Tech Biz

Bots generate more than half the traffic on the public Internet. This is indisputable. In fact, the Association of National Advertisers believes that advertisers will lose $6.3 billion globally to bots in 2015. This will not stop until someone (the marketers, the government, the justice department) makes it stop because everyone – the ad networks, the traffic sellers, the bot creators, the publishers, the ad agencies, the trading desks, the DMPs, the SSPs, everyone – except the marketers – is making money. Continue Reading →

Every crisis needs a villain. The advertising crisis is no exception. Some want to blame ad networks, others want to blame programmatic pricing tools, and still others believe that bad coding is at fault. Page load times are an obvious villain, but maybe we should blame the evildoers who clutter our world with massive amounts of interruptive, unwanted ad fodder. In practice, there are a number of easily identifiable tactical and executional factors contributing to the industry's existential crisis. Sadly, even if the industry could solve all of them, the effort would do very little, if anything, to correct the misalignment of outcomes and incentives that are the root of ad evil. Continue Reading →

Perhaps a better title for this article would be "TiVo BOLT – For People Who Love to Be Informed, Enlightened and Entertained by Watching Free Over-the-Air Television or IP-Delivered Traditional Television Content Through a Set-Top Box Rented from a Cable, Satellite or Telco, but Hate the Commercial Advertisements that Subsidize the Content." No matter how you spin this, the TiVo BOLT is a referendum on the state of the commercial television business. After all, you don't really hate TV; you really hate TV commercials. You probably also hate the experience of trying to get all of your content to play on your big-screen TV. This is all about to change. Continue Reading →

Apple's iOS 9 (the new iPhone operating system) contains a very special feature that enables third-party app developers to develop Ad Blocking tools. These tools, which have been around for PC-based web browsers for years, are probably better described as "content blocking" because they allow you to block all kinds of noncommercial stuff (also because there is a heated debate as to whether or not ads are "content"). Pundits and students of the commercial advertising business have identified this technological achievement as the beginning of the end of days. Others cite history and say the industry will get past the problem. After all, content blocking is not new; it's just newly relevant. Right? Continue Reading →

I just scheduled an appointment at my local Apple Store to purchase an iPhone 6s Plus on September 25th using Apple's new iPhone Upgrade Program. It's right for me, but is it right for you? And, is it good or bad for the carriers? Continue Reading →

Fake women, fake privacy, real hack – that's the way my eulogy for Ashley Madison's IPO would start. Fake women, because the ratio of female names to male names in the hacked database dump is skewed extremely male. Fake privacy, because everyone now has access to Ashley Madison's private database. Real hack, because the hackers have actually ruined people's lives. Continue Reading →

According to some new rumors, Apple will have to delay the announcement of its "live" Apple TV streaming service until sometime in 2016 for two excellent reasons: 1) Apple is having trouble making content deals, and 2) Apple has no idea how much bandwidth it's going to need to deliver the service. Continue Reading →

Last week the S&P Media Index lost 8.3 percent (approximately $53.7 Billion of value) in just three days. During that time, shares of Viacom lost 20 percent, 21CF (Fox) and Discovery Networks lost 11 percent, Disney took a 9 percent hit and even CBS dropped 6 percent. It was a tough week. Is this the beginning of Mediamageddon? Continue Reading →

Remember the receptionist on the 15th floor who used to take excellent phone messages on those adorable pink pre-printed message pads? Her job predeceased yours by a few short Internet years. Continue Reading →

I got an email from Google AdWords thanking me for my payment. Payment? What payment? This is my personal, private email account; it's not tied to Google AdWords or anything else for that matter. Had I been hacked? Continue Reading →