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I know, I know...I'm supposed to be on vacation. But this is just too delicious to let go. For years fools like me have been warning advertisers and marketers about the absurd amount of crime and fraud in online advertising. And, of course, because marketers are smarter than everyone else, none of the warnings have any effect. Well, maybe they'll wake up now. Introducing Methbot -- “the largest and most profitable ad fraud operation to strike digital advertising to date” says, WhiteOps , a provider of online fraud protection software. According to the Pivotal Research Group , Methbot is responsible for... - 200-300 million fraudulent video impressions a day - $3-$5 million in criminal revenue a day - More than $1 billion in annual revenue a year from fraudulent online video advertising When you realize that total US income from online video advertising will only be $7 billion this year, you can see how enormous this fraud is. Pivotal says, "the scale of this single...

With 2016 about to come to an end, and me late to the market with the obligatory 5-point click-bait list, let's take a step back from the mundane and horrifying details of  day-to-day life in ad land and take a look at the big picture. Here are the five major advertising industry realities of 2016. 1. Agency Business In Trouble Several years ago the agency business as a whole stopped investing in creativity and placed its bets on data, analytics, and other disciplines which seemed more promising. Having abandoned their raison d'etre for these apparently fertile and trendy pastures, agencies are now paying the price. They are finding that clients are even more dissatisfied than usual. The momentum for large clients to move their business in-house, or to consultancies-cum-agencies, or to non-AOR arrangements is growing and is a serious threat to the health of the agency business. 2. Online Advertising Equals Google and Facebook Outside of China, Google and Facebook account for 7...

It’s hard to imagine an industry more in need of disruption than the fossil fuel industry. There is no question that the burning of fossil fuels creates toxic byproducts that cause serious illnesses and death. There is compelling evidence that the burning of fossil fuels is contributing to what might turn out to be irreversible damage to the environmental stability of our planet. Geopolitically, the economics of attaining fossil fuels has caused hundreds of billions of dollars to be transferred from Western countries to places bent on our destruction. And individually, purchasing fossil fuels for automobiles is a major financial burden on many low income consumers. It’s hard to draw up a more compelling case for the need for disruption. Strangely, there is a very obvious technological solution to a substantial aspect of the problem — battery powered vehicles, or as we call them, electric cars. And yet, electric cars have not been anything near a disruptive technology. In 2008 we had 12...

The US Department of Justice (DOJ) is investigating whether agencies are guilty of bid-rigging on production and post-production jobs. Commercial production and post-production is a $5 billion business in the US. There is no announcement yet of which agencies may be under investigation but you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to take a good guess. WPP, Omnicom, IPG, and Publicis all have in-house production and post-production capabilities. IPG has said that it has been contacted by the DOJ about this investigation. According to The Wall Street Journal , agencies have been accused of manipulating the bidding process and coercing production houses into submitting phony, overpriced bids — called “check bids.” These phony bids create a paper trail that agencies use as cover when clients want a rationale for why agencies award jobs to themselves. This new scandal comes on the heels of the ANA investigation this summer which found that unethical media buying practices were “pervasive...

It all started with pineapple pizza. Who's fucking idea was that? Then we got blueberry bagels and olive oil ice cream and avocado toast and almond milk and pretty soon it'll be salted caramel Viagra. Have you tried to buy potato chips lately? Do they have to fuck with everything? Can't they leave potato chips alone? I went to the grocery the other day to buy my favorite lunch: a tuna sandwich, chocolate milk, and potato chips. I stood there staring at the potato chip shelf for about 10 minutes and couldn't find a bag of simple, plain-ass potato-flavored potato chips. Everything had insane ingredients that had no business being anywhere near a potato chip. Bloody Mary and Jalapeno and... Anyway, as long as the snack food industry has decided to go off the deep end, I thought I'd help them out with some new flavor ideas for potato chips. Here we go: - Red Pepper and Milk - Sweet Maui Onion and Handbag - Fully Grown Beaver - Cheddar and Self-Driving Car - Mushroom and...