Tor Sundsbarm

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@zerohedge Where else would you find a $8.5M Mansion?

[Max Anderson @MaxAnderson]

As someone who has personally spent $500k / mo+ on Google Ads for years, I can tell you with certainty:

This revenue growth in Search is artificial & extremely unhealthy for Google’s business long term

Search volumes are declining as legacy search is being increasingly cannibalized by non-monetized LLM queries

Google’s response?

Manufacture revenue growth via short-sighted, highly extractive, customer-hostile tactics. I.e. charge advertisers more for lower quality clicks, including clicks they do not want and explicitly did not approve Google to charge them for

A few examples to illustrate:

For all of its history until recently, Google operated on a 2nd price auction model

I.e. if you bid $5 CPC and the next highest bidder bids $1 CPC, Google charged you $1.01 for the click (one penny more than the 2nd highest bidder) rather than the $5 you bid

This was a genius move by Google early on as it incentivizes advertisers to input their true maximum willingness to pay rather than trying to play the game of bidding low and constantly adjusting to try to stay just ahead of the next highest bidder while still not paying too much

However recently, Google silently deprecated the 2nd price auction and began charging advertisers as much as their bid and budget caps allow, regardless of what anyone else is bidding

It’s a short-sighted cash grab at the expense of the long term health of the advertiser ecosystem

Making thing worse, Google also recently nerfed keyword targeting precision

Google previously had precise keyword targeting settings that allowed advertisers pick individual search phrases to bid on, defined down to the character w/ exact match or phrase match targeting

This was one of the core features that made search advertising magic, enabling advertisers to run extremely precise campaigns based on exactly what their target customer typed

But now, even if you bid on a specific term or phrase using the strictest exact
-match targeting settings, Google will show your ad across 1000’s of unrelated keywords, labeling them as as “exact match (close variant)”

The definition of “close variant” means whatever they want it to and changes constantly. The result is advertisers get billed for clicks that are totally irrelevant to their business and that their targeting settings explicitly forbid Google from targeting. Google does it anyway and there’s no ability to turn this off

So now exact match is broad match, and broad match is just meaningless spam

This is all very bad for advertisers, but for Google, it allows them to show your ad and bill you for clicks across 1000x more searches that were previously going unmonetized (mainly because they’re garbage queries no one wants)

This is how you grow revenue atop declining search volumes

Lastly, and perhaps most egregiously, Google quietly stopped respecting budget caps by a factor of 2x. For example campaigns we’ve been running for years with $1000 daily budget caps suddenly began spending $2000+ per day

And the extra spend is entirely on the garbage keywords Google arbitrarily throws in as “exact match (close variants)” which have no value to our business, but can’t be turned off

Google offers no refunds nor any recourse for overspend or spend on keywords you explicitly did not target

These are not the actions of a healthy business. These are the actions of company whose core business is in decline but desperately needs to pump quarterly earnings so Wall Street will continue to fund insane capex while hopefully looking through their rapidly deteriorating negative free cash flow

Google operated a benevolent monopoly for the better part of 25 yrs

Meaning the value Google captured from Search was but a small fraction of the value it created, and that spread produced a potential energy that justified expectations of high earnings growth far, far into the future

This is now no longer the case

At the alter of AI capex, Google is sacrificing the golden goose

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@henrywinter Best World Cup in history of football. English pundits and media is the worst . Fire 50% of them tomorrow! Just bitch and complain and think England should have won the World Cup.

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@hicasamadim 9

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@ferarri001 9
8+1+0

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@GunnerPuls Milan Baroš & Jan Koller

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@markgoldbridge England always find a way to fuck it up!

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@LizAnnSonders Make it Elisabeth Anne Sodefjeld and you are the real deal 🇳🇴

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@FabrizioRomano At least 6 players from Croatia played on a much higher level than Ronaldo. What a joke!

[Ryan Detrick, CMT @RyanDetrick]

The middle class is shrinking they keep saying.

True, but it is because they are going to the upper middle class. That part conveniently gets left out.

Also, poor and lower middle class are much lower than 45 years ago.

Nice one from @awealthofcs on things getting better.

[Daily Loud @DailyLoud]

Fan sneaked tequila into the stadium in a flask disguised as a cell phone

[HOW THINGS WORK @HowThingsWork_]

In Romania, To encourage exercise & wellness riders can travel for free on local bus by doing 20 squats. A device counts the squats and then issues a free ticket.

What do you think of this idea? Are you Squatting? 😂

[Dr. Rhonda Patrick @foundmyfitness]

Drink your coffee black (no additives) if you want the full health benefits.

2-3 cups per day has been associated with a 25% reduction in all-cause mortality. That benefit goes away when cream and/or sugar are added.

I think this happens for a few reasons:

• Dairy proteins can bind to coffee’s antioxidants and polyphenols and slow their absorption.

• Heavy cream, butter, and MCT-heavy coffee don’t necessarily block coffee polyphenols, but they can add substantial saturated fat and calories. For someone watching ApoB or LDL-C, this can work against the very cardiovascular benefits they’re hoping to get from coffee.

[Hedgeye @Hedgeye]

Software-development job postings cratered nearly 60% year-over-year in 2023.

They've now clawed all the way back into positive territory.

Computer science is still one of the fastest-growing degrees on campus, and these grads may be in better shape than the market assumed when ChatGPT first rolled out.

[Techmeme @Techmeme]

Analysis: Palo Alto Networks shareholders have voted to reject pay packages for top executives seven times since 2015, more than any other S&P 500 company (@ajmartinny / Bloomberg)

(Visit Techmeme dot com for the link and full context!)

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@Jason June 1st

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@chamath Seems more logical to raise capital gains taxes on high net gains in the $100M+ range and above.

[Breaking Aviation News & Videos @aviationbrk]

🚨 WATCH: A paraglider gets hit by a Cessna 172 near the Austrian town of Zell am See.

The paraglider was able to pull her rescue parachute and land safely shortly after the incident on Saturday.

According to police, the 44-year-old Austrian had started from Schmittenhöhe in the direction of Piesendorf. Above the Pinzgauer Hütte, she collided at 1:15 p.m. with the Cessna piloted by a 28-year-old.

The pilot of the Cessna, which flew from the Glemm Valley in the direction of Zell am See, was able to land the aircraft safely at Zell am See Airport.

Video: sab_thi

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@Jason Do you ever try FSD in Tahoe during difficult conditions such as snow slush and salt all over the place?
I leave my Y home and take my Q5 AWD

[Tor Sundsbarm @SundsbarmTor]

@BG2Pod Yes, especially now after $NVDA earnings call