Good morning. Today, a would-be Nielsen rival wins in court, an ailing ad giant gets ready for new leadership and hotel “cruises on land” expand the map.

A jury last week ruled against Nielsen in its lawsuit alleging patent infringement by the upstart measurement firm HyphaMetrics, but the long cold war over media measurement continues, Patrick Coffee reports.

Broadcasters and ad buyers for years have complained about Nielsen’s grip on TV ratings, while Nielsen has tried to evolve. It told buyers in January that it would retire its traditional panel-only numbers in favor of a product combining those ratings with data from vendors such as smart TV makers.

The company has also lodged patent suits against several smaller rivals. The HyphaMetrics complaint is the first to get a jury verdict.

The expense of defending against Nielsen’s lawsuits winds up getting passed on to the broader TV ecosystem and affects viewers in turn, according to Peter Liguori, CEO at VideoAmp, one of Nielsen’s legal targets.

“Media companies bear these costs, however, it is ultimately consumers who pay the price,” he said.

WPP has halved its dividend to create room for incoming CEO Cindy Rose to review the U.K. advertising group’s strategy and spending plans,, Adrià Calatayud reports.

The owner of agencies such as Ogilvy, VML and AKQA said second-quarter revenue less pass-through costs fell 5.8% on a like-for-like basis compared with a year earlier. That was WPP’s steepest quarterly decline in that metric since the pandemic-era declines of 2020.

The company has struggled to return to growth amid a series of client defections to rivals, subdued spending among some of its customers and challenges in its Chinese businesses.  The industry is also bracing for a period of disruption caused by AI.

It was the last set of results with Mark Read at the helm. Rose, who had been chief operating officer for global enterprise at Microsoft, takes over Sept. 1.

Big hotel brands like Hyatt and Marriott are betting that affluent travelers will give new consideration to all-inclusive vacations—often derided as cruises on land—if they promise better food, drinks, service, rooms and pools, Dawn Gilbertson writes.

Hyatt has become a major all-inclusive player in Mexico and the Caribbean thanks to big acquisitions, and now has 10 all-inclusive brands including Hyatt Ziva, Hyatt Zilara, Secrets and Breathless. The company this summer opened Secrets Baby Beach, its first all-inclusive in Aruba.

Marriott meanwhile just opened its first all-inclusive W resort, in Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic, following last year’s debut of its first Marriott-branded, all-inclusive in Cancún, Mexico. There are even preliminary plans for an all-inclusive Ritz-Carlton.

Tough assignment: Gilbertson tried out two of the newer crop for the Journal. See what she found.

New York Times stock hit an all-time high after it reported gains in both subscription and advertising revenue, saying its relationships with readers help insulate against AI-fueled declines in search traffic. [WSJ] 

Elon Musk said xAI will let marketers pay to advertise in replies by its Grok chatbot. [FT] 

OpenAI named Omnicom’s PHD its global media agency of record, suggesting plans to ramp up advertising. [Ad Age]

Disney will eliminate the standalone Hulu app, though the brand will continue as a tile in Disney+. [Variety]

Disney’s thriving theme parks are buying it time to figure out streaming. [WSJ] 

Ousted and then returned Outdoor Voices founder Ty Haney is trying to make the muted, millennial athleisure brand hip again with bolder colors and a bedazzled hoodie. [Washington Post] 

Bath & Body Works is setting up kiosks in college bookstores. [Glossy] 

Maybe not everything can be an ad business after all: Shell is shutting down the Volta Media network of ad-supported EV charging stations, which it acquired in 2023. [AdExchanger]

Why cryptic billboards featuring Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes have popped up across L.A. [THR]