Sorrell sees media industry 'panic' over Internet

[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Adam Pasick]
WPP Chief Executive Martin Sorrell, head of the world's second-largest advertising and marketing company and one of the media sector's best known prognosticators, told attendees at a Internet Advertising Bureau conference that declining circulation, viewership and revenue figures had big media companies running scared. Sorrell's dire warning that print and television are steadily losing ground to their new media rivals was tempered by the influential views of Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates, who said such distinctions would soon disappear. "The notion of Internet versus non-Internet advertising -- over the next decade that notion will be obsolete," he said at the conference. Gates said the future lies in all forms of content -- from movies to TV shows to news -- being distributed in a customized form online, sponsored in part by advertising that will zero in on specific demographics and interest groups. "We're taking it to a new level, for advertisers to target specific audiences," he said. Microsoft's new paid search system allows advertisers to indicate whom they want to reach based on criteria such as geographic location and gender, in addition to the keyword-based ads offered by companies like Google.
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