I co-authored a report released yesterday. For those concerned about the obesity crisis, it’s a useful resource. It also offers a good overview about the forces shaping the global media system. It’s available here.
Category: privacy
Regulators Must Stop Microsoft/aQuantive as well as GoogleClick
Today’s announcement that Microsoft is swallowing the immense aQuantive digital marketing apparatus is no surprise. Having lost the leading third-party online display giant Doubleclick to its archrival Google, Microsoft is desperate to remain relevant in online marketing. The $6b acquisition of aQuantive provides Microsoft and its adCenter platform with the digital marketing clout of Atlas. Atlas products include services designed to super-charge brand-marketing friendly ads utilizing rich media, broadband video, search, etc.
The deal is more proof that the FTC better wake-up and do something about the consolidation of the online advertising market. That agency can’t address the hypocrisy though of Microsoft lobbyists. They have beseeched advocates, including this blogger, to stop the Google-Doubleclick merger. All along we knew that Microsoft was desperately seeking a deal, including with Yahoo!
We will discuss the deal later in this column. But it underscores what we’ve been saying, including in our November 2006 complaint to the FTC. There’s major and troubling consolidation occurring in the online ad market. If we want to see competition and content diversity thrive online, regulators need to act. Perhaps our friends in Europe at least will. They certainly need to examine the landscape over the last few weeks. Yahoo! acquires the remaining interest of Right Media for $680m; Time Warner’s AOL buys German-based adTech and Third Screen Media; and ad giant WPP snatches up 24/7 Real Media online ad firm for $649m. Something, we suggest, is going on. Is the FTC listening?
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Microsoft and IM. Using “Cause Related Engagement” to Validate Interactive Advertising & Data Collection
A series of questions need to be broadly addressed about the proper dimensions for interactive digital marketing, including privacy, individual autonomy, economic fairness, and ecological balance. But some NGO’s (see list) are so so eager to partake of the interactive advertising spoils, they partner with (or permit) digital marketers to engage in practices which should be questioned–not condoned.
Take the “I’m Making a Difference” campaign from Microsoft. The company has tied-in its digital advertising campaigns with “cause” marketing efforts. As Microsoft marketer Mich Mathews explained this week at its Strategic Account Summit:
“…people are driven to get engaged in topics they feel very personally passionate about. So another path that we’ve been exploring is this thing called cause-related engagement. We’re using better technology in our communication services to help people speak up for social causes that they care about. What you’re seeing here, is a new initiative from Windows Live. We start a conversation using IM, Microsoft shares a portion of the program’s advertising revenue with some of the world’s most effective organizations that are dedicated to social causes.
With every instant message, customers help address the issues that they’re feeling most passionate about. It could be poverty, child protection, disease, environmental issues. All you have to do here is sign up and start an instant message conversation, then every ad you see in your message window contributes to the grand total that we’re going to send to the cause. This program is really inspiring people to get involved and make a difference.
Now, even though the campaign to date has largely been un-media, it’s already gone as great pass-along, which illustrates the power of mixing great content with a compelling cause. And in the first months we’ve had hundreds of thousands of new sign ups to Messenger and an increase in page views per user, which, of course, is great for our advertisers, and even greater news for those charities who are involved.”
But before charities and nonprofits agree to be involved with such efforts, they need to fully vet both the privacy issues and the overall impact digital marketing will have on society. If we are to have a global digital medium that fully supports a civil society, NGO’s must be leaders in shaping the new media environment. That means being conscious and responsible–and not just blithely accepting the money.
Microsoft’s Vision for the Internet’s Future: Not a Pretty Picture
“We can tell you who saw…we let you target that…we will let you serve that on dayparting…†Yusuf Mendi, Microsoft’s Senior VP and “Chief Advertising Strategist†delivered such words—and more— yesterday. We urge you to watch and listen to his presentation. One learns that Microsoft is willing to help its wealthiest customers to better “pop†their brands. This includes helping them `know’ “who the user is and target to the user.†Mendi told the group that he knows they don’t want to target only “raw tonnage.†So, for Microsoft, the “quality of the user†can be better defined by the “25 behavioral segments†that can be targeted to the “280 million people who use Hotmail†at least once a month. The 280 million Messenger users can be targeted with rich media marketing technologies that sense their mouse hovering and interacting with an ad. For Microsoft, the “end to end IP experience†is all about transforming the global digital platform into one powerful brandwashing system.
Mr. Mendi told the audience that Microsoft is “open for business†to help “redefine†the Internet’s future. Such a future—given to us by Microsoft, Google, Yahoo!, major ad agencies and marketers—raises a series of disturbing questions and should be a cause for alarm and debate. The foremost role for digital media should be to promote civil society (that’s not the “cause†marketing cases Microsoft and others have embraced as the “Trojan Horse†to convince everyone to endorse the idea about data collection and targeted interactive marketing). Shaping the most powerful platforms so it can better collect our data and then drive our behaviors—without our full awareness and informed consent—is not a responsible act. That’s why it’s time for a much more robust debate about where this is headed—before it’s too late.
We will be come back to Mr. Gates and the Summit.
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Microsoft’s Mobile Marketing Data Ploy
Mobile marketing is the emerging threat to our privacy, with a range of behavioral targeting and other data collection techniques. While there are privacy problems throughout the field, we think Microsoft’s recent purchase of European-based ScreenTonic is a good example of what to expect. Europe is a prime mobile marketing testing ground. Here’s an excerpt from an interview conducted by Advertising Age with Joe Doran, general manager of Microsoft Digital Advertising Solutions:
“Ad Age: What kind of targeting data will Microsoft and ScreenTonic be able to offer marketers?
Mr. Doran: ScreenTonic does basic targeting based on handset by carrier and by the site [where the consumer is] actually at today. Based on information we can comb from the carrier and the operator, we could get enhanced data for advertiser, such as gender or geo-location. It’s probably not as robust as we would want it to be, but it’s as good as what everybody is doing in geo-based targeting on mobile advertising today….
Ad Age: How will mobile be sold and measured?
Mr. Doran: For display advertising — which is where ScreenTonic really fits — that will primarily be placed and sold on CPM [cost per thousand viewer] basis. There will be performance-based media just as there is all over digital marketing today…High content, highly contextually targeted, high value placements will drive high value CPMs.”
From: Microsoft Explains Mobile Ad Network Purchase.” Alice Z. Cuneo and Abbey Klaassen. Ad Age. May 4, 2007 (sub. required).
Microsoft’s Interest in Ownership Deal with Yahoo!: Another Indication about Growing Broadband Consolidation
Microsoft has helped lead the criticism about the impending (and worrisome) takeover of Doubleclick by Google. But Microsoft, of course, has always pursued a strategy of domination. It just can’t beat Google in the interactive ad market. But its alleged interested in a deal with Yahoo!–through acquisition or partnership–is another major troubling sign about consolidation and control in the emerging new media space. Federal authorities and state AG’s need to investigate what this will mean for content competition, privacy and–dare I say it–civil society.
See: “Microsoft Asks Yahoo to Reconsider Merger Talks: Report.” David Kaplan. paidcontent.org
Google Gobbling Airwaves to Expand Mobile Data Reach?
excerpt and my italics: “Google’s lobbying activities and its March move to join the Coalition for 4G in America (a consortium that joins Skype, Yahoo, satellite TV provider DirecTV, EchoStar, Intel and wireless services provider Access Spectrum) are bearing fruit. The coalition – which is widely considered to be dominated by Google – has petitioned the FCC asking for policy changes in the airwaves auction. If it has its way the auction will allow packaged bidding, a policy change that would let bidders acquire nationwide licenses…If Google does indeed go wireless, then it will control two key touch points to mobile content and apps: the network and the mobile search engine. It also will be in a prime position to dictate the mobile advertising ecosystem from end to end and not have to bother with pesky mobile operators and third-party players that demand their share of the ad revenue pie. The jury is on whether this is the plan. But if anyone can pull this off, Google can.”
from paidcontent.org
Leading Ad Exec on Googleclick: Deal Should Raise “Privacy Concerns”
Omnicom Group is a global advertising/marketing powerhouse, controlling such well known “brands” as BBDO, DDB and TBWA. They represent PepsiCo, P&G, Apple, Fedex, McDonald’s, etc. etc. They know the business. Here’s what Omnicom’s president John D. Wren said yesterday about Google’s Doubleclick deal, in a story written by Reuters (my bold and italics):
“What it’s going to raise – and this will be a very good conversation in the marketplace – are privacy concerns. The technology that exists far exceeds the laws and thinking of the people that are going to be impacted by it,” he told investors on a conference call. Wren welcomed what he said would be a healthy debate that will ultimately clarify privacy laws when it comes to consumer information on the Internet.
“I’m encouraged by the deal, because I’m most encouraged by the discussion that the deal is going to cause the marketplace to have. Any definition will be positive for us.”
In other words, even the ad industry recognizes that the powerful and intrusive tools they have developed require safeguards, rules, policies, limits. For both privacy and the interactive ad market.
Red Herring: “DoubleClick’s cookie cache is a treasure trove for Google”
excerpt: “Without a doubt, DoubleClick’s historical data is very valuable,†says Jupiter Research analyst Emily Riley. “Every time you’re online, every page visit, and every ad you see comes with the possibility that a cookie is placed on your machine. DoubleClick has all the data.â€
How much data? Ms. Riley’s back-of-the-envelope calculation puts it into the fifteen figures: with more than 100 million web users viewing a quarter million pages a year, it hits the 2.6 quadrillion mark—and that’s just U.S. users. If DoubleClick’s ad network touched even half of those interactions, it amounts to the kind of database advertisers would drool over. “What it does is complete the picture for Google about what’s happening on publishers’ web sites,†Ms. Riley says.
From: “Crunching the Cookie.” Sean Wolfe. Red Herring. April 19, 2007
No More Doubletalk from Doubleclick. A Public Challenge
Doubleclick is claiming it doesn’t really know anything about us, and that its data is controlled by its clients.
Let’s get to the truth. Doubleclick should immediately make public the entire range of data, including behavioral and profiling information, that it now holds on its own (versus what it claims is owned by clients). This should include what it collects from DART and every other product available in the U.S. and abroad. Doubleclick should also fully disclose its complete data-related plans for its new Media Exchange. Let’s find out what information about all of us is available to Doubleclick from its servers. Doubleclick should turn over this information to the FTC, the European Commission and an independent panel of academic computer experts who have no affiliation with the online ad industry. Ask the panel and the FTC/EC to conduct an intensive review of its data holdings and capabilities from a personal privacy perspective. Arrange for these experts to conduct inspections at the Doubleclick Technology Group’s facilities in “New York, Colorado, Chicago, San Francisco and Europe.” Make all of the findings public as soon as possible.
This is something Google should insist on, as part of its own public interest due diligence.