Gord and Josh, I don't put all of the blame on Trump at all. There has been a growing sense of dissatisfaction by groups who feel left out by changes is society and the  government, by those who resent the growing influence of certain ethnic groups, by those who think that their  "way of life" is threatened by the progresive left's woke ways and it's "socialish" tendancies--which they equate with "Communism", etc. Put these all together and combine them with very weak Democrat POTUS candidates like Harris and an obviously tottering POTUS like Biden, plus a lack of acceptable policies about illegal immigration, and you create fertile ground for a showman like Trump to exploit. And he--under the guidance of his far right manipulators---has exploited it effectively. 

But even even the undying support of many MAGAS is wavering due to Trump's increasingly unhinged behavior, the damage done by  t he tariff wars, the obviously botched Iran war, etc. This is creating a spectacle for foreign observers to decry and marvel at--but I think that most understand that the MAGA movement will fade once their "leader" is gone--which should be soon. The question is what comes next, more of the same with a hard  right politician? A radical tilt to the far left? A stroner POTUS with centerist leanings who pulls us out of this mess? Needless to say most hope for the latter outcome as a hard shift to the left, will only  revive the MAGAs again.

In short, all is not lost--in my opinion.

Ed - I tend to agree with Joshua. It's too easy to try to isolate the issue to Trump alone. Let's not forget that he won the popular vote and has assembled a group of syncophants that has allowed him to do this damage. The fault lines in America run far deeper than just Trump and will still be there when he's gone. The world - and Canada - has learned a very hard lesson here. The US can't be trusted. And once trust is broken, it's not a simple matter to regain it. As far as who else is there to lead - I think the global dynamics have changed substantially. Middle powers have started to step forward to take a bigger role. And let's not forget China, who will be the ultimate winner from the US's decline. As a Canadian, I would love to return to the times of when I repeated crossed the border and our countries were fundamentally aligned but I don't see that coming back in my lifetime.

i'm far less optimistic. You can't "unlearn" something once you know it. The rest of the world has learned the level of risk associated with an over-reliance on the US for trade and alliances. Sure, they know this is because the POTUS is a malignant narcissist in the throes of frontotemporal dementia. But do you think Canada, e.g., will ever make this mistake again? The fiasco of Trump has laid bare for all the world to see the utter irreponsibility of a nation placing too many eggs in the US basket. If I was a Canadian voter and I had a choice between the "Bygones be bygones, let's disproportionately rely on the US again" candidate, and the "Lesson learned, a diverse portfolio of trade partners and allies is best for Canada" candidate, I know which one would get my vote.

Thank you Frank. Really great framing of the two sides of the ad measurement problem and synthesis of potential ways to solve them. In my view, Ed is absolutely correct that the branding and promotion side will require different metrics as iw Howard on the criticality of overall market transparency, particularly around share of viewing -- a reason that I have been a fan of Nielsen's Guage and its potential to be expanded to other media channels and to deliver granular audience cuts as well.

Dave, I agree. The comments also show that advertising has two different measurement needs. Brand advertising still requires trusted, independent measures of reach, frequency, and audience delivery, while performance marketing can be held accountable through verified consumer outcomes.

Outcome-based advertising will not replace a market-wide measurement currency, but it can reduce dependence on self-reported platform metrics. When payment is tied to a clearly defined and independently auditable action, such as a qualified visit, lead, or purchase. The advertiser can verify what occurred and pay for performance rather than a platform’s estimate of exposure.

Gordon is right about the danger of proprietary databases and arbitrage, Ed is right that branding and sales promotion require different metrics, and Howard is right that the overall marketplace has become far too opaque. The strongest path forward may be a combination: independent audience measurement for branding, transparent outcome verification for performance, and common standards that prevent the seller from being the only party grading the results.

Josh, I think that most world leaders--including the bad guys---realize that it's the Trump/MAGGA movement's extreme backlash against what they see as the progressive left's excesses that is causing this disturbing behavior by our government. But it's not most Americans that are blamed and once the MAGA's are quelled many think that a strong, new POTUS can restore America's standing in the world pretty quickly. After all who else is positionan to effectively take the lead. 

The most enduring legacy of the Trump presidency will be the fact that the rest of the world no longer considers the US a reliable trading partner, or a trustworthy ally, One man has singlehandedly terninated the world leadershiop position we have held since World War II. The American Century is officially over. 

Howard, yes. It starts with no transparency into overall consumption, nor a desire on the part of he digital walled gardens to proved one at the campaign level

Dave, agree 100%. I grew up in a fairly open and transparent Linear TV marketplace. We knew our share of viewing, we knew what advertisers ran on competitive networks and not ours. Got to AOL in 2001 and it was so different. So opaque. I had no idea what AOL's share of consumption was. Fast forward 25 years, and things are so much worse. There's not enough discussion about how we operate as an industry without a comprehensive, marketplace view of consumption, ads, spend. There's definitely not enough talk in the industry about this. 

Extraordinarily vulnerable, Dave.  100% agree.

That may be, Dave, but such branding "enhancements" are primarily oriented to appeal to sales promotional people for their campaigns, not the brand managers and CMOs who direct the marketers' major branding efforts. In other words, "advertising" has a split personality. The branding side is usually handled by different people --and agencies--than the sales promo function and the latter is increasingly in-house. The objectives are different as are the metrics and thus the need for better auduence measurement. It's far more important for the branding side.

Hopefully the Canadians understand that Trump's words and deeds ref Canada reflect the sentiment of only a very small portion of Americans. Once we are rid of Trump, we should try to re-establish the strong relationship we once had. It is important to understand that Trump is following the coward/bully playbook: pounce on the weak (e.g. Venezuela and Cuba) and avoid conflict with the strong (China, Russia, and North Korea). He received a big suprise when Iran turned out to be less weak than he thought. Canada has the potential to pose a similar surprise. 

Good points Ed, but the digital platforms claim (and charge for) branding value in their banners, newsfeed mentions, web video, social video, audio, podcasts and search. The spend their massively outweighs everything else now.

Gordon, exactly. Without market wide currency, the game moves to proprietary databases and arbitrage.

Of course, Dave--for other forms of "legacy media"--radio, magazines, newspapers, etc.

But you are right for  some of streaming and most of the rest--digital audio, social media, You Tube, etc. the sellers provide whatever data they can get away with.

On the positive side, most of this problem affects non-branding campaigns. A typical branding ad budget consists of 50-65% linear TV plus streaming and about 10-15% in other traditional forms of media--leaving only 20-25% in question re measurement. In contrast, sales promotion buys are very heavily concentrated in digital media which do not provide third party measurement. For search, it may not matter as most search buys charge only for clickthroughs. But for the rest--LOL.

Yeah, I know of one company used by a range of advertisers, media, agengies, and trade associations to track both TV and the other 90% of ad spending, down to the county level and across 18 different types of media. And rhe data is now on steroids, behind an MCP server. Its why some of the biggest advertising media get bigger. They "see" where that other 90% is coming from.

Would be great to understand churn. I use one platform consistently month to month, but supplement with another platform for a month or two before I unsubscribe and switch to another platform. No more than 2 services per month and only one consistently throughout the year. I only have two  streaming platforms for about six months out of the year during the colder/winter months.  

The variety of streaming services and higher costs are literally devolving into what we started using them for in the first place. 

Interesting piece — the point about buyers doing silent research before sales ever gets involved matches what we see too. Tools like free utilities (we run Video2Jpg, a free online video-to-image converter at https://video2jpg.com/) get discovered exactly this way: people search, test the tool anonymously, and only reach out later. The vendor-screening AI is essentially formalizing that behavior.

I'm with Canada I don't like tariffs and Trump should stop picking on Canada. I miss that friendship, I hope it can be mended in a few years.

I'm already sick of the personal attack ads Nov can't come soon enough.

It's great to see Newsweek really focusing on transparency. We're proud to have worked with them closely as they developed policies around AI and hope we can always hold them up as a model. While news organizations fear transparency around AI these days, it's vital for them to step forward and be clear with the public how and why they use AI. They should include what tools they are using and how these are trained. We know from Trust Project research and others' that if not, the public will assume the worst. 

What's happening here is nothing new. About 50 years ago when I was completing my master's degree, my lead professor used my thesis methodology to start a lucrative consulting business to provide candidates, political parties and non-profit organizations with data on the most important issues and how they should be addressed in advertising. THis adds a digital component to the process.

But how do they determine exactly what each member of a househiold thinks about each issue and how do they determine whether that specific person watched a particular TV show?