Hearst faces an age and gender discrimination lawsuit

Hi! Welcome to the Insider Advertising daily for September 25. I'm Lauren Johnson, a senior advertising reporter at Business Insider. Subscribe here to get this newsletter in your inbox every weekday. Send me feedback or tips at [email protected].

Today's news: Former Esquire exec sues Hearst, layoffs at Kantar, and a former Pinterest and Facebook exec speaks out against Facebook.

A former Esquire exec is suing Hearst, alleging age and gender discrimination

• A former Esquire ad executive sued parent company Hearst, alleging sex and age discrimination, report Patrick Coffee and Lucia Moses.
• Lauren Johnson, 52, alleged in a lawsuit that her former boss Jack Essig "regularly mocked" older employees and female workers while she worked there from 2016-2018.
• A Hearst Magazines spokesperson said it investigated the allegations and believes the lawsuit has no merit.

Read the full story here.

Bain Capital research and consulting firm Kantar plans to cut 10% of US staff. Here's what we know so far.

• Patrick also reported that market research and consulting firm Kantar plans to cut 10% of its US workforce, or around 300 people.
• WPP sold 60% of Kantar to Bain Capital in 2019 in a deal that valued it at $4 billion. 
• "Like many companies, Kantar has felt the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. We are making changes to our business now, unfortunately including redundancies, to ensure we rebound in a stronger position, capable of sustainable growth," a spokesman said.

Read the full story here.

Noam Galai/Getty Images for TechCrunch

Facebook's former director of monetization says Facebook intentionally made its product as addictive as cigarettes — and now he fears it could cause 'civil war'

• Tim Kendall, former Pinterest president and Facebook director of monetization, testified that Facebook built its products to be addictive like cigarettes.
• In a testimony before the House Consumer Protection and Commerce Subcommittee published Thursday, Kendall accused Facebook of building algorithms that have facilitated the spread of misinformation, encouraged divisive rhetoric, and laid the groundwork for a "mental health crisis."
• At the subcommittee hearing Kendall testified at, lawmakers said the spread of misinformation on Facebook could be cause for future government regulation of social media platforms.

Read the full story here.

More stories we're reading:

• Bringing TikTok to the Oracle Cloud would be a huge win for the database giant, but experts say that the real challenge in taking on Amazon will be getting large enterprises to sign on (Business Insider)
• Skincare is surging across TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube. New data reveals which brands have seen the biggest boosts on social media, from CeraVe to Vaseline. (Business Insider)
• Amazon's ad revenue in 2020 is set to grow 23.5% despite the pandemic (Insider Intelligence)
• The pandemic became personal when Booking Holdings' CEO caught COVID-19. Now, he's taking on Airbnb and calling on the government to save a battered travel industry. (Business Insider)
• 'It's like being in a sci-fi nightmare film': Whole Foods employees say Amazon workers are crowding stores, ignoring virus protocols, and hounding them for help as online orders surge (Business Insider)
• 'How much do we want to get screwed?': Confessions of an agency exec on lack of payment due to coronavirus (Digiday)
• Reddit rolls out 3 flavors of brand safety inventory controls (AdExchanger)

Thanks for reading and see you on Monday! You can reach me in the meantime at [email protected] and subscribe to this daily email here.

— Lauren

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