¶The $2.4 billion cash exit marks a sharp step-up. It reflects both the growing cost of AI-driven fraud and the premium placed on proven behavioral technology already embedded in major banks.

¶This will make you pause for a moment the next time you’re using your bank’s app on your phone. Turns out, AI has been watching your “digital banking sessions.” BioCatch, the company being acquired by Visa, analyzes “thousands of real-time signals during digital banking sessions….[including] keystrokes, touch gestures, device handling and signs of coercion.”

¶Don’t worry, though. BioCatch is watching your every move for your own protection. The company’s “AI models distinguish legitimate users from fraudsters in milliseconds.”

¶That’s probably a good thing, but be careful as you pause during your next “digital banking session” to reflect on the many ways in which AI has entered our lives. Thinking about it for too long may have consequences.

¶ESPN is much more than a TV network these days, with younger consumers increasingly engaging with the brand on the social platforms where the creators operate every day.

¶“We have such a loaded roster of what I’ll call traditional football talent. We really looked at putting this group together as an opportunity to find talent that speaks to different fan communities or speaks to those audiences in a way that’s more unique and social first,” says Kaitee Daley, ESPN senior VP of digital, social & streaming content.

¶I think all sports have been dealing with the reality of having multiple audiences and the challenge of using multiple channels effectively to reach those audiences over the past several years. I think that’s true for ‘broadcasting’ actual games (network television broadcasts v. streaming broadcasts v. social posts during the game) as well as pre- and post-game analysis and commentary (talking heads in studio v. long-form write ups on The Athletic and other web publications v. “stories” on Instagram and other platforms).

¶With its “layoffs” of “traditional talent” last week and now this announcement of the new “class of digital creators for its Creator Network”, ESPN has shown its hand a bit: individual content producers, who tend to be “social first”, are viewed as a source of growth.

¶“The post-2013 ESPN era steamrolls ahead.” In that era of ESPN, the individual is valued over the company because, maybe, “in 2026 [that] is the only way to break through in the crowded media environment.” (Id.)

¶Sports media is changing rapidly, and the 2026-2027 NFL season, I think, is going to tell us a lot about where it’s at and where it’s headed. Stay tuned…to something.