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David Letterman Caitlin Roper the Late Show

Need to Know – The latest US media & marketing news: Twitter pulls hate speech ad, Letterman says goodbye & eBay preps Amazon Prime competitor

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By Rebecca Stewart, Trends Editor

May 21, 2015 | 4 min read

Morning all, here’s a glimpse at all the media and marketing news you should know today.

David Letterman hosted his final Late Show last night

1. Twitter has been forced to pull a hate speech ad which urged transgender people to commit suicide, notes Wired. The promoted Tweet was posted by a troll impersonating Australian feminist activist Caitlin Roper. An anonymous 4chan user has claimed responsibility for the ad, saying that it was a retaliation to Roper's campaign "to get GTA V banned from Australia".

2. David Letterman signed off of The Late Show after 33 years last night. The presenter received a send off from a host of stars, including Barbara Walters, Jerry Seinfeld and Tina Fey, as well as four presidents who declared that their "long national nightmare" was over. His successor Stephen Colbert will take the reigns in September.

3. EBay is currently testing a subscription loyalty scheme to match Amazon Prime, according to The Verge. The program, which is reportedly dubbed eBay+, is being tested with a handful of top-rated sellers in Germany. Pricing has yet to be announced, but it's thought that the annual subscription fee for buyers could be somewhere between €15 and €20 (around $17 to $22).

4. Meanwhile, Amazon is upping its Prime game and will now begin delivering products from local stores, asserts the Next Web. Prime Now will offer one-hour delivery from local stores in addition to the firm's own warehouses. The rollout kicks off in select neighborhoods in Manhattan, where customers can order from D’Agostino, Gourmet Garage and Billy’s Bakery.

5. Spotify is to start streaming video content and podcasts, says Yahoo. The new offering will include material from Vice and Comedy Central, and is set to position the Swedish firm to compete with the likes of YouTube and Vimeo.

6. The artist behind the iconic 2008 Obama 'HOPE' posters has been sentenced to two years of probation and fined $25,000 following a bitter copyright dispute, writes the New York Times. Shepard Fairey, who was hit with a civil lawsuit in 2009 for using the copyrighted Associated Press photo as the basis for his rousing portrait, has been reprimanded for tampering with evidence in the case.

7. A Michigan pastor, who is married with five children, has resigned after it was revealed he shared photos on gay dating app Grindr, reports Time. Rev. Matthew Makela from Midland, who asserted that being gay was a “sinful temptation", posted images to the platform and claimed he was looking to "mess around".

8. And protesters descended on McDonald's HQ yesterday ahead of the brand's shareholder meeting, notes USA Today. Over 1,500 staff and supporters rallied at the fast-food giant's offices in Illinois over a pay dispute – larger protests are planned for this morning. The corporation has put a media ban on the meeting.

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