Data-Driven Thinking Archives

Broadsign’s Big Move Isn’t The Endgame. It’s The Opening Gambit

Broadsign’s acquisition of Place Exchange last week is a defining moment for programmatic out-of-home (OOH). But it is not the endgame; it is merely the setup. The OOH stack is being rebuilt from the inside out. The final owner is not yet in the room. When you look at the sequence of recent deals, the […]

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Data-Driven Thinking

CTV Is Less Transparent Than YouTube. That Should Alarm Everyone

YouTube is more transparent than CTV. Let that sink in. In 2025, the fastest-growing segment in programmatic media is now less transparent than the walled garden we have spent the last decade criticizing for opacity. And the consequences are already showing up in the market. Look where the major media companies landed this quarter. Disney […]

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Data-Driven Thinking

Self-Driving Advertising Is A Myth: Why Automation Can’t Replace Creative Judgment

Generative AI is the new ad land obsession: a shiny promise of a fully autonomous world of self-driving advertising. But behind the hype lies the costly delusion that automation can replace judgment and more content somehow means better marketing. We’ve entered the age of machine-made abundance, where content can be generated faster than it can […]

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Data-Driven Thinking

Why Weakening CIPA Would Hand Big Tech A Free Pass On Data Abuse

Private right of action isn’t just a talking point for future privacy laws; it’s already law. The California Invasion of Privacy Act (CIPA) has included an individual’s right to bring a civil suit since 1967. With privacy under unprecedented attack by data brokers and social media, it is the wrong time to weaken these protections, […]

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Data-Driven Thinking

The Truth About AI In Marketing Measurement: What Works, What Doesn’t And What It Costs You

The world of marketing measurement is buzzing about AI. But when it comes to complex techniques like media mix modeling (MMM), the field is awash with false promises about the benefits that these new technologies offer. This creates enormous risks for enterprise marketers who regularly base multimillion-dollar decisions on such models. The hard truth is […]

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Data-Driven Thinking

AI Slop Is The New MFA, And We All Need To Fight It

Low-quality, AI-generated content – or AI slop – is flooding the open web. The entire digital ecosystem is adapting to the challenges that generative AI’s exponential growth presents. As someone who spends a lot of time thinking about media waste and ROAS, I’ve seen how easy it is for bad actors to spin up thousands […]

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Data-Driven Thinking

Why Meta’s Exit From MRC Audits Should Be A Wake-Up Call For Marketers

Meta’s decision to withdraw from the Media Rating Council’s brand-safety audits and its subsequent loss of accreditation have sparked important questions for advertisers that depend on transparency and accountability to protect their brands online. When one of the world’s largest advertising platforms steps away from independent verification, it’s a reminder of how critical third-party accountability […]

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Data-Driven Thinking

Why Your First AdCP Project Is Probably Going To Fail

Ad Context Protocol (AdCP) is being sold as a magic bullet. But let’s be honest: Your first AdCP project is probably going to fail. It won’t fail because the protocol is bad; it will fail because you’ve been sold a simplistic dream – a “universal API” for ad tech – and that’s what you’re budgeting […]

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Data-Driven Thinking

AdCP And The Math Of Agentic AI: Building For Today’s Economics, Not Tomorrow’s Dreams

While the promise of agentic AI in advertising is intoxicating, autonomous systems optimizing campaigns and making real-time adjustments still face a sobering reality: The economics don’t work for everything – yet. Let’s look beyond the generalized AI hype to a more actionable and immediate trend: using Model Context Protocol (MCP) and its advertising-focused cousin, Ad […]

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Data-Driven Thinking

Personalization Isn’t Everything: The Case For Marketing That Brings People Together

Marketers today are tasked with delivering hyper-personalized messaging at scale. Luckily for them, AI has made it possible to reach individuals with uncanny precision (as we all know: right message, right time, right channel). But as the pendulum swings hard toward 1:1 personalization, a critical question emerges: Just because we can personalize every interaction, does […]

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