There is a perceived power struggle between tech providers, trading desks, agencies, and brands themselves. The extent of this intra-industry battle for a piece of the pie depends on who you ask, but it's clear that agencies are at least thinking about it. However, it's not just RTB and programmatic buying that are changing the way agencies operate. The underlying theme of being faster -- which is the promise of ad tech -- is what's weighing on the minds of agencies.

I never imagined I'd cover an industry keynote touching on the subjects of, among other things, 3D printing, drones, Big Data, and neuroplasticity -- but that's pretty much what the far-ranging and free-wheeling presentation of UPS Director of Social, Mobile and Digital Communications Rob Russell touched on during his keynote at OMMA Atlanta Thursday morning. Best of all was the way Russell framed the theme of the presentation: "Marketing in the Age of Now" -- which, when you think about it, is a much better concept than "real-time" marketing. In fact, Russell dumped on industry buzz terms like "RTM," "Big …

G2 Crowd, an enterprise software review site, has released a ranking of 15 marketing automation systems based on over 800 user reviews. To be clear, this list is different than the VentureBeat report from one month ago that ranked the best marketing automation vendors for small and mid-sized businesses. However, like the VentureBeat report, Hubspot tops G2's list as well, scoring an impressive 95 out of 100 in customer satisfaction.

Over the past two weeks, three ad technology companies -- AdRoll, AppNexus, and RadiumOne -- have opened offices in Australia. The region has been of growing interest in recent months, but three companies making a serious investment within two weeks of each other caught my attention. So I spoke with Adam Berke, president, AdRoll; Dave Osborn, VP of sales, Asia-Pacific, AppNexus; and Eric Bader, CMO, RadiumOne, to find out why.

CBS took some shots via the Twitterverse over the weekend during its broadcast of the Kansas vs. Stanford NCAA Basketball game for repeatedly cutting to a shot of a distraught young Kansas fan watching his team lose. Many on Twitter had something to say about the shots, eventually turning #cryingkansaskid into a trend. Could the network have reacted to the live Twitter feed and altered their live broadcast?

For those hoping "real-time marketing" would dwindle in 2014, your optimism appears to have been all for naught. Currently, 76% of marketers are using real-time marketing, and 88% consider it important to their 2014 plans. The 76% figure might even seen low, especially when considering that 85% are using programmatic technologies to buy ads.

The real-time nature of today's consumers has lent itself to programmatic ad technologies. But that same nature has threatened traditional TV advertising, which is still the 800-pound gorilla in the room. And while TV may not be in "adapt or die" mode, some companies are looking to make multitasking consumers more suitable for the big screen.

RadiumOne, a demand-side platform (DSP), has found that people ages 45-54 are two and a half times more likely to click on shared auto content than any other type. That age group ranges from late Baby Boomers to early Gen Xers.

Much of the digital world of advertising has been automated, even if advertisers are only putting a small portion of budget toward it and publishers a minimal amount of inventory. (Well, that depends on whose data you read; some will tell you advertisers are spending big and publishers are holding nothing back.) Either way, automating online media-buying is in, but some are focused on bringing it out -- meaning outside.

We can't offer you $1 billion, but we can offer you something better. Actually, wait. Maybe not better. But you could still win free entry to an OMMA RTB event of your choice (New York, London, or Los Angeles) by playing along.