Director Thomas Beug has joined bicoastal production company Chelsea Pictures for exclusive representation in the U.S. Beug’s work marries a sense of real-life storytelling with an eye for cinematic imagery. He continues to bring his talents to different forms and genres spanning commercials, documentaries, music videos, and TV shows, collaborating frequently with brands such as Puma, Adidas, Prudential, and Budweiser.
Beug began his career at Droga5 as employee #8 in 2006, and led a global PUMA campaign with top athletes such as Novak Djokovic, Kaka, Dwight Howard, and Tyson Gay. His continued work with PUMA also led Beug to direct Usain Bolt’s return to Jamaica following his multiple Gold Medal victory at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
On the documentary front, Beug directed the short Hangar B, which profiled a group of octogenarians devoted to restoring antique aircraft in a spare hangar of the Floyd Bennett Airfield in Brooklyn. Hangar B earned Best Documentary Short distinction at the FastNet International Shorts Festival, received a “Critics Pick” at the DOC NYC Film Festival, and brought Beug to the White House for AFI Docs.
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