Why Google’s Ad Business Could Implode w/ Tim Hwang

Paris Marx is joined by Tim Hwang to discuss how digital ad markets became financialized, why Google and Facebook have an incentive to hide how poorly digital ads actually work, and how a financial bubble in digital advertising could usher in a better future of the internet.

Tim Hwang is a writer, researcher, and former global public policy lead for artificial intelligence and machine learning at Google. He is also the author of “Subprime Attention Crisis: Advertising and the Time Bomb at the Heart of the Internet.” Follow Tim on Twitter as @timhwang.

Tech Won’t Save Us offers a critical perspective on tech, its worldview, and wider society with the goal of inspiring people to demand better tech and a better world. Follow the podcast (@techwontsaveus) and host Paris Marx (@parismarx) on Twitter.

Find out more about Harbinger Media Network and follow it on Twitter as @harbingertweets. You can also find out more about Alberta Advantage on their website.

Also mentioned in this episode:

• The United Kingdom’s Information Commissioner isn’t so sure Cambridge Analytica was as good at changing our minds as it made us all believe.
• When Procter and Gamble cut their digital ad spend by $200 million, its reach increased by 10%.
• A Google report found that 56% of ad impressions may not even be seen by humans.
• Facebook’s “pivot to video” was based on false metrics and caused a lot of journalists to lose their jobs.
• Paris wrote a critical review of The Social Dilemma for Jacobin.