Frenemies: The Epic Disruption of the Ad Business (and Everything Else)

A plethora of recent books have focused on disruption in the ad world; Mara Einstein's Black Ops Advertising concentrates on the threats of content marketing, while Tim Wu's Attention Merchants situates newer forms of advertising in their historical context. New Yorker writer Auletta (Googled: The End of the World As We Know It) delves into how disruptions are impacting the most powerful agencies and personalities in the business and changing the way advertising is bought, sold, and created. With journalistic precision, the author profiles the executives and companies that have dominated the advertising, marketing, and media industries over the past decade before pivoting to describe how relatively new influencers such as Facebook and Google have overturned conventional thinking. Traditional agencies and media brokers are facing challenges from all quarters, including both the companies that have historically turned to them for marketing expertise and the platforms that have provided space for branded content.