Pulse Films has added director Jonathan Van Tulleken to its commercialmaking roster. He has helmed E4’s BAFTA-honored show Misfits and in 2013 directed the entire second season of Channel 4’s celebrated drama Top Boy. His shorts have been selected and screened at a number of international film festivals and his work in TV has been nominated for and has won awards including BAFTA, BBC Short Film Awards, and Virgin Media Short Finals. His 2009 film Off Season was nominated for a BAFTA and is currently being adapted into a full-length feature for Big Talk Films and Studio Canal….Director Matteo Bonifazio has joined MRB Productions’ spot directing roster for exclusive representation in the U.S. Shortly after graduating from the University of Genoa, Bonifazio began collaborating with MTV Networks, shooting pan-European promotions and ads in London and Milan. The work he helmed during that partnership earned him several accolades including a PromaxBDA Europe Award for one of his MTV Your Noise’s television promos. It also helped to shape and develop his very personal directing style that is strongly rooted in the youth generation of today. Bonifazio has since also directed campaigns for major international brands including Sony, Reebok, Vodaphone, Campari, Fiat, Fila, VW, Hyundai, McDonald’s and American Airlines. Bonifazio has worked all across Europe and in the U.S. He recently relocated from Spain to London. He joins a directorial lineup at MRB that includes Jamie Babbit, Jeremy Haft, Mark Teitelman, Branson Veal and James Wahlberg….Encore, a Deluxe Entertainment Services company, has brought technology expert Scott Ballard aboard its VFX division as pipeline supervisor. Ballard is tasked with expanding the company’s inter-studio pipeline across all Encore VFX facilities worldwide. He comes to Encore from the L.A. area offices of international technology and ride film company RGH….
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