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Dutch regulator fines Uber 825 million euros over automated driver blocking
Software deactivated driver accounts from 2018 to 2022 with no human review at all. Uber has appealed, and three earlier Dutch fines also remain unresolved.
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TikTok pays $400 million as DOJ moves to vacate its 2019 COPPA decree
Payment splits into $300 million now and $100 million on vacatur, ending ten-year sworn compliance reports. Judge Otis Wright hears the motion on September 21.
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Etsy gains 36% in holiday sales, partly credited to Google AI Max
Just 61% of shoppers used AI last holiday season, Google tells retailers, and 94% of those who did rated it valuable. Which feed work moves that number now?
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Explaining RampID
RampID is LiveRamp's pseudonymous people-based identifier, used to match consumer records across advertisers, publishers and platforms without moving raw PII.
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Explaining ID5
ID5 is a universal advertising ID and identity graph that recognises users where third-party cookies fail. Its mechanics, origins, scale claims and disputes.
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Explaining Max CPC
Max CPC is the highest price an advertiser will pay for one click, a ceiling entered into the ad auction that platforms are now removing from new campaigns.
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Microsoft retires Max CPC as ChatGPT Ads defaults to automated bidding
Microsoft removes Max CPC from new campaigns October 1, ChatGPT Ads preselects automated bidding, and Google adds AI Max experiments. Plus an Oura ad lawsuit.
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Three promotions later, the acronyms are still the same
Sixteen terms, four groups of four, one grid. It rewards anyone who has bought media across channels, and one group is trickier than it looks.
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Google Preferred Sources gains 255,000 selections since late May
Embed code, deeplinks and downloadable assets ship with the button, and subdirectories stay ineligible. Discover also gains free-text tuning in the Google app.
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YouTube adds 4 dispute categories for AI likeness claims that block videos
Studio's Copyright menu becomes Claims, holding Content ID matches and privacy notices alike. Blocked videos carry no strike, and no revenue share is offered.
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Encoders gain YouTube dual streaming as vertical feed lacks 5 of 9 features
Live ad midrolls, pre-rolls, 4K and Premieres are off for the vertical half, hitting creators and buyers. Can one shared chat carry two very different feeds?
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ChatGPT Ads gains 3-platform targeting as reporting stays at 2 buckets
Media buyers can exclude iOS App, Android App or Web from delivery, a lever absent since February 9. Mobile web still counts as Mobile in Insights. What breaks?
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News
News from the programmatic advertising and ad tech industry. PPC Land covers platform updates, acquisitions, privacy and policy shifts, research, and product launches across display, video, search, social, retail media, audio, digital out-of-home, and mixed reality — and the data and AI developments reshaping how ads are bought and sold.
Dutch regulator fines Uber 825 million euros over automated driver blocking
Software deactivated driver accounts from 2018 to 2022 with no human review at all. Uber has appealed, and three earlier Dutch fines also remain unresolved.
TikTok pays $400 million as DOJ moves to vacate its 2019 COPPA decree
Payment splits into $300 million now and $100 million on vacatur, ending ten-year sworn compliance reports. Judge Otis Wright hears the motion on September 21.
Etsy gains 36% in holiday sales, partly credited to Google AI Max
Just 61% of shoppers used AI last holiday season, Google tells retailers, and 94% of those who did rated it valuable. Which feed work moves that number now?
Microsoft retires Max CPC as ChatGPT Ads defaults to automated bidding
Microsoft removes Max CPC from new campaigns October 1, ChatGPT Ads preselects automated bidding, and Google adds AI Max experiments. Plus an Oura ad lawsuit.
Google Preferred Sources gains 255,000 selections since late May
Embed code, deeplinks and downloadable assets ship with the button, and subdirectories stay ineligible. Discover also gains free-text tuning in the Google app.
YouTube adds 4 dispute categories for AI likeness claims that block videos
Studio's Copyright menu becomes Claims, holding Content ID matches and privacy notices alike. Blocked videos carry no strike, and no revenue share is offered.
ChatGPT Ads makes automated bidding the default in new ad groups
Maximize results carries no CPA, CPC or ROAS guarantee and is preselected for eligible ad groups. Manual: Max bid remains the only route to a hard bid ceiling.
Oura sued over 95% sleep staging accuracy claim in ads
Peer-reviewed testing put stage detection at 53.18%, and the filing counts 91 live Meta ads carrying that promise. Health-category buyers now face a jury test.
Rival agentic ad protocols overlap on 13 functions, IAB Tech Lab says
Agentic ad protocols AAMP and AdCP overlap on 13 functions, IAB Tech Lab says, while just 6% of marketers act on in-platform AI advice, StackAdapt has found.
LT.agency cuts 40-hour ad refresh work by 98% with Fluency
Case study reports 456% more form submissions and 71% lower cost per lead for one client, none of it audited. Three creative hires followed. What is unsaid?
Explainer
Reference articles that each go deep on a single ad tech term. Every entry in the Explaining series opens with a plain-language definition, then covers the mechanics, origins, key dates, limitations, and commonly confused adjacent terms - grounded in PPC Land coverage, platform documentation, and industry standards from bodies like the IAB.
Explaining RampID
RampID is LiveRamp's pseudonymous people-based identifier, used to match consumer records across advertisers, publishers and platforms without moving raw PII.
Explaining ID5
ID5 is a universal advertising ID and identity graph that recognises users where third-party cookies fail. Its mechanics, origins, scale claims and disputes.
Explaining Max CPC
Max CPC is the highest price an advertiser will pay for one click, a ceiling entered into the ad auction that platforms are now removing from new campaigns.
Explaining engaged view
Engaged view is non-click conversion credit for video ads: a viewer watches a qualifying portion, does not click, converts later, and the ad still gets credit.
Explaining DNT
DNT is the Do Not Track HTTP header, a one-character browser opt-out that sites were free to ignore. How it worked, why it collapsed, and what replaced it.
Explaining GPC
GPC, or Global Privacy Control, is a browser signal telling sites not to sell or share personal data. How the header works, and where law makes it binding.
Explaining Consent Mode
Consent Mode is Google's API for relaying cookie consent choices to its tags, adjusting data collection when consent is denied and modelling lost conversions.
Explaining JS error
JS error in Microsoft Clarity is an uncaught browser script exception, captured by the tracking code, grouped by message and linked to the session recordings.
Explaining hard bounce
Hard bounce is a permanent email delivery failure the receiving server will not retry. How SMTP status codes, suppression rules and sender reputation connect.
Explaining spam trap
Spam trap: an email address with no human owner, used by mailbox providers and blocklist operators to expose senders who harvest, buy or fail to clean lists.
Games
Daily word games for advertising professionals. Test how well you really know the industry: a new Connections-style grid every day, sorting 16 ad tech terms into four hidden groups, plus a weekly crossword built from the terminology that fills programmatic briefs, DSP dashboards, and measurement decks. Free to play, no account needed. Come back each morning for a fresh puzzle — and find out whether you know your bid shading from your supply path optimization.
Three promotions later, the acronyms are still the same
Sixteen terms, four groups of four, one grid. It rewards anyone who has bought media across channels, and one group is trickier than it looks.
The platforms named all of this before you ever logged in
Sixteen terms sorted into four groups of four. Saturday's grid runs on platform vocabulary, and the hardest group is not the one you reach for first.
Two dashboards, one number, and sixteen terms to sort
A daily grid of sixteen terms in four groups. This one leans on the reporting and privacy end of the stack, where one group is trickier than it looks.
The ad stack between the brief and the screen it lands on
Sixteen terms, four groups of four. One group reads like plain marketing language and is not, which is where most solvers spend their first mistake.
The search channel has two dialects and one glossary
A grid of sixteen terms drawn from the paid and organic sides of search, where one group has nothing to do with advertising until you look at it twice.
Automation took the trading desk's job, not its words
Sixteen terms, four groups of four. Most of this grid comes from the machinery of a media buy, and one group has been hiding in plain sight for years.
For anyone who inherited a channel they never asked for
Sixteen terms and four groups of four, drawn from across a working stack. One group reads like a vendor list and isn't, which is where most people slip.
Everything on the second monitor, sorted into four groups
Sixteen terms from across the stack, sorted into four groups of four. One group is tighter than it looks, and it is not the one you will reach for first.
What the quarterly review expects you to already know
Sixteen terms, four groups of four. Today's grid leans hard on commerce vocabulary, and one group is far harder to place than its plain wording suggests.
For the person who reads release notes before coffee
Sixteen terms, four groups of four, drawn from the parts of the job that changed most in the last decade. The hardest group rewards a long memory.