Brand safety up, virtual reality down. To Ben Winkler, these are the two biggest changes year-over-year in the magnitude of discourse at the Digital Content NewFronts.<\/p>\n
\u201cI haven\u2019t seen a single presentation that didn\u2019t begin, have a middle and end with brand safety,\u201d says the Chief Investment Officer at OMD<\/a>. \u201cI\u2019ve seen the biggest rise on the side of brand safety and the biggest decline on the side of virtual reality.\u201d<\/p>\n Last year, Winkler explains in this interview with Beet.TV, you could not walk out of NewFronts<\/a> presentations \u201cwithout Google Cardboard<\/a> strapped to your head looking at the latest virtual reality options.\u201d By contrast, this year some company presentations \u201caren\u2019t even checking the box, and that\u2019s a function of scale,\u201d he adds. \u201cOur clients need big scale to reach lots of people, and VR isn\u2019t quite there yet.\u201d<\/p>\n On the contrary, there\u2019s no escaping the subject of brand safety in the light of some marketers pulling their ads from digital platforms that haven\u2019t done enough to ensure their content is inoffensive. To Winkler\u2019s<\/a> way of thinking, there should not be a debate about the need for brand-safe environments.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s nothing more important than the context in which our clients\u2019 advertising appears. That\u2019s what brand safety is,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Publishers that create and own their content have a \u201cvery simple and elegant story\u201d about brand safety, he says. That\u2019s a far cry from platforms that are populated with lots of user-generated content.<\/p>\n \u201cThe challenge YouTube will have is trying to combine their massive scale with the technology and human element to make all of our clients feel comfortable about advertising in that marketplace.\u201d<\/p>\n He welcomes the audience-targeting consortium OpenAP formed by Fox, Turner and Viacom because it represents a radical departure from buying TV audiences based on broad age and gender demographics.<\/p>\n Being able to target specific audiences is \u201cextraordinarily important\u201d and it\u2019s going to make TV more effective both for the advertisers and for the broadcasters themselves,\u201d says Winkler.<\/p>\n We spoke with him at the Turner NewFronts presentation.<\/p>\n