Future Media | Ricky Sutton | Substack

Why Google sent you that email this morning

#461: The hidden story behind Google’s new search personalisation, and the facts every publisher needs to know to prepare...

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Australia doubles penalties to push under-16s social ban

#466: Six months in, the world-first social ban is doubling fines - and the eSafety Commissioner's threat is being delivered...

Jun 28 • Ricky Sutton

Exclusive: The Fall and Rise of the Trillionaire Paperboys

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Jun 26 • Ricky Sutton

8:06

The real reason your next iPhone is far more expensive

#464: Outgoing CEO Tim Cook built Apple's empire on a geopolitical fault line. Now you're paying to move it...

Jun 22 • Ricky Sutton

Why Tin Man Tim's making you pay more for an iPhone

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Jun 18 • Ricky Sutton

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The Court of Karma ends Google’s $4 trillion free ride

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The visionary who built Siri is now transforming news

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The line item that exposes Google's chokehold

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Jun 5 • Ricky Sutton

Shareholders tell Zuck being dead is bad for business

#459: A few hours ago, Meta's shareholders demanded Zuck tie exec pay to protecting kids before fines and regulation crush Meta's growth...

May 28 • Ricky Sutton

A tech billionaire, a beach and a dog who can't read signs

#458: What a small, brown act of civil disobedience tells us about how tech's power and a growing wealth imbalance is hurting the things we love...

May 21 • Ricky Sutton

Future Media

Future Media

Reporting on the collision of Big Tech and Big Media...

Newsletters

Scotch and Watch

The headlines my mates and I are sharing over a scotch...

Google on Trial

Latest from the antitrust trial that is reshaping the internet...

The DoJ's attempt to break the world's most valuable company...

Inside Zuck's brain

From social scion to AGI Caesar told in his own words...

Eye on AI Overviews

Tracking Google's shift from search to an answer engine...

Inside the FTC's probe of Meta, Instagram and WhatsApp...

Future Media Explains

Sometimes this is complicated. Explains breaks it down...

Future Media Intelligence

Your source for board-ready data and interactive charts...

Podcasts

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The fund that fought Murdoch is now after Snap

#453: Snap cut trust and safety and investors saw US$117 billion vaporise. Now Wall Street wants a major restructure…

Apr 20 • Ricky Sutton

Netflix's ad machine is locking in the next generation

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Apr 17 • Ricky Sutton

Musk's $44 billion Matryoshka is cracked open

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Mar 23 • Ricky Sutton

Pinterest just fired a starting gun in a retail media war

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Google on Trial

Advertisers launch $218 billion damages claim against Google

#454: The biggest claim in digital advertising history launches as the clock ticks down to Brinkema's ad tech ruling...

Apr 20 • Ricky Sutton

Judge says search harms news but publishers can't sue

#454: Analysis: Court dismisses five counts brought by US publishers against Google but the ruling gives publishers a map to win...

Mar 24 • Ricky Sutton

Google enforcer's fired - now it's down to these guys

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Feb 16 • Ricky Sutton

Mail, Gannett closer to payout as Google stunt backfires

#431: A high-stakes strategy to avoid a jury has gone awry, accelerating damages claims by two major publishers...

Jan 5 • Ricky Sutton

Publishers lack courage to quit Google without break-up

#420: The antitrust lawyers have been back in court. Google says it will fix ad tech if it's left alone. The DoJ says no-one trusts Google any more...

Nov 24, 2025 • Ricky Sutton

Future Media Explains

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How your iPhone become someone else's $105,000

#467: Four charts that show what your iPhone habit costs you and why you'd be quids in if you'd made one different decision...

Jul 2 • Ricky Sutton

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The real reason your next iPhone is far more expensive

#464: Outgoing CEO Tim Cook built Apple's empire on a geopolitical fault line. Now you're paying to move it...

Jun 22 • Ricky Sutton

17:42

Why Google sent you that email this morning

#461: The hidden story behind Google’s new search personalisation, and the facts every publisher needs to know to prepare...

Jun 11 • Ricky Sutton

8:13

The line item that exposes Google's chokehold

#460: A reader asked me what Google Network is. The answer is everything if you believe in publishing and want the ad funded open web to survive...

Jun 5 • Ricky Sutton

How Spotify is squeezing its artists to dodge ads problems

#455: Four secret levers the world's favourite streamer is using to shift cash from creators to shareholders to hide its failing ad ambitions...

Apr 29 • Ricky Sutton

AI Overviews

51:15

Tech's legal nemesis opens up on threat to Google's shield

#466: Europe's top anti-platform lawyer breaks down the ramifications of a German court ruling Google's a publisher...

Jun 30 • Ricky Sutton

3:08

The Court of Karma ends Google’s $4 trillion free ride

#462: For 30 years, Section 230 gave Google a get out of jail free card that destroyed the publishing industry. A Munich court just cancelled it...

Jun 16 • Ricky Sutton

17:42

Why Google sent you that email this morning

#461: The hidden story behind Google’s new search personalisation, and the facts every publisher needs to know to prepare...

Jun 11 • Ricky Sutton

Publishers bleed $3.1 million a day as Brinkema delays

#456: AI Overviews is hoarding record ad revenue for Google. Latest earnings show the gap has more than doubled since it was ruled a monopolist...

Apr 30 • Ricky Sutton

Dollars v Sense

55:09

Meta insiders break cover on Australia's under-16s ban

#428: Two former chiefs reveal that Zuck knows how young kids are but chooses growth over safety - and how Australia can reset the world...

Dec 15, 2025 • Ricky Sutton, Kelly Stonelake, and Brian Boland

1:04:17

AFP's AI chief shares how the global newsroom is adapting

#413: Sophie Huet reveals how she's retaining 1,700 heads, predicting news in 150 countries, and preparing for AIs to be her next customers...

Nov 9, 2025 • Ricky Sutton, Chris Duncan, and Sophie Huet

13:02

Social justice groups target OpenAI for "coaching suicide"

#412: Suit alleges OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman designed a product that manipulates users psychologically and contributed to four deaths...

Nov 9, 2025 • Ricky Sutton

Meta's misogynistic culture puts kids at risk, warns insider

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Jun 14, 2025 • Ricky Sutton

Meta on trial

Shareholders tell Zuck being dead is bad for business

#459: A few hours ago, Meta's shareholders demanded Zuck tie exec pay to protecting kids before fines and regulation crush Meta's growth...

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Jurors candycrush Meta and Youtube "to make them feel it"

#456: Cupcakes, gazelles, and a jar of candy convinced a jury Meta and YouTube engineered addiction in children - and it could change the web...

Mar 26 • Ricky Sutton

Live: Meta loses landmark case for failing to protect kids

#455: Court hears Meta put a $270 price tag on teen users - and fought to hook them with addictive features...

Mar 25 • Ricky Sutton and Kelly Stonelake

30:12

Meta headed back to court on antitrust after FTC appeal

Breaking news: Just 64 days after Zuck emerged victorious with his social network intact, America's regulators have launched an appeal...

Jan 20 • Ricky Sutton

Q: Where are we now with the Meta antitrust case?

#354: Meta has slunk off into the shadows now its high-profile antitrust case has ended. So where are we, and what's coming next?

Jul 9, 2025 • Ricky Sutton

4:57

Apple on Trial

12:01

Apple's perfect storm as profit, politics and privacy collide

#405: Apple's about to hit $4 trillion for the first time ever but it's far from cookies and cream inside its Oreo-shaped headquarters in Cupertino...

Oct 28, 2025 • Ricky Sutton

Publishers due millions as Oz rules app charges illegal

#365: Breaking: Judgement opens way for publishers to sell subs directly avoiding high fees and compensation going back years...

Aug 13, 2025 • Ricky Sutton

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Apple’s app stranglehold is now a political flashpoint

#348: Competition lawyer Gene Burrus reveals a landmark event that put Cupertino on a collision course with the most powerful people on Earth...

Jun 23, 2025 • Ricky Sutton

47:23

We're at peak tech, and that's why Apple looks so rotten

Yeah yeah, no-one believes me but let me share some of the very real ways that you are being hurt by Cupertino's $363 billion juggernaut...

Aug 23, 2024 • Ricky Sutton

Apple shapeshifts to use privacy creds for profit - DoJ

Antitrust enforcers allege Apple wraps itself "in a cloak of privacy, security, and consumer preferences to justify its anticompetitive conduct..."

Aug 21, 2024 • Ricky Sutton

Future Media

Reporting on the collision of Big Tech and Big Media...

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