Everything you need to know about youth marketing and Millennial research, at your fingertips.

Quote of the Day: “I feel like companies should focus on helping the small communities in their area and sustainability.” -Male, 24, WV

Scribd, a service described as the Netflix of e-books, has just made comic book enthusiasts very happy. The e-book service is now offering users unlimited access to its library of comic books for $8.99 a month, and this week added 10,000 comic books and graphic novels, including 500 Marvel comics. Scribd reports that comic book publishing is currently an $870 million industry, and their service helps to digitize the space. They have had “record breaking numbers” of users signing up for free trials, showcasing comic book readers’ passion and enthusiasm. (MarketWatch)

Millennial women are closing the pay gap—in some areas of the country. The Institute for Women’s Policy Research found that in New York City, women under 35 bring in $1.02 for every dollar men of the same age earn, and women are also narrowing the pay gap in Vermont, D.C., California, and North Carolina. However, this unfortunately isn’t the norm: women of this age group in Wyoming make 72¢ for every dollar their male peers make, in Louisiana 78¢, in Utah 79¢, and the national average is 89¢. A major contributing factor to these pay differences is education: D.C. is the best-educated part of the country and NYC is a “magnet for highly educated women.” (Vocativ, Glamour)

Kanye West’s sneaker collaborations with Nike were famously popular, so to handle the hype around their first design by the rapper, the Yeezy 750 Boost, Adidas has created an app that could change the game for sneakerheads. Where they once would have woken up a dawn and stood in line to get their hands on one of the 9,000 pairs being released, now consumers have “a virtual line” in their hands. The app, Confirmed, is designed for selling limited edition sneakers, notifying users when a certain shoe is available in their area, and allowing them to reserve a size to purchase in person. (Quartz) 

For their first product targeting 20-somethings, the new Skin Renewal Serum, Estée Lauder’s Origins skincare is rolling out a global digital campaign developed by their own Millennial employees. The #QuarterLifeCrisis push includes social media promotion, and an app that provides skincare information, product giveaways, and interactive photo features. Vloggers Jen Chae and Tanya Burr will also be promoting the product, and Origins has partnered with BuzzFeed to create Quarter Life Crisis native content. The brand hopes the approach will show that they are not just “your mother’s brand anymore". (Digiday)

Millennials might love Las Vegas, but they don’t appear to love the gambling city’s iconic, and profitable, slot machines. Simple, solitary, repetitive games of chance like the slots can seem outdated and uninteresting to a generation used to mobile and social gaming. To start attracting these younger players, casinos are giving gambling a video game makeover, and hoping to add more games that rely on skill—think Angry Birds, but for cash—and that could be played on large touch-screen tabletops. While the average age of those visiting Vegas has dropped in the last five years, the visitors who gamble during their stay has also fallen from 83% to 71% in roughly the same time period, so adjusting games to Millennials’ preferences could be essential. (Washington Post)

Every other week we tap into our panel of 150,000+ Millennials in a survey of 1,000 14-32-year-olds for their take on current events, trending topics, changing attitudes, and new norms. The question library in the My Library tab on Ypulse.com allows Silver and Gold subscribers to see what we’ve asked and how we’ve asked it for every monthly survey we've done, giving them a better understanding of how we talk to Millennials and an accessible data bank of all of the Millennial statistics available to them. (Ypulse)