Who Will Do Multi-Media Media?

[Posted by David Card]

follow me at davidcard

I was pretty skeptical about Google's efforts to sell radio ads, back in the day. Here is the Wall Street Journal's story of its trials and tribulations. Does anyone else find it problematic that the big players in online ads -- Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and what's left of AOL -- are each pure-plays, with no traditional media business? (I'm not giving credit to Time Warner for synergy any more.) If all media is multi-media, and someone has to deliver cross-media audiences for integrated marketing, where does this leave them? Betting on mobile?