Thread by @jason_kint

Day 3: USvGoogle. Wow. “Google imposed debt on publishers” in damning evidence. After opening day with evasive top Google exec who ran adtech for both sides of market (but said “I believe so” to header bidding happening and AdX having 20% take rate), fireworks with DOJ expert. /1

Impressive DOJ expert Dr. Ravi systematically walked through conduct that had the interest conflicts lights blinking like fire alarms in Court. First, he testified 53% of Google's wins in auction were due to "First Look" (basically jumping in line to block) in Google's AdX. /2

We saw an email exhibit explaining to leadership that "launching AdX into non-DFP servers destroys G's advantage leading to AdX losing access to overall queries with less valuable inventory begetting lower CPMs causing pubs to decrease G's access to their inventory. WTF. /3

Google came across weak in its argument there was a workaround to Google's First Look in waterfall by using the sponsorship listing for header bidding. And that's before you get to the key point you're then allowing header bidding to compete with direct deals up top. /4

So First Look clearly bad (basically 53% of time Google gets to jump everyone and ignore rest of market) and then the switch to Last Look after header bidding also was cleanly explained showing Google can open the silent auction envelope and outbid the top bid when they want. /5

Then we see email from Google engineer, Martin Pal (testifying) to leadership Don Harrison explaining that (the blockbuster) "Dynamic Revenue Sharing is just another way to exploit Last Look." It's right there in the emails. And cleanly explained in Court exhibits. /6

He explains it allows G to bid high or low on high-value or low-value impressions respectively where AppNexus is about to win at high or low prices. BUT... AppNexus can't do the same when Google is about to win. From me, this is alleged conduct privileging the market power. /7

or as Dr. Ravi said, "Last Look steals bids (and revenues." He also said scale matters because as you make it higher then the effects grow further. Sounds like the search case Google just lost, yes? /8

Dr. Ravi took us thru bid shaving (Poirot), RPO and other manipulation of bids. Again, cleanly. He noted scale is critical to information advantage. As it relates to DRS, he said, "Google imposes debt on publishers" in banking the funds and paying them back over time. wow. /9

Link to Day 2.

https://x.com/jason_kint/status/1833634975783989682