Last week I published a five-part investigation into the TV measurement industry that got me a lot of new friends and a few new enemies. If you missed it, go read it first. I'll be here when you get back.

Then something happened that doesn't usually happen in ad tech: people started returning my calls.

A lot of people.

Board members. Institutional investors. Current and former C-suite executives across multiple measurement companies. Agency leaders who negotiate the deals. Network executives who've sat across from Nielsen's team knowing they had no real leverage. I now have pages of internal reports, financial documentation, HR records, and strategic materials that have never been made public.

And the picture that's emerging is, frankly, a mess.

Not a dramatic, cinematic mess. Not a single villain, single hero, somebody-call-the-SEC mess. More like a slow, systemic, everyone-knows-and-nobody-does-anything mess. The kind that costs the advertising industry billions of dollars a year and persists because fixing it would require people to do extra work for the same money. Which, if you've ever watched an agency holding company CFO react to the phrase "incremental operational complexity," you know is the one thing that will never, ever happen. They'd rather set the money on fire. At least fire is warm.

What follows is everything new. No rehashing. If you want the background, that's what the original series is for.

Let's go.

I want to start with something that's been genuinely strange to report.

I like VideoAmp. I think the technology is real. I think the clean room IP is genuinely differentiated. I think $150 million in advanced currency revenue built from zero in three and a half years is a number that deserves respect, not another breathless "company in crisis" headline from someone who's never built anything more complicated than a LinkedIn post. I've said this publicly and I'll say it again here.

Which makes the communications situation absolutely, bewilderingly stupid.

Since publishing the original series, I've spoken to people across VideoAmp's orbit. Major investors - people with serious money on the line - talked to me. People with direct knowledge of the company's operations, finances, and strategic direction engaged openly, with data, with case studies, with a level of detail that made clear the real story is better than what the trade press has been writing.

These aren't disgruntled ex-employees grinding axes. These are people who own significant pieces of this company. They're talking because they think the truth helps VideoAmp, not hurts it.

The people actually running the company right now? Scared is the only word I can come up with.

Peter Liguori was formally announced as CEO in July 2025. Less than six months later, he stepped down effective January 5, 2026, with Tony Fagan becoming CEO on January 6. Jenny Wall gone. The entire C-suite turned over before we even published the original series. The company's public line is that these were always planned departures, defined engagements tied to the currency push, natural transitions, everything going according to plan. The press release frames it as positioning VideoAmp for "its next AI chapter" and an "agentic future," with Fagan's technical background as CTO-turned-President-turned-CEO as the rationale.

A six-month CEO tenure that was "always the plan." And if you believe that, I have a Nielsen accreditation to sell you.

I was in the process of scheduling an on-the-record interview with VideoAmp leadership when it got canceled. That's how I found out they were gone. You don't cancel press interviews because of a smooth, planned transition. You cancel press interviews because something changed fast and nobody's sure who's authorized to talk yet.

I sent a text to Bryan Goski, who leads VideoAmp's revenue organization, in Manhattan - hoping it wasn't too early - just trying to clarify some basic operational details. Not a gotcha. Not an ambush. The kind of routine fact-check any company with a functioning communications operation handles over coffee.

Nothing.

We've now sent a formal request for comment to Purpose Worldwide, VideoAmp's external PR, with specific questions about revenue, leadership transitions, the Vista debt structure, headcount, and the AI pivot. Backed by sourcing they won't expect. We'll report their response in Part 3.

Here's what I don't understand: the people with the most to lose - the investors, the board - are confident enough in this company's story to walk me through it with documentation. The hired executives running the day-to-day won't return a text message. When the owners are more transparent than the operators, that's not a communications problem. That's a culture problem. And culture problems don't get fixed by hiring an external PR agency to not respond to emails on your behalf.

The real shame is that VideoAmp's actual story is good. Not perfect. But good. There's a genuine tension between the external "agentic AI" jargon - the buzzword soup that sounds like every other company's 2026 press release fed through a McKinsey intern - and what's actually happening inside the stack architecturally, which is legitimately interesting. But nobody's explaining that because nobody's talking.

And we need to talk more about their DEBT, not their investments. They’ve incorrectly claimed debt financing, was in fact, “investments.” That’s not true, and they know it.

Every day without a response is a day the narrative gets written without them. And buddy, I am writing.

The insider account, why the CEO transitions happened the way they did, the real fundraising math the press has gotten consistently wrong, what the Vista debt actually looks like, and what "agentic AI" means when you strip away the marketing language - that's Part 3. For paid subscribers.

Let me say something that might surprise people given what we reported last week: iSpot has real technology and real value. The Trade Desk integration is meaningful. The outcomes measurement capabilities are legitimate. The 605 acquisition gave them a genuinely strong data science team and a massive device footprint. Their ad-occurrence detection is solid. When iSpot does what it does best - connecting TV exposure to business results across linear and streaming - it's a useful product. Sean Muller built something real. That's not nothing.

The problem isn't the product. The problem is everything around the product. And frankly, it's also ambition. iSpot positioned itself as a currency challenger, but currency requires content measurement - Average Commercial Minute is a content metric, not just an ad metric - plus local ratings in 210 DMAs and out-of-home. iSpot doesn't have content measurement at the required level. Doesn't have local. Doesn't have OOH. What they have is outcomes and attribution, and that's a real business. But it's a different business than the one they've been selling to investors and putting in press releases.

And even in outcomes, the competitive landscape is tougher than iSpot's positioning suggests. Several brand-side buyers we've spoken to independently flagged InMarket and NCSolutions as the CTV measurement players they actually trust for proving in-store lift - companies quietly winning budget-justification conversations where the money actually gets approved or killed. Not the companies making keynote speeches. The companies getting purchase orders..

Since then, we've learned more. And honestly, I wish iSpot would just talk to me, because the silence is making this worse than it needs to be.

The timing. On October 29, 2025 iSpot announced the hiring of Julie Van Ullen as President and Chief Revenue Officer. She came from Rakuten Rewards, where she's credited with driving 135% revenue growth. IAB board member. Well-connected. Well-regarded. By all accounts, a strong hire.

The question is what she walked into. You're a seasoned executive. You take a President and CRO role at a measurement company positioning itself as a Nielsen alternative. The press release says "next phase of innovation and growth." But the company is in the middle of cutting 25% of its workforce. Either she knew the full picture and took the job anyway because the mandate is turnaround - which would actually be impressive and worth talking about publicly - or the situation was presented differently than reality. Either way, there's a real story here and it's one iSpot should want to tell, because a credible executive choosing to take on a hard challenge is a better narrative than this wall of silence.

The layoff math, and some honesty. In the original series, we reported that iSpot had cut nearly 100 employees, roughly a quarter of the company. Since then, I've heard from additional sources. And what they're telling me doesn't line up with that number. Not even close.

So let me do something you almost never see in trade press: I'm going to push back on my own reporting.

The original sourcing pointed to a large-scale reduction.

But newer sources, multiple, independent, credible, suggest something much closer to normal operational movement.

People leave companies. Contracts end. Teams get reorganized after acquisitions, which is exactly what you'd expect post-605. That's not a mass layoff. That's a company evolving.

Did people lose their jobs at iSpot? Yes. That's never fun, and those people deserve acknowledgment. But was it the dramatic quarter-of-the-company bloodbath we initially characterized? I don't think the evidence supports that anymore.

I still stand by the fact that we were the only outlet paying attention. And I'd rather be the reporter who gets it first and corrects it publicly than the one who never showed up at all. That's the job.

The WARN Act analysis from the original piece? The absence of filings could just as easily mean the numbers never hit the thresholds, not that iSpot's lawyers were threading a needle. I gave that framing too much weight. The more straightforward explanation is probably making a lot more sense.

iSpot still hasn't talked to me directly and I still wish they would. But I'm not going to hold silence against them when my own numbers needed revising first.

iSpot's response to our reporting has been... creative. They haven't called me. Haven't emailed. Haven't issued a statement. What they've done is gotten their clients to call me. Brands, agencies, industry friends - reaching out off the record to push back, clarify, defend. Somebody encouraged them to reach out. And look - the fact that clients will defend iSpot actually says something positive. You don't pick up the phone for a vendor you don't believe in.

iSpot has a story worth telling. A product that works. Clients who believe in it. A new President with a real track record. What could be framed as a necessary restructuring. That's not a bad story. Nobody's telling it. And in the absence of the company's own voice, mine fills the vacuum.

Note: A third-party comms team has claimed iSpot, so expect more information coming out. Please.

Quick update on the company I called "the smartest player in measurement" in the original series.

EDO is still doing the thing that works: measuring outcomes, partnering with everyone, threatening nobody's core business. Disney, Netflix, Amazon, Nielsen, NBCU - all working with them simultaneously. The partner-with-everyone model remains intact and growing.

They've got an $18.3 million problem though. In January, a federal jury in California found EDO liable for breach of contract with iSpot. EDO is appealing. Jury sided with EDO on half the claims. $18.3 million is less than 40% of what iSpot wanted. Business hasn't missed a beat.

The irony of a company approaching breakeven at a fraction of iSpot's cost - without mass layoffs - while iSpot simultaneously cuts 25% of staff and sues EDO for $47 million is... well, it's this industry in one sentence, isn't it?

Full lawsuit details, what the court filings actually reveal, and why both companies' statements about each other are probably correct simultaneously - Part 4.

Here's the thing about the original series that surprised me most: how little pushback I got on the Nielsen section. Network executives, agency leaders, even people who defend Nielsen privately - almost nobody disputed the infrastructure moat thesis. The consensus was resigned agreement. Yeah, we know. What are we supposed to do about it?

So here are three updates that, taken together, paint a picture of a company simultaneously losing on every front and winning anyway. Which is kind of the whole point.

BD+P accreditation is in trouble, but not sure anyone will care. Five sources with direct knowledge of the MRC process, including individuals connected to the MRC itself. This isn't a maybe. It's a when.

MRC audit committee members were asked to vote on stripping accreditation or giving Nielsen 60 more days. The issues: processing delays, HDAM problems, sample representation, Hispanic measurement accuracy. The VAB's December 2025 report documented 45-58% of total hours with over 20% audience variance between BD+P and panel-only for key buying demos. NFL hours with substantial double-digit variances. An MRC spokesperson called this "a routine procedure." Routine. For a product accredited eight months earlier.

Our prediction: Nielsen loses BD+P accreditation. Nobody cares.

Here's what almost nobody is saying: the 2021 accreditation loss was never what opened the door to alternatives. That's the popular narrative and it's wrong. The real inflection was Nielsen One - BD+P itself. Once Nielsen changed its own methodology, sticking with Nielsen no longer let you dodge switching costs. Nielsen made itself an alternative currency. It eliminated its own barrier to entry. The MRC pulled the badge in 2021 and the market yawned. It'll yawn again.

The VAB's critique is substantive. Nielsen called it "seriously flawed and manipulated," citing time-zone normalization issues and Live-Only vs Live+SD methodology. We reported those rebuttals. The VAB says they don't hold up. The MRC appears to agree. Though I'll note: the VAB describes BD+P as "volatile," but they're measuring variance relative to other providers, not change over time.

That's variation, not volatility.

Fair point. Wrong word. If you're picking a statistical fight with Nielsen, get your terminology right.

Twenty-six executives confronted Nielsen last June. Most renewed. Why nobody switches anyway, and the pricing trap that makes leaving cost almost as much as staying - Part 2.

The communications lockdown. Peter Naylor - Chief Client Officer - went on Beet.TV at IAB ALM for what amounted to an introduction. No real questions. No follow-ups. "Marketing intelligence." "One-stop shop." "Promptify everything." Whatever "promptify" means.

I'm sure it tested well in a focus group somewhere.

This isn't incompetence. It's probably good strategy. Open methodology debate drags them into the VAB's narrative. Re-litigating MRC issues reminds everyone about 2021. Unscripted Q&A risks surfacing contract practices now being actively litigated. So: managed formats, scripted points, never get specific. Freeze the frame. Over-index on authority symbols. Under-supply detail.

Smart. Infuriating. Smart.

Nielsen's marcom and PR team is great. Wonderful to work with. That is not the issue. The issue is the industry needs to hear from Nielsen's actual leaders about BD+P, the MRC review, the VAB concerns. Not through me. Not through Beet.TV. From them. Directly. On the record. As amazing as I am - and I am quite amazing - I shouldn't be the one explaining Nielsen's methodology because their executives won't sit for a real interview.

At least eleven patent lawsuits since 2021. Zero wins. Jury cleared HyphaMetrics, calling the claims "baseless and predatory." VideoAmp suit dismissed March 31 - judge found patents "directed to unpatentable subject matter." Nielsen filed a new suit two days later. Monday dismissal, Wednesday complaint. That's not IP protection. That's the legal department running a subscription service.

TVision fired back with antitrust counterclaims in November 2025. Court denied Nielsen's motion to freeze discovery. It's moving forward. At least eleven suits, zero wins, and now a counterclaim that could force open the contract terms everyone in the industry whispers about but nobody has seen.

What TVision is actually alleging, what discovery could expose, and why this matters more than any accreditation decision - Part 4.

We described Comscore as "probably the most underrated company in measurement." We said boring was a superpower.

Jackelyn Keller is gone.

I know Keller. Outgoing. Gregarious. The kind of person who lights up a conference floor and makes you actually want to hear about cross-platform measurement methodology over a cocktail. Exactly the person you want promoting your product. No longer with the company. CMO position not refilled.

Comscore is still MRC accredited nationally and locally in all 210 DMAs. Still JIC certified across every evaluated national currency category. Still the cleanest business model in measurement with zero ad conflicts. Still the "boring unicorn."

The problem is nobody can hear them. Steve Bagdasarian stepped into the external role, though let's not pretend this is new territory — as Chief Commercial Officer, public engagement has consistently been part of his remit. He's substantive. Credible. Can do methodology in his sleep. But he's not a storyteller. He's not the guy who makes an agency head stop scrolling LinkedIn and think, huh, maybe I should take that Comscore meeting.

And that's the real problem. Having someone capable in the role isn't the same as having someone magnetic in the role. Comscore doesn't need another executive who can walk a client through cross-platform deduplification without breaking a sweat. They need a celebrity. A face. Someone the industry actually wants to listen to — not someone they tolerate at conference panels while checking dinner reservations.

The irony is brutal. Comscore has never had a stronger product story and has never been worse at telling it. Nielsen has never had more questions to answer and has never been better at not answering them. One company can't find a voice. The other figured out silence is a strategy. If Comscore and Nielsen could somehow merge their communications teams, they'd have the most effectively mediocre PR operation in media. Which is saying something in an industry where the bar for PR is already underground.

Comscore's strategic positioning, their AI play, whether they can deliver on the national currency promise — none of it lands if there's nobody in the room who can make people give a damn. Part 2.

It's not methodology. We covered that. Panels, big data, clean rooms - important, not the real story.

It's not leadership drama. CEO carousels make good copy. They don't explain market structure.

The real story is who controls the data supply chain and what it costs. TV manufacturers now make more from your viewing data than from selling you the television. Currency-grade data costs roughly 5x outcomes data. That single economic fact explains why outcomes companies survive and currency challengers bleed.

Samba TV figured this out first. Sold the media business. Embedded in the chipset layer with MediaTek. On-device AI. Privacy by design. The architecture that might survive the regulatory reckoning that's coming for everyone else's data pipes.

The privacy litigation. Texas AG sued five TV manufacturers in December. Samsung class action in January. Samba class action ongoing. The same ACR pipes every measurement company depends on are under legal assault. If courts mandate opt-in consent, the entire industry's data supply gets disrupted.

That's Part 2. For paid subscribers. It's the piece that explains why companies actually live and die in this market. And it has nothing to do with who has the better algorithm.

97% of linear TV impressions in one measured quarter went to 55% of viewers. The other 45% - the incremental reach that drives outcomes - systematically starved.

One case study: 2% of ad exposure causally linked to purchases. 98% waste. Same budget, optimized distribution: causal lift from $84 million to $206 million.

Wanamaker was an optimist. It's not half your advertising. It's 98%. And the half you think is working is mostly serving ads to people who were going to buy anyway.

The full case study, what "causal" means here, and why this should keep every CMO awake - Part 3.