It's Go(ogle) time

Monday! US v Google II! It’s happening!

Certified monopoly Google’s latest showdown against the Department of Justice kicks off next week. This time, it’s all about adtech.

The DoJ says Google abused its market position to monopolize all sides of the adtech industry, hoovering up 30 percent of every dollar spent on digital ads.

By tying together all of its adtech products, “Google became player and referee in the game it wrote the rules to,” Arielle Garcia told The Drum. “And advertisers, publishers and consumers all paid for it.”

That Drum piece, "What we know about Google’s upcoming adtech antitrust trial – and how it might play out,” is a great five-minute primer for what’s to come.

Speaking of Arielle, send her good vibes as she is packing up and rolling out to attend the trial in person. (Also pray for her GAINS as she is a powerlifter and courtroom rules mean she can’t chomp on a sweet potato during opening arguments.)

She’ll be sending out regular updates on the trial and her thoughts. Get them directly in your inbox by visiting USvGoogleAds.org, our homepage for all things Google trial and clicking Sign Up in the top right. You’ll get an “account confirmed” email once you do.

Arielle will also be posting updates to LinkedIn, X, and now Threads.

Bonus reading: What to watch for in the Google ad tech trial that could redefine digital advertising, featuring Sarah Kay Wiley.

Hate speech is running on Facebook, and Meta’s profiting  

A new report from FastCompany revealed that ads depicting transgender people as “groomers” ran repeatedly on Facebook, despite it being explicitly against Meta’s hate speech rules. And even after GLAAD reported some of the ads as hate speech, they stayed up. 

It’s a feedback loop of hate and profit, as Sarah explains in the piece: Paid ads push followers to the advertiser’s page, and more followers means more people see the content and Meta gets higher advertising rates.

The World Bank forgot the No. 1 rule of the internet: Avoid the comments 

About 25 percent of marketers plan to yoink ad spend from X next year, a new survey by Kantar has revealed, continuing an exodus that started after Elon Musk took over Twitter.

One of the more recent departures was the World Bank. CBS News found ads for the organization running in the comments beneath racist content.

This isn’t surprising to us: Back in June, we reported on how X was putting ads in the comments of toxic content. Even X itself says its brand safety controls apply only to its “For you” timeline.

We found ads for organizations like Sega and Semafor running beneath racist content, including a cartoon depiction of a lynching with antisemitic imagery.

But X does make it possible to opt out of advertising in the replies. So if you must use ad spend on that platform, here’s how to opt out.  

That’s all from us for this week. Thanks for reading, and be back in your inboxes soon!

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