Just like last year’s avalanche of “AI-powered” PowerPoints (we saw your decision trees in Excel, Larry), now everyone’s a “curator”. Not in the Louvre sense, not even Etsy. We're talking adtech “curation,” which—according to most of the current hype—means slapping together some half-baked URL lists and hoping the client’s too confused to ask questions.

Well guess what? Curation is 2025’s AI.
Same nonsense, new costume.

Now everyone is a curator.
SSPs? Curators.
Retail media platforms? Curators.
That guy who once ran retargeting campaigns in 2012? Oh yeah—he’s a curator now too.

The whole industry is suddenly a walking LinkedIn post about "curated PMPs." And just like with AI, most of it is... how do we say this politely?

At IAB Tech Lab’s 2025 gathering of buzzwords and politely restrained applause, Audigent’s CEO Drew Stein got on stage and basically nuked the room.
Not with more jargon, but with actual truth bombs the industry didn’t want to hear.

He didn’t mince words. He didn’t hide behind corporate doublespeak.
He flat out said what the rest of us have been whispering for months:

👉 “The industry is packed with bandwagon jumpers and poseurs.”
👉 “Everyone claims to be a curator — but is not.”
👉 “If it doesn’t have real data, real inventory access, and real optimization… it’s just complete nonsense.”

Let me translate for the folks in the back:
Most of what’s being sold as curation is a lie.

It's not curation if you're just:

What you’re doing is ad network cosplay — and no one’s impressed.

This isn’t a pretend game for pitch decks. There’s over $100 BILLION moving through PMPs globally.
Real money. Real buyers. Real consequences.

Which means the grift is scaling. Fast.

But here’s the thing Stein made crystal clear: when done right, curation works.

Let’s run the numbers:
📈 +20% bid density
🏆 +118% win rates
💰 Up to 74% net publisher revenue gains (after fees!)
🧬 +260% revenue lift in health verticals
📱 +70% uplift in mobile app monetization
🎯 3x higher CTRs, 70% lower CPCs vs. DMP segments

These aren’t fake numbers. They’re from real campaigns. With real strategy. And yeah — real curation.

But those results only show up when you have:
✅ Unique data
✅ Robust inventory connections
✅ Optimization that doesn’t sleep

Miss one? You're not a curator. You’re a ✨segment decorator✨.

Just when you thought the man was done, he went full sarcasm mode.

Referencing the lazy PMP builders flooding the market with garbage, he deadpanned:
👉 “Do it. Do it.”

Yes. That’s a Starsky & Hutch quote.
Was it a flex? Was it passive-aggressive genius?
Does it matter?

What matters is he sees you.
And now, so do we.

If you're still selling curation without actual audience data, without real-time optimization, without even understanding what a clean bidstream looks like…

You’re not in adtech. You’re in theater.
And the curtain’s about to fall.

So, to the marketers who want results, and the publishers who want revenue without getting fleeced:
Vet your curators. Demand receipts. Burn the fake scrolls.

📣 Stay Bold, Stay Curious, and Know More Than You Did Yesterday.
(And if you’re still calling a whitelist “strategy,” maybe sit this one out.)

💌 Forward this to a friend who’s still stuck in 2021.
🧠 Upgrade to the full issue below — where we really break down the data.

Stacy Bohrer of OpenX broke down curation into two buckets for us — and, in classic adtech fashion, made it sound both straightforward and revolutionary:

Bohrer gave a real-world flex: a luxury auto client ran one Deal ID packed with 11 audience segments (think auto intenders, high-income households, etc.). Instead of layering on data at the DSP, they used OpenX’s curated segments up front — and saw better performance plus a 12% lift in working media dollars.

In her view, this kind of supply-side curation does a few key things:

Her bet on the future? Everything goes biddable — as long as the black boxes get cracked open and the value of every impression is clear. Because, as she says, "Only when we do that will the future be as bright as it can be."

✅ Real Deal: Clear disclosure of publishers, domains, and app IDs. No "blind" or "mystery box" inventory.
❌ Lemon: Vague descriptions like "premium publishers only" with no specifics.

✅ Real Deal: Guaranteed priority access to inventory before it hits open exchanges.
❌ Lemon: The same inventory available in open RTB, just with a higher price tag.

✅ Real Deal: Custom audience segments, brand-safe contextual signals, or publisher first-party data.
❌ Lemon: Generic targeting that mirrors open market options.

✅ Real Deal: Higher CPMs justified by scarcity, exclusivity, or premium placements.
❌ Lemon: Paying more for the same junk you’d find in open auctions.

✅ Real Deal: Pre-bid brand safety (IAS, DV, Grapeshot), anti-fraud (ads.txt, sellers.json), and viewability guarantees.
❌ Lemon: No third-party verification or weak fraud prevention.

✅ Real Deal: Custom deal terms (floor prices, blocklists, private auctions).
❌ Lemon: A generic Deal ID slapped on open-market inventory.

✅ Real Deal: Direct collaboration with publishers for custom ad experiences (e.g., high-impact units, sponsorships).
❌ Lemon: No publisher involvement—just a repackaged RTB deal.

If your "PMP" fails 3+ of these checks, you’re likely buying a lemon—a repackaged open auction with a markup. Demand better from your SSPs and media partners.

🚀 Pro Tip: Ask for a pre-bid report to verify exclusivity before committing. No transparency? Walk away.

When Bill Wise, CEO of Mediaocean (aka the guy who quietly powers a terrifying amount of your media supply chain), says something about the future of advertising, you don’t ignore it—you start rewriting your pitch deck.

Wise, a longtime adtech power broker and one of the few execs who’s played both sides of the media chessboard (DoubleClick, Right Media, and now Mediaocean + Innovid), just dropped what amounts to a eulogy for the open web.

✅ Stitching together point solutions is dead.
✅ Neutrality without scale is irrelevant.
✅ And “openness” without control is just chaos in a trench coat.

Curation.

And not the playlist kind. Wise is betting big on curated, consolidated ecosystems that offer scale, transparency, and control—without being a duopoly meat grinder like Google. By merging Innovid and FlashTalking into one unified platform, Mediaocean is trying to create a buy-side operating system that competes not by replicating walled gardens, but by offering an independent alternative to them.

The open web's value prop used to be freedom, interoperability, innovation.
Now it’s fragmentation, inefficiency, and CFO heartburn.

Agencies are desperate to stop duct-taping solutions together. Brands want control and ease. And everyone wants fewer meetings with five different vendors who each promise the same thing and deliver slightly different flavors of underwhelming.

“If you care about creative personalization, supply path optimization, or just not wasting your damn media dollars… the ad server isn’t just infrastructure—it’s the power base.”

Translation: whoever controls the ad server is the platform.

And he’s not handing that over to Google without a fight.

Bottom line?
Curation isn’t just a buzzword. It’s the battle plan.
The open web, as we knew it, is toast.
And Bill Wise is already building what comes next.

If you think the free version of ADOTAT is spicy, you haven’t even touched the hot sauce. Behind the velvet rope of ADOTAT+ is where the gloves come off, the KPIs get real, and the industry sacred cows get turned into kosher brisket.

We're not here to regurgitate slide decks or play stenographer to press releases. We’re breaking down performance metrics that actually move revenue, exposing which SSPs are selling you fool’s gold, and dissecting the curation charade with surgical precision (and a side of sarcasm).

You want to know if that shiny “Self-Optimizing PMP” is a game-changer or just a glorified Excel macro? ADOTAT+ has the receipts.

You want real win rate lifts, post-fee revenue gains, and a breakdown of who’s gaming the open exchange like it’s 2017? It’s all in there.

And if you don’t subscribe? Well, enjoy your influencer marketing benchmark report and hope your DSP isn’t still buying autoplay ads on dating apps.