Daniel Mirsky joins Twist’s sales staff
Twist has added Daniel Mirsky to its staff sales team. He joins fellow team members Rob Neill and Kathryn Lotis to represent nationwide Twist’s directorial roster which includes: Rich Michell, Matt Pittroff, Scott Pitts, Chris Stocksmith and Marc AndrĂ© Debruyne; and recent roster addition, integrated creative collective Tomato. Mirsky continues his creative pursuits as an ensemble member of theatre company The New York Neo-Futurists, for whom he previously worked as a technical director and artistic collaborator. He brings to Twist much experience in environmental activism and sales, with organizations such as Greenpeace, Green Mountain Energy, and 3D printing startup Makerbot.
Skouras welcomes back production designers
Production designer David Batchelor Wilson has wrapped principal photography on Soham Mehta’s Run the Tide starring Taylor Lautner and produced by Pilar Savone. The production designer is again available for commercials and features through The Skouras Agency. The same holds true for Skouras production designer Kevin Kavanaugh who recently completed Otto Bathurst’s Hysteria.
Calderon joins Band Pro's sales team
Christian Calderon has joined the sales team of Band Pro Film & Digital, Inc. at its Burbank headquarters. An experienced DP, producer and media specialist, Calderon has worked in the professional broadcast and cinema industry for over 15 years. In addition to studying at the New York Film Academy and earning a BA in Communications from Cal State Northridge, Calderon has delivered over 600 talk show episodes for the Telemundo Network, and has worked producing over 100 short and long form commercials over the course of his career. Calderon’s hiring also comes, in part, as a response to the ongoing Latin American industry renaissance. A fluent speaker of Spanish, Italian, and English, Calderon will work closely with Band Pro’s international Latin American market client base, as well as local Los Angeles and domestic US clientele.
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