It’s a jampacked episode of The Big Story this week, as the ad industry trades haymaker punches with its major antagonists: Apple policymakers and federal regulators.
IAB CEO David Cohen kicked things off with a blistering keynote to open the trade org’s Annual Leadership Meeting on Marco Island, Florida.
The IAB to has been known to commerce its biggest conference of the year with a major (often salty) hot-take, and this year was no different, as Cohen came out swinging against Apple and regulators for their “dystopian nonsense.”
And he didn’t cool down as the day wore on, says AdExchanger Executive Editor Sarah Sluis, who sat down with Cohen a few hours after the keynote.
Just one day later, the antitrust division of the Department of Justice announced a lawsuit against Google for alleged monopolistic practices in its ad tech businesses.
Managing Editor Allison Schiff perused the DOJ suit, which is chockful of juicy details about the lengths Google is believed to have gone in its single-minded mission to stamp out header bidding. She also has the deets on what remedy the DOJ is seeking, which would involve a potential Google breakup, and how long it could be before this case – the DOJ is calling for a jury trial – actually sees a courtroom.
