Kendra Barnett

EXCLUSIVE: Amazon Offers Free DSP Face-Off for Media Buyers, Leaked Slides Show The retail giant is offering to foot the bill for advertisers to engage in head-to-head tests between Amazon DSP and rivals.

SCOOP: Amazon is pushing ad agencies to try its DSP by offering head-to-head tests against rivals—covering all costs in some cases in an effort to prove performance. Tensions with @thetradedesk.bsky.social are heating up. See the leaked pitch deck @adweek.bsky.social 👇 www.adweek.com/programmatic...

Inside the Closed-Door Meeting Where Marketing’s Power Players Map The Future ADWEEK gained first-time access to a private meeting among marketing executives who collaborate to set growth targets for their sector.

On Monday @adweek.bsky.social was granted exclusive access to @anamarketers.bsky.social's closed-door CMO summit, where select brand execs mapped marketing’s AI-driven future and established around 20 industry-wide growth proposals for 2026. Here's what happened: www.adweek.com/brand-market...

Meta Withdraws From MRC Brand Safety Audits, Loses Accreditation Just Months After It Was Issued The social giant no longer wishes to be audited for brand safety by the media industry’s leading accreditation firm.

👀 important update from @kendrabarnett.bsky.social at @adweek.bsky.social:

#Meta will no longer subject itself to annual #BrandSafety audits from the Media Rating Council ( #MRC ).

Read more 👉 www.adweek.com/media/meta-w...

Meta Withdraws From MRC Brand Safety Audits, Loses Accreditation Just Months After It Was Issued The social giant no longer wishes to be audited for brand safety by the media industry’s leading accreditation firm.

SCOOP: Meta has lost its MRC brand safety accreditation for Facebook & Instagram feeds just months after earning it, after opting out of annual audits, @adweek.bsky.social has learned. The company says it will opt for 3rd party audits instead. www.adweek.com/media/meta-w...

The Trade Desk Execs Share New Details About How Sell-Side Solution OpenAds Will Work CEO Jeff Green admits the DSP is edging into sell-side territory, but says it’s for the benefit of all players in the adtech ecosystem

NEW: TTD execs Tues shared new deets about OpenAds, its publisher product debuted this month in the wake of Prebid's Transaction ID shakeup in Aug. After some pushback, CEO Jeff Green admitted OpenAds marks TTD's encroachment into the sell side. For @adweek.bsky.social www.adweek.com/programmatic...

EXCLUSIVE: Mobile Adtech Giant Verve Lays Off Part of SSP Team The Swedish company gave impacted staffers little explanation for the reorg, according to sources.

Scoop: Mobile adtech company Verve laid off parts of its staff in late Aug and early Sept, @adweek.bsky.social has learned. Cuts primarily affected the marketplace team. The reorg came ahead of the announcement of Verve's €16.2M acquisition of Captify this month. www.adweek.com/media/exclus...

Business Insider Accuses Google of Suppressing Publisher Ad Revenue in Federal Lawsuit Business Insider joins a growing roster of publishers and publisher-adjacent tech companies suing Google over its ad practices.

NEW for @adweek.bsky.social: BI accuses Google of rigging ad auctions & suppressing publisher revenues in new federal lawsuit. Latest in a wave of antitrust cases against the tech giant, many of which have been levied by publishers & publisher-adjacent tech firms. www.adweek.com/media/busine...

Execs Allege Racial and Gender Discrimination Against Agency Horizon in Federal Lawsuit Horizon Media is facing allegations of racial and gender discrimination in a federal lawsuit filed by one current and one former executive.

NEW: A federal lawsuit accuses indie agency Horizon Media of race & gender discrimination, retaliation & a hostile workplace. Plaintiffs say leaders marginalized Black execs, restricted resources & undermined DEI efforts. Horizon denies it. For @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/agencies/hor...

EXCLUSIVE: Scope3 Lays Off Staff as Part of Shift Toward Agentic Advertising Scope3 is cutting some jobs as part of what it characterizes as a strategic restructuring.

SCOOP: Scope3 laid off some of its sales team last week—part of what the firm describes as a "strategic shift" toward agentic ad solutions. One affected staffer said some other employees quit after the reorg was announced. Details in my story for @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/media/scope3...

EXCLUSIVE: Media Buyers Block Publicis’ Epsilon SSP Over Data Leakage Concerns WPP, IPG, Havas, and others sent media dollars and data to a rival—via Epsilon’s SSP

SCOOP for ADWEEK: Top agencies mistakenly bought ads through Publicis' Epsilon SSP via opaque reselling—sending money & valuable data to a rival. Some are now blocking the platform over concerns that Publicis—the only holdco with an SSP—could gain a competitive edge. www.adweek.com/media/public...

EXCLUSIVE: Media Buyers Block Publicis’ Epsilon SSP Over Data Leakage Concerns WPP, IPG, Havas, and others sent media dollars and data to a rival—via Epsilon’s SSP

NEW INVESTIGATION from @kendrabarnett.bsky.social:
Because of the murky nature of digital ads, major advertising companies have been unknowingly sending their data to a direct competitor.
www.adweek.com/media/public...

The Trade Desk Shareholders Will Vote Whether CEO Jeff Green Should Keep Supervoting Shares The company’s board is urging investors to maintain its current stock structure for another 10 years.

NEW: Shareholders of the The Trade Desk will vote Sept 16 on whether to change the voting structure of the company, potentially imperiling CEO Jeff Green’s control, according to an SEC filing. The board recommends keeping Green in power. For @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/programmatic...

Google Has Been Quietly Using Gemini AI to Weed Out Ad Fraud and Invalid Traffic Google researchers have been using Gemini models to identify deceptive and disruptive ad serving techniques in mobile apps and across the web.

EXCLUSIVE: Google has been testing ways to mitigate invalid traffic using Gemini-powered AI tools over the last year and a half, the company told @adweek.bsky.social. Google claims to have stemmed "deceptive or disruptive" mobile ads by 40% during a 14-month period. www.adweek.com/media/google...

Instagram Adds Repost Feature, Friends Tab, and Snap Map Lookalike The updates mimic Snap and TikTok features in the race for user attention.

NEW: Instagram on Wednesday announced a slate of product updates, including a reposting feature, a 'Friends' tab, and a messages-embedded live map akin to Snapchat's Snap Map. For @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/media/instag...

OpenX Sues Google, Alleging 'Rigged' Ad Auctions The supply-side platform is seeking damages over what it says are anti-competitive adtech practices.

BREAKING: OpenX is suing Google, alleging the company's anti-competitive practices forced the firm to shutter its ad server and stifled competition. The filing follows an April ruling that found Google operates an illegal monopoly in adtech. For
@adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/media/adtech...

X Will Give Brands Lower Ad Rates for ‘Aesthetic’ Ads Brands will be subject to a new scoring system based on the appearance of their ad copy and ad creative on X

Exclusive for @adweek.bsky.social: X is incentivizing advertisers with lower CPMs to publish what X's head of Americas Monique Pintarelli calls "beautiful" ads. Ads will receive 'aesthetic scores'—those with low scores will pay more and be algorithmically suppressed. www.adweek.com/social-marke...

The Next Leader of X Won't be a Traditional CEO, Experts Say Musk is piloting X toward an AI-first future.

NEW for @adweek.bsky.social: Musk may not be seeking a CEO-type to fill Linda Yaccarino's shoes. That's because X's business model is transforming from an ad-supported social platform to what's likely to be a subscription-based AI utility in xAI. www.adweek.com/media/xs-fut...

BREAKING: Linda Yaccarino is stepping down as CEO of Elon Musk's X after two years in the role. Story for @adweek.bsky.social www.adweek.com/media/linda-...

Google Wipes 350 Android Apps Tied to Major Ad Fraud Scheme Traffic generated by the IconAds scheme primarily originated from Brazil, Mexico, and the U.S.

EXCLUSIVE: Google has pulled some 350 apps from its Play Store after learning about an extensive fraud scheme that served out-of-context mobile ads to juice impressions. Story for @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/programmatic...

EXCLUSIVE: AI Bots Will Now Write Community Notes on X X will let AI chatbots generate their own Community Notes, which are user-submitted comments attached to some posts that offer additional context.

Tuesday scoop for you: X will begin testing AI-generated Community Notes today. Via an open API, users can build their own AI note writers for fact-checking. AI-generated notes will still be subject to feedback from human users. Story for @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/media/exclus...

Cannes Lions Live Blog | ADWEEK Cannes Lions Live Blog | ADWEEK

The @adweek.bsky.social team is live-blogging its way through Cannes, dropping juicy sound bites from industry bigwigs, touring the coolest activations, documenting key announcements, & getting the goss at the most exclusive parties. Check in for regular updates! www.adweek.com/brand-market...

Madwell Says It's 'Unlikely' It Can Repay Vendors, Many Owed Thousands Madwell, the indie agency that shuttered in April after its financial strain worsened following a fallout between its cofounders, told some vendors that it may not be able to fulfill outstanding payme...

Scoop: Recently shuttered agency Madwell said in an email that it doubts it can pay back vendors it still owes—who are collectively due many thousands. Five people with outstanding invoices expressed disappointment & anger in conversation with @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/agencies/mad...

EXCLUSIVE: Ads From Verizon, Shell, and Others Ran Next to Explicit Videos on Top Android App Ads for blue-chip brands like Verizon, Starbucks, and Instacart are being served on an app full of suggestive content via popular exchanges operated by Meta, Amazon, Epsilon and AppLovin.

SCOOP: Ads for blue-chip brands ran on a TikTok-like adult video app—many via servers incl. Facebook Audience Network, Amazon, Publicis-owned Epsilon, AppLovin, Basis and InMobi. After @adweek.bsky.social's inquiry, Google blocked the app from monetizing: www.adweek.com/media/exclus...

FTC Issues Sweeping Demands to Media Rating Firms Over Industry Ties The investigation comes amid an influx of conservative scrutiny around advertisers’ decisions to cut spend on platforms like X.

JUST IN: The FTC is probing media rating firms Media Matters and Ad Fontes Media, asking for information about their industry ties with orgs including WFA, NewsGuard, IAB, DoubleVerify, Check My Ads, and more, according to a letter reviewed by @adweek.bsky.social:

Google Brings Ads to AI Mode The search giant is inserting ads into its AI answers, as users ask more commercial questions

NEW: Ads are coming to AI Mode, the AI-powered search experience launched earlier this year, Google announced at its flagship marketing event on Wednesday. Plus, ads in AI Overviews will now be served on both mobile and desktop. Story for @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/media/google...

Google Unleashes Autonomous AI Agents for Marketers It's a big change in how marketers use Google—if regulators don’t force a breakup

NEW: Google today debuted a Chrome-embedded AI agent for marketers—even as threats of a Google breakup intensify amid ongoing antitrust battles. For @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/media/google...

DoubleVerify Sues Adalytics, Alleging Defamation Ad verification firm DoubleVerify is suing Adalytics, alleging that the research and analytics firm defamed the adtech company in its recent report about fraudulent traffic in digital advertising.

SCOOP: DoubleVerify is suing consultancy & research firm Adalytics for alleged defamation, specifically focused on claims made in Adalytics' March bot traffic report. Story for @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/programmatic...

I'll be at Google I/O and Google Marketing Live next week at Google HQ in Mountain View, reporting for @adweek.bsky.social and connecting with tech and advertising leaders. Will you be there? Let's link up!

Email: kendra.barnett@adweek.com
Signal: kendra.16

X's Angela Zepeda Confirms X Brand Campaign Is Coming Soon The exec told ADWEEK that the social platform plans to redefine itself post-Twitter later this year.

NEW: X’s global head of marketing Angela Zepeda, who joined the platform in September, told @adweek.bsky.social on Wednesday that X will launch a brand campaign sometime "after Cannes" this year. Story here: www.adweek.com/media/x-mark...

EXCLUSIVE: Madwell Cofounder Launches AI-Centric Ad Agency Madwell cofounder David Eisenman, whose dramatic falling-out with business partner Chris Sojka preceded the indie shop’s recent closure, has launched a new ad agency.

Less than two weeks after the closure of indie agency Madwell—which followed the messy legal falling-out of its cofounders and a spate of financial woes—one of its founders, David Eisenman, is back with a solo venture. I've got the exclusive for @adweek.bsky.social: www.adweek.com/agencies/mad...