Director Steve Beck, formerly of Industrial Light + Magic Commercial Productions, San Rafael and Los Angeles, has joined bicoastal Reactor Films. Word is that Reactor is also about to add director/designer Linzi Knight, who continues to be partnered in Toronto house Red Rover….In an effort to satisfy the debts of New York-headquartered Shooting Gallery Inc. (SGI), its Toronto-based parent, itemus, has issued a preliminary base shelf prospectus that—if approved—would permit itemus to issue shares of itemus stock to SGI creditors; itemus is liable for up to $10 million of SGI debt. Meanwhile, a group of SGI investors has filed suit against SGI, itemus and former SGI president/CFO Stephen Carlis, alleging that SGI failed to pay investment returns and accusing Carlis of fraud and deliberate misuse of funds. As earlier reported (SHOOT, 7/6, p. 1) SGI’s financial problems undermined its profitable commercial and music video shop, Shooting Gallery Productions, which closed in late June…..Director Tryan George has come aboard bicoastal M-80 Films. George was most recently with now defunct The End….Director Eric E. Fitzpatrick and bicoastal Cohn+Company have parted ways….89 Greene, New York, is adding editor Paul Kelly who comes over from BUG Editorial, New York. Kelly’s official 89 Greene start date is Sept. 1….Larry Pecorella, partner/composer at Chameleon Music, Chicago, has signed with Com/track, Chicago, where he joins composers Bryan Rheude, Dave Hutten and Justin Hori; the Chameleon Music staff—including in-house rep Marya Fletcher—will merge into Com/ track….In other Windy City news, Chicago-headquartered post shop The Filmworkers Club has acquired Astro Color Laboratories, Chicago. Filmworkers also owns Chicago-based sister shop, Sanitary Lab….Creative ad boutique Elvis & Bonaparte, Portland, Ore., has shuttered. Several of the shop’s personnel are expected to launch a new venture, according to Dave Helfrey, the agency’s former VP/creative director …Caroline Jones, a creative director/copywriter who founded, among other ad shops, Mingo, Jones, Guilmenot—now the Chisholm/Mingo Group, New York—and Caroline Jones Inc., also New York, died of cancer on June 28 at the Calvary Hospital, Bronx, N.Y. She was 59….Ronald Monchak, a longtime creative executive in the Detroit advertising community passed away June 26 of leukemia. Monchak retired as chairman of D’Arcy Detroit, Troy, Mich., in 1993…
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