vice fight : tim kaine and mike pence defended their running mates in a heated debate tuesday night . as the wall street journal reports, hillary clinton<u+2019>s vice presidential pick mr. kaine set the aggressive tone early , frequently interrupting mr. pence, who won some plaudits for keeping his cool but drew criticism for avoiding explaining some of donald trump<u+2019>s more bombastic statements and policy proposals. the two sparred over mr. trump<u+2019>s tax returns, refugee policy and russia, while moderator elaine quijano of cbs news had some trouble keeping the pair under control. mr. trump, it should come as no surprise, was live-tweeting. while vice presidential debates tend not to have a big sway on the election, they are still huge tv events. ratings figures will arrive later today, and we<u+2019>ll see how the numbers stacked up against some tv executives<u+2019> modest expectations for less than 60 million viewers. the debate four years ago between joe biden and paul ryan brought in 51.4 million viewers, while mr. biden<u+2019>s 2008 duel with sarah palin set the vp debate record with 69.9 million. early bird : twitter is an <u+201c>unpolished jewel<u+201d> waiting to become a great company, salesforce chief executive marc benioff told a dozen tech ceos at a dinner recently, wsj reports. mr. benioff has been making the case to investors that salesforce should acquire twitter because of its data, as well as advertising and e-commerce opportunities. but there are other potential suitors with much higher market values, like google and disney, that might also be interested in twitter, which is expected to field bids this week that could be in the $20 billion range. mr. benioff is on the hunt for a major deal after losing out on linkedin to microsoft. while twitter has had its well-documented growth problems, in theory its service could help salesforce add new features to its sales and marketing services (it already incorporates twitter in many of them). and mr. benioff is convinced that twitter, with a strong acquirer like salesforce, can figure out how to better draw in ad revenue for its content. measuring up : facebook<u+2019>s video miscalculation , in which the company for two years overstated the average duration that users spent watching videos, was a high-profile blunder . but, as cmo today reports, the error has tapped into a deeper problem: advertisers and publishers want better third-party tracking . facebook works with measurement companies like nielsen, comscore and moat, which provides advertisers data on things like ad-completion rate. but moat, for instance, wouldn<u+2019>t have caught facebook<u+2019>s error because it doesn<u+2019>t actually track the specific metric facebook was found to be overcounting. plus, in general, moat collects its information independently of facebook and doesn<u+2019>t check facebook<u+2019>s reporting. that<u+2019>s part of the reason why the association for national advertisers has called on facebook to agree to a measurement audit from the media rating council, the industry standard. for now, mrc ceo george ivie says it<u+2019>s unclear whether third-party firms are <u+201c>doing the measurement or receiving and recording the data<u+201d> from platforms like facebook. while facebook hasn<u+2019>t committed to anything, mr. ivie said discussions continue and the company has <u+201c>stated some willingness<u+201d> to move forward. google<u+2019>s home : google on tuesday announced the latest slate of products that the tech giant hopes will give it more of a presence in the consumer hardware business. as wsj reported, google unveiled the new pixel smartphone , highlighting the device<u+2019>s battery life (seven hours from 15 minutes of charging) and camera. google also revealed home, its $129 rival to amazon<u+2019>s $180 echo voice-controlled speaker. both pixel and home feature google<u+2019>s new siri-rival, a digital assistant that the company has made a central part of its effort to step up the artificial intelligence in its products. google<u+2019>s clout in all things internet is well known, but stepping up its hardware business has been more of a challenge. the company is also using home as an opportunity to potentially expand its userbase for youtube red, offering a six-month subscription to the online-video service. as expected, google also showed off the daydream virtual reality headset , which will cost $80. the new york times is moving to replace most standardized banner ads on its site with a proprietary display ad format that will dynamically adjust in size when viewed across different devices. the goal is for the ads to look more <u+201c>native<u+201d> to the site and improve the experience for marketers and users. [ cmo today ] criteo is acquiring e-commerce ad tech firm hooklogic for $250 million. the company works with retailers like wal-mart, macy<u+2019>s and target. [ adexchanger ] wikileaks founder julian assange has promised to release documents that will be <u+201c>significant to the u.s. election.<u+201d> mr. assange said wikileaks plans to publish documents every week leading up to the election. [ wsj ] check out variety<u+2019>s list of highest-paid tv actors, from the estimated $1 million per episode received by <u+201c>the big bang theory<u+201d> actors to the $750,000 an episode for lauren graham and alexis bledel in netflix<u+2019>s revival of <u+201c>gilmore girls.<u+201d> not to mention judge judy, who rakes in an estimated $47 million a year. [ variety ] yahoo last year secretly scanned hundreds of millions of yahoo mail accounts on behalf of u.s. intelligence agencies, a move that upset some top executives. the company said it <u+201c>complies with the laws of the united states.<u+201d> [ reuters ] anderson cooper has signed a new deal to stay at cnn, essentially taking himself out of the running to become kelly ripa<u+2019>s co-host on abc. [ hollywood reporter ] vice<u+2019>s tv channel in the u.k. appears to be off to a rough start in the ratings. viceland uk on sky received a peak audience of about 14,000 people from 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. during its first two weeks. [ the guardian ] gannett and tronc haven<u+2019>t reached a final deal agreement, but are said to have at least bridged the valuation gap that has led to months of back-and-forth talks. [ bloomberg ] netflix has signed a deal with luxury-theater chain ipic to show its original movies in theaters the day they come out on the streaming service. [ wsj ] follow us on twitter: @wsjcmo , @digitalshields , @vranicawsj , @jackmarshall , @perlberg , @alexbruell , @srabil , @asharma subscribe to our morning newsletter, delivered straight to your inbox, at http://on.wsj.com/cmotodaysignup . write to steven perlberg at steven.perlberg@wsj.com
cmo today: tim kaine, mike pence spar in vp debate - wsj
steven perlberg