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Spotify Wrapped 2025 is here, and its inspired by mixtapes, DIY aesthetics, and all things pre-internet. After plenty of anticipation, Wrapped has now debuted for the eleventh year in a row. As public interest in Wrapped has mounted exponentially each yearand other brands have flocked to dupe the formatSpotify has been compelled to continuously up the ante on its own design concept, and this year is no exception. Wrapped 2025 comes with 12 brand new features, each intended to make the experience more personalized than years past. In the music world (and everywhere else), 2025 has been a year dominated by conversation around the explosion of AI technology. In September, Spotify itself issued new policies around AI-generated music, explaining that while it wont ban AI-generated songs or AI tools, it is focused on removing what it calls AI slop from the platform. At the time, Spotify said it had already removed 75 million spammy AI tracks from the site in just 12 months. Now, it appears Spotify is going full anti-AI in the design of Wrapped. [Image: Spotify] If brands are looking to the future or to AI for inspiration, we did the opposite, Payman Kassaie, Spotifys director of brand and creative, said in a press conference ahead of the launch. This year, Wrapped is rooted in the world of mixtape cultureand its a refreshing change from last years Wrapped, which was widely critiqued for embracing AI. [Image: Spotify] How Spotify Wrapped became a marketing hit Since debuting in 2014, Wrapped has become a massive hit for Spotify. In 2023, the campaign drew in more than 225 million monthly active users and increased engagement by 40% year-over-year across 170 markets, according to an earnings report from the company. And thats not even counting the free marketing that Spotify rakes in annually through the thousands of user-generated, organic posts from Spotifys user base of 700 million, who share their Wrapped results with followers across socials. To meet the hype, Spotify has slowly turned Wrapped into a design-centric extravaganza, debuting an entirely fresh look and feel for the review each year. Spotify’s 2022 wrapped: “Listening Personality”. [Image: Spotify] In 2021, the brand introduced Audio Aura, a color analysis of users top musical moods. In 2022, it tried out a zodiac-esque feature called Listening Personality alongside a psychedelic design. And last year, it opted for a techy, glitchy aesthetic to complement a new add-on called Music Evolution, which tracked users musical eras over the course of the year, and an AI-generated podcast feature that narrated users’ listening history (but somehow did not include top album or genre stats). While typically an easy brand win, last year’s launch was broadly panned. [Image: Spotify] Spotify Wrapped 2025 embraces a retro aesthetic To appease those critiques, Spotify appears to be doing a full 180 with this years design. The techy aesthetic has been traded for a look that calls to mind an era when listening to music was a physical processfrom building a mixtape to burning your own CD or even putting together a scrapbook of your favorite artists. [Image: Spotify] We looked back at the way people used to share music before Wrapped existed, and that led us to rooting our visual identity this year in the world of mixtape culture, Kassaie said. I may be dating myself a bit here, but if you’ve ever burned a CD for a friend, you know that each one becomes its own little canvas for the creator. That’s kind of the feeling we wanted to captue with this year’s design.” [Images: Spotify] Every visual, he added, is made to feel handmade, with cutouts, images, doodles, and various textures lending the platform a DIY quality. The design is grounded in a palette of black and white, with pops of color reserved for key moments like artist images and album covers. [Image: Spotify] On the data side, Spotifys team went back to the drawing board to differentiate itself from competitors. This year, it will offer a top album list for the first time ever. In addition, its introducing 12 entirely new data-driven features, including Listening Age, which analyzes the five year span of music that users engaged with more than others in their age group; Wrapped Clubs, which sorts users into one of six clubs based on listening style; and Wrapped Party, which lets groups of friends compare their Wrapped data in a real-time, interactive setting. [Image: Spotify] Spotify hasnt entirely forgone AI in this process, either. Listening Archive is an AI-powered feature that spotlights certain days throughout the year, like a users biggest discovery day or most nostalgic day. Still, the overall vibe of Spotify Wrapped 2025 is less a celebration of AI, and more a return to the fundamentals that make sharing music fun. [Image: Spotify]
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E-Commerce
Less than five months have passed since American Eagles controversial Sydney Sweeney campaign, which led to accusations ranging from cluelessness to Nazi propaganda. While the mall mainstay defended the campaign and has escaped relatively unscathed, a new quarterly earnings report shows the success of its sister-brand Aerie is buoying its financial results. On Tuesday, December 2, apparel retail company American Eagle Outfitters (AEO) shared its third-quarter earnings for fiscal 2025, including $1.36 billion in revenue. The 6% increase year-over-year (YOY) beat Wall Streets predicted $1.32 billion in revenue, according to consensus estimates cited by CNBC. The company also reported earnings per share of 53 cents, compared to 44 cents expected. American Eagles namesake brandand home to the Sydney Sweeney has great jeans advertisementscant claim much responsibility for the jump. Its comparable sales grew by only 1% YOY, while Aeries comparable sales jumped 11% YOY. “Resurgence in intimates” Looking at the fiscal year to date, Aerie also reported higher revenue than last year, while the American Eagle brand lagged behind itself YOY. In an earnings call, president and executive creative director of American Eagle and Aerie, Jennifer Foyle, pointed to a “resurgence in intimates and strength across all of the brands offerings, as key to Aeries success. Foyle added that the brand has seen an acceleration in demand since the spring. In October, Aerie made an anti-AI pledge, promising not to use the technology to generate bodies or people in its ads, staying 100% Aerie real. AEO has raised its fourth-quarter guidance, with CEO Jay Schottenstein sharing that the company had a record-breaking Thanksgiving weekend led by an acceleration in demand across brands and channels and underscored by outstanding growth at Aerie and Offline. Offline is an activewear brand opened by American Eagle in 2020. The company now predicts $155 to $160 million in operating income for the fourth quarter, up from $125 to $130 million, and an 8% to 9% increase in comparable sales. Its operating income guidance for the fiscal year also rose, jumping from between $255 and $265 million to $303 to $308 million. Investors responded with glee to the news. American Eagle shares (NYSE:AEO) rose more than 14% after-hours and into premarket trading on Wednesday. The stock is up more than 21% year to date.
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E-Commerce
The Trump administration is pausing all immigration applications such as requests for green cards for people from 19 countries banned from travel earlier this year, as part of sweeping immigration changes in the wake of the shooting of two National Guard troops.The changes were outlined in a policy memo posted Tuesday on the website of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the agency tasked with processing and approving all requests for immigration benefits.The pause puts on hold a wide range of immigration-related decisions such as green card applications or naturalizations for immigrants from those 19 countries that the Trump administration has described as high-risk. It’s up to the agency’s director, Joseph Edlow, on when to lift the pause, the memo said.The administration in June banned travel to the U.S. by citizens of 12 countries and restricted access for those from seven others, citing national security concerns.The ban applied to citizens of Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen while the restricted access applied to people from Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela.At the time, no action was taken against immigrants from those countries who were already in the U.S. before the travel ban went into effect.But now the news from USCIS means those people already in the U.S. regardless of when they arrived will come under extra scrutiny.The agency said it would conduct a comprehensive review of all “approved benefit requests” for immigrants who entered the country during the Biden administration.The agency cited the shooting of two National Guard troops by a suspect who is an Afghan national as a reason for the pause and heightened scrutiny for people from those countries. One National Guard soldier was killed and another wounded in the Thanksgiving week shooting near the White House.“In light of identified concerns and the threat to the American people, USCIS has determined that a comprehensive re-review, potential interview, and re-interview of all aliens from high-risk countries of concern who entered the United States on or after January 20, 2021 is necessary,” the agency said.The agency said in the Tuesday memo that within 90 days it would create a prioritized list of immigrants for review and if necessary, referral to immigration enforcement or other law enforcement agencies.Since the shooting, the administration has announced a flurry of decisions it was taking to scrutinize immigrants already in the country and those seeking to come to the U.S.Last week, the director of USCIS said in a social media post that his agency would be reexamining green card applications for people from countries “of concern.” But the policy directive Tuesday goes further and lays out in more detail the scope of who will be affected.USCIS also said last week that it was pausing all asylum decisions, and the State Department said it was halting visas for Afghans who assisted the U.S. war effort.Days before the shooting, USCIS said in a separate memo that the administration would review the cases of all refugees who entered the U.S. during the Biden administration.Critics have said that the Trump administration’s actions have amounted to collective punishment for immigrants. Rebecca Santana, Associated Press
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E-Commerce
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