Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign up here.
The LUMA Escape
LUMA Partners – the investment bank of ad tech, essentially – is having a major fracture.
Brian Andersen, a co-founder and partner, along with partners Mark Greenbaum and Dick Filippini, are all exiting over a disagreement with co-founder and CEO Terry Kawaja, Insider reports. LUMA will buy them out of their existing shares.
The company is at an inflection – or at least a reflection – point. Insider notes that LUMA closed 17 transactions in 2021, but haven’t announced one deal this year.
LUMA’s three breakaway partners also wanted a larger share of equity and commissions on sales.
Kawaja is a vaudeville performer as CEO, known for satirical comedy videos and edgy takes.
“What I want to stress is this is not an ugly divorce or anything like that. We have spent 13 years growing a great franchise that was hugely successful for all of us,” Andersen tells Insider.
You Can Never Go Homepage Again
You might say that if Web2 was the platform-ification of the internet and Web3 is the decentralized blockchain whatever, then publishers had a homepage strategy in the Web1 days.
People came directly to the site, and once there, the publisher had great control over the experience and site loyalty.
On the one hand, consider the web-great Homestar Runner, which had a homepage covered in crazy animated features and Easter eggs.
Then there was the cynical business advantage, and Drudge Report is actually the prime case study for that.
Drudge Report, a conservative news aggregation service, convinced a large number of people to make its site their browser homepage or pushed them to visit organically rather than via a search engine or social net.
Then the homepage was swallowed by search and social.
Nowadays, the “interface” where publishers cultivate their audience is the email inbox. Maybe the next up is a ChatGPT plugin.
The homepage opportunity won’t come again, writes Brian Morrissey at The Rebooting.
“Efforts to build attention metrics as proxies for loyalty mostly foundered,” he says. “The nostalgia for homepage strategies is like all nostalgia: unrealistic.”
The New Ad Tech Tax
When marketers think “ad tech tax,” it’s vendor take rates. But there could be actual state ad tech taxes.
Maryland is the first US state to propose an online ad tax. Its Digital Advertising Services Tax would collect between 2.5% and 10% of gross revenue above $100 million earned from digital ads served within the state by companies that make at least $1 billion annually.
The idea is to target the biggest companies, like Meta, Google and Amazon, without damaging small business advertisers or publishers.
The tax was passed by Maryland’s state legislature in 2021, but vetoed by then-governor Larry Hogan. The legislature overrode Hogan’s veto, but the tax was struck down by a Maryland circuit court in 2022.
The state legislature is seeking to overturn that decision in the Maryland Supreme Court, which began hearing arguments on Friday, Bloomberg reports. If Maryland’s online ad tax is approved by the court, and if it survives challenges at the federal level, it could set a precedent for other states.
But Wait, There’s More!
Vevo pitches itself as a FAST powerhouse. [Adweek]
Seven reasons why media is a no-good, horrible, rotten business that I love anyway. [Napkin Math]
Despite agencies’ investments in data tech, advertiser expectations still fall short. [Digiday]
Warner Bros. Discovery reported a surprise profit in streaming TV. [Ad Age]
