The Open Internet is still with us

As my friends and family can attest — I like controversy, discussion and debate. So, at the risk of adding a superfluous bit of controversy, I never get tired of defending Michael Jordan as the greatest basketball player of all time. Or Steph Curry as basketball’s greatest shooter ever. Or Meryl Streep as the best actor or actress ever. Or Michelangelo as the best sculptor ever. Or John Lennon and Paul McCartney as the best music duo since the advent of rock ’n’ roll.

In addition to debates, the great ones sometimes inspire rumors, perhaps the most famous being the death hoax. Is Elvis really dead? Is Jackie Chan still alive? Is Paul actually dead? I find this last one the most fascinating.

In 1967, a rumor started that Paul had died in a car crash. People were convinced that the song “I’m So Tired,” if played backward, signaled “Paul is dead.” In 1969, the Beatles released the iconic “Abbey Road” cover with Paul crossing barefoot, which inadvertently sent the rumors into overdrive.

The rumors grew so intense that it required a cover story in Life magazine in November 1969, featuring Paul McCartney, living on his farm in Scotland with his family, to prove he was very much alive — long before AI and photoshop might render such proof futile.

The article, titled “Paul Is Still With Us,” helped to squash the hysteria, but the rumor never completely vanished. 

As always, there will be some who never let the data get in the way of a good story or a juicy rumor.

It’s in that vein that I’ve heard a lot of bold assertions about the open internet lately. A few of them include:

The open internet is dead. (And what follows or precedes this bold but misguided declaration always includes a discourse about AI.)
The open internet is losing to walled gardens.
The open internet isn’t something to rally behind anymore.

I strongly disagree with all three of these assertions, and I believe that data can show us that the open internet is thriving — indeed, that it’s never been in better health.

Let me explain why. First, I think it’s helpful to define the open internet. When concepts get shortened or abstracted to a few words on a banner, often they get ambiguous, which is especially true in this case. And, selfishly, defining it well also makes it easier for me to describe to others what I’m fighting for and what motivates me — because the thriving open internet is the democratic North Star that I spend a very high percentage of my waking moments thinking about.

Many people use the terms “open web” and “open internet” interchangeably. Others try to limit their definition of the open internet to what happens inside of an internet browser. This is both a silly and impractical definition of the open internet because, among other things, internet technology has become infused into all manner of technologies way beyond the browser, such as streaming TV, digital audio, mobile apps and games. All of these things are monetized in very open and competitive ways.

If that weren’t enough, at this moment, the world’s information technology is evolving faster than at any point in history.

AI is changing our lives and the digital world in a way that is at least as profound as the way the internet itself did so 30 years ago. Among so many other things, AI will change the nature of content and our interactions with browsers.

One of the most fascinating manifestations of this is a little-known debate that has been ongoing for years in some corners of Google — along with the related power struggles. The debate centers around a fundamental question — is Chrome a platform or an app? As the AMA AI chatbot race rages on, we will likely get an answer to this. We’ll find the answer in how Chrome, with its built-in search, evolves its relationship with its sibling, Gemini. For this discussion however, a definition of the open internet that confines it to a browser is not practical. It never was. But it is even less pragmatic in the AI world that we’re all rapidly building.

Today, a much more useful way of thinking about it is the contrast between the open internet and walled gardens.

Definition — the open internet is the decentralized, competitive, innovative, less-restricted portion of the internet. It is where nearly all premium content thrives today — streaming TV, streaming movies, streaming music, journalism and most of live sports. It is the vast majority of the content consumed inside a browser, inside of your Spotify app, on your Roku or Samsung TV or inside of your DirecTV box — all regardless of whether it’s on your phone, your laptop, your desktop, your living room TV, your airplane screen or a digital billboard.

The open internet monetizes in two main ways: subscription (pay for access) or ads (pay using your time to consider ads/offers). Of course, these are not mutually exclusive and today most of the premium corners of the open internet use hybrid pricing. The key is that both methods are subject to competitive dynamics. Ad prices and subscription prices are beautifully in competition with other options.

Because the open internet is decentralized, open internet ad supply chains contain multiple parties. Monetizing an individual impression is a bit like hosting a trial. To have justice, there needs to be at least three players — a defense attorney, a prosecuting attorney and a judge. With a supply-side platform (SSP) representing the seller — you have one entity that wants the highest ad price possible. With a demand-side platform (DSP) representing advertisers, you have an entity representing the buyer and wanting the best relevance and value. Neither wants an unfair transaction, but they each just represent the opposing interests of their clients. The judge, or the market maker in this case, is protecting the fairness and integrity of the ad auction. It sets the rules of the court. It stands as a neutral party protecting the process even more than the outcome of any individual case.

But due process is expensive. Justice comes at a cost. As a comparison, authoritarian governments have an advantage of swift, easy, decisive and less complicated structures. However, history has shown that absolute power does corrupt absolutely. Such a system isn’t inherently bad in small doses. However, human beings with unchecked power generally, eventually, make devastating decisions. A mantra of “do no evil” often evolves into “win by any means necessary.”

The walled gardens do have a lot of things going for them. They have a simpler supply chain. For all intents and purposes, they are the Big Tech platforms that are so dominant that they are a must-have on most media plans. That scale is what makes them well equipped to make their own rules. In fact, they can make those rules draconian in their favor and the market will tolerate it because of their scale, as we’ve seen in recent court cases. In effect, in many cases, the walled garden represents the buyer, the seller, the judge — not to mention the stenographer and the court reporter. These dynamics mean the advertiser often does not have clear, objective line of sight into what they are buying, how it is performing or the real cost.

But the real reason I’m so optimistic about the open internet is its growth dynamics. Ten years ago, consumers spent most of their digital time within walled gardens such as Facebook and Google. Today, that trend has reversed, largely because of the digitization of TV, sports-watching and music. The pandemic pushed the TV industry toward streaming, to a point where almost all major TV studios and networks are now prioritizing streaming — even spinning off their streaming divisions as the high-growth engines of their business. Similarly, in the U.S. alone, consumers spend an average of three hours a day listening to digital audio. If you saw my daughter’s daily Spotify consumption trend you wouldn’t be as surprised by that statistic as I initially was.

But even if you don’t believe the data, try this little thought exercise: If you had to make a choice, would you choose a life without all of streaming music and movies and TV and journalism and live sports — or a future without YouTube and Instagram?

User-generated content can be fun. It can even be addictive. It passes the time while you’re waiting in line. And there’s certainly a place for it in the media plan. But increasingly consumers, and the advertisers trying to reach them, are choosing premium content on the open internet. And for advertisers, this is good news. It means their brands can show up against the very best, premium content. And advertisers and agencies can better participate in the process and measure success on the open internet than they ever could in the walled gardens.

I’m a big believer in the power of market dynamics. Over time, markets — assuming they are sufficiently open and transparent — will bend toward efficiency. Competition makes it so. The hardworking consumer who carefully chooses where to allocate their discretionary money, gets more choice, at competitive prices. That competitive environment fuels innovation. Including innovation in advertising, which is one of the reasons I’m so excited about the potential of a competitive, open internet to drive exciting invention and innovation in our industry for decades to come.

Paul is still with us — despite all the furor of the 1960s and over 50 years of time and innovation down the long and winding road of yesterday.

The open internet is still with us. And its best days are ahead.