By Kristin Wilcha
NASHVILLE --The American Advertising Federation (AAF) unveiled the winners of the Best of Show ADDYs during its 2005 National Conference last week in Nashville. Rainier Brewing Company’s “RainierVision/Remember Rainier” campaign out of Cole & Weber/Red Cell, Seattle, won the overall Best of Show honor.
The fully integrated package includes: new and vintage TV spots; Rainier Vision, a cable-access style show featuring two die-hard fans of Rainier beer, which aired on a UPN affiliate in Seattle; print and posters; a 12-foot, neon R that rode around Seattle in a pick-up truck; and a Web site that tied all the elements together. (Wyatt Neumann, who directs under the Neverstop, New York, banner directed the broadcast elements of the project.)
The package has won assorted accolades: the Gold Cube in the inaugural hybrid category at the Art Directors Club Awards, a Gold Clio in the Content and Contact category, as well as the inaugural Battle of Brands competition presented by the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) and the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP).
Best of Show Public Service was awarded to the Light of Life Foundation’s “Breast” campaign out of Lowe, New York. The Best of Show Interactive award went to Bernstein-Rein Advertising, Kansas City, Mo., for a campaign promoting the music artist Julia Othmer.
Google Opens Its Defense In Antitrust Case Alleging Monopoly Over Online Ad Technology
Google opened its defense against allegations that it holds an illegal monopoly on online advertising technology Friday with witness testimony saying the industry is vastly more complex and competitive than portrayed by the federal government.
"The industry has been exceptionally fluid over the last 18 years," said Scott Sheffer, a vice president for global partnerships at Google, the company's first witness at its antitrust trial in federal court in Alexandria.
The Justice Department and a coalition of states contend that Google built and maintained an illegal monopoly over the technology that facilitates the buying and selling of online ads seen by consumers.
Google counters that the government's case improperly focuses on a narrow type of online ads — essentially the rectangular ones that appear on the top and on the right-hand side of a webpage. In its opening statement, Google's lawyers said the Supreme Court has warned judges against taking action when dealing with rapidly emerging technology like what Sheffer described because of the risk of error or unintended consequences.
Google says defining the market so narrowly ignores the competition it faces from social media companies, Amazon, streaming TV providers and others who offer advertisers the means to reach online consumers.
Justice Department lawyers called witnesses to testify for two weeks before resting their case Friday afternoon, detailing the ways that automated ad exchanges conduct auctions in a matter of milliseconds to determine which ads are placed in front of which consumers and how much they cost.
The department contends the auctions are finessed in subtle ways that benefit Google to the exclusion of would-be competitors and in ways that prevent... Read More