Please see our recent write-up of the ALJ’s decision to affirm the finding in FTC v. 1-800 Contacts of antitrust violations in their ad tech agreements. You can find that write-up here.
Search Advertising
Changes to Google Ad Policy to Affect Pharmaceutical Industry; Requires Immediate Action to Paid Search Ads
Google has announced a new advertising policy for pharmaceutical companies that presents significant issues and dictates immediate changes. Effective July 20, pharmaceutical companies can no longer run pharmaceutical ads in the so-called “Black Box Ad Format” – a format that had previously been approved by the FDA. Instead, pharmaceutical companies will now have to run…
Google Adwords: Use Of Competitors’ Keywords Is Okay… Sometimes
At the end of last month, the long-awaited judgment in the Interflora v Marks and Spencer case on trade mark infringement as it relates to keyword advertising was delivered by Mr Justice Arnold. The case dates back to 2008, when Interflora brought a case against Marks and Spencer for its purchase and use of the search terms “interflora”…
A Free Internet Once Again For France?
At the start of this year, the second-largest French ISP, Free, took the surprising decision to release an update for its customers which allowed them to block third party ads if they so desired. Even more surprising was the fact that a total blocking of such ads was the default position created by the…
Google Shows Advertising In a New Light
Google has launched a new advertising format this week which it says will be better at targeting consumers and more cost effective for advertisers. Welcome to Lightbox. Lightbox advertisements initially appear as regular display advertisements within a webpage, but when the user hovers over the advertisement for two seconds, it quickly expands into a super-sized…