The Third Coming Of Open RTB; Unilad Faces Insolvency

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Third Time’s A Charm

For eight years the IAB Tech Lab’s OpenRTB Working Group has made incremental changes to the OpenRTB spec. But OpenRTB 3.0, slated to release for public comment next week, will be an entirely new protocol, according to Jim Butler, Oath’s CTO of global supply platforms and co-chair of the working group. “The complexity in the supply chain has gotten to the point where the underlying model that 2.0 was based on was not really a reality any more,” Butler tells eMarketer. Exchanges will have to support both 2.0 and 3.0 specs, since the two aren’t reverse compatible like previous RTB updates. More. In light of this and other factors, the IAB Tech Lab plans to hold a long beta period. More at AdExchanger.

Sad Lads

It appears that Unilad, once one of the most viral publishers on Facebook, doesn’t have enough cash to pay its creditors. How did it go from one of the top-performing social content companies to facing insolvency? In a word: Facebook, where the algorithm giveth and taketh away. The US publisher LittleThings knows what that’s like. But while the going was good, Unilad was a champ at revving engagement on Facebook and maintained a ruthless focus on metrics, Digiday reports. If a video didn’t gain traction within 30 minutes, Unilad would immediately take it down. When Facebook changed its algorithm to favor content from friends and family at the beginning of the year, Unilad started live streaming and cultivated branded content deals – but it wasn’t enough. “For a number of these publishers, things are out of their control if they rely on walled-garden platforms,” said Alex DeGroote, an independent media analyst. More.