As SHOOT went to press, New York-headquartered, publicly held Paradise Music & Entertainment announced that its bicoastal Shelter Films subsidiary has ceased all operations. The Paradise release read that discussions are underway with Shelter Films’ president Steve Shore to resolve outstanding issues in his employment agreement. According to Paradise, contributing to the decision to shut down Shelter was the weakness of the advertising market compounded by the effects of recent events on that market. As reported in this week’s lead story, Paradise’s other commercial production house, Straw Dogs, has also closed, with former Straw Dogs’ president Craig Rodgers filing a demand for arbitration that alleges improprieties on the part of Paradise….Ron Ames and Rob Le-gato have come aboard Santa Monica-based Steam as creative directors. Both are available to direct via Steam. Ames was most recently represented as a spot helmer via now defunct Crash Films. Legato is a noted visual effects supervisor spanning features and TV….Animation director Chris Prynoski has joined Hollywood-based Class-Key Chew-Po Commercials, a division of animation studio Klasky Csupo. He is perhaps best known as the creator and executive producer of the cable TV series MTV Downtown…. Lance Paull and David Corr have been named co-presidents/ executive creative directors of Publicis, New York. Paul last served as creative director/partner at Berlin Cameron & Partners, New York, and Corr was a group creative director at TBWA/Chiat/Day, New York…..John Lovelace has joined New York-headquartered design shop So! Animation as partner/executive producer/director of new business development….Sarah Mahoney has been named executive producer of West Los Angeles-based visual effects house Zero Mass, a newly formed division of edit house TNT Media Services. Mahoney and visual effects supervisor Mark Kolpack head Zero Mass….Greg Stacy has joined Belief, a Santa Monica-based broadcast design and production studio, as its executive producer. He formerly served as senior producer for the weekly TV series Hot Rod Magazine TV, which airs on the Speedvision Network. Belief is headed by president/founder/executive creative director Mike Goedecke. Managing director/partner Steve Kazanjian recently exited Belief to pursue other, more interactive-centric opportunities….
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