSJ reports. "We no longer feel compelled to work with a publication which has put its need for 'clicks' above journalistic integrity," the campaign said in a statement regarding a Washington Post story initially headlined "Donald Trump Suggests President Obama Was Involved With Orlando Shooting." Mr. Trump took a shot at the paper's owner, Jeff Bezos, saying that the Amazon founder is using the Post as a political tool to ensure Amazon doesn't get "sued for monopolistic tendency." Marty Baron, the Post's editor, said in a statement that Mr. Trump's move "is nothing less than a repudiation of the role of a free and independent press," and that the paper was "proud of our coverage, and we're going to keep at it."

Elsewhere

Gawker Media will be able to keep the lights on thanks to a $22 million loan from Cerberus Capital Management. The digital publisher, which filed for bankruptcy last week as it prepares to sell, would have been forced to liquidate without the loan. [ WSJ]

Meanwhile, Gawker CEO Nick Denton has agreed to serve as a consultant to Ziff Davis if the publisher wins the auction for Gawker Media. A filing excludes working on Gawker.com, the company's flagship site, from Mr. Denton's non-compete, perhaps paving the way for him to buy back the property from Ziff Davis. [ Politico]

"Hamilton" mania helped drive the 2016 Tony Awards on Sunday night to the event's highest rating in 15 years. The CBS program brought in about 8.73 million viewers, a 35% jump from last year. [LA Times]

At its developer event, Apple announced that Apple TV will now offer an interface for the Dish owned Sling TV streaming package. [ Re/code] The company also redesigned Apple News, allowing for paid subscriptions within the app from publishers including National Geographic and The Wall Street Journal. [ Nieman Lab]

In an expletive-filled interview, Thrillist CEO and digital media scion Ben Lerer called the current media landscape a "golden age," since TV companies are looking to tie up with digital publishers. Mr. Lerer criticized the media for being too gleefully critical of companies like BuzzFeed and Vice. [ Ad Age]

Americans' confidence in newspapers hit a new low, according to a Gallup poll. Only 20% of Americans say they have a "great deal" of confidence in newspapers. [ Gallup]

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Write to Steven Perlberg at steven.perlberg@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

June 14, 2016 08:00 ET (12:00 GMT)

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