You know you're dealing with a new ad paradigm when entire industry panels are devoted to defining it. That's clearly the case at OMMA Native, where panels are struggling to box in (and un-box) all that is (and could potentially be) native advertising. Simply put, native is "in-stream," "integrated," and appears to be content, explained Serge Del Grosso, Media Director, North America, SapientNitro. By that definition, "Google invented native years ago with paid search," David Levy, co-founder of SocialVibe, half-joked. But, native, as Levy's peers see it, is so much newer and more exciting than that! It's about rethinking "content …

Why does Buzzfeed -- which is in the business of reaching the broadest audience possible -- bother with posts about being from Michigan, or being left-handed? Because "targeting people" works, and "the content really does find the audience," according to Eric Harris, EVP Business Operations at Buzzfeed. That's why the site does a ton of what Harris calls "identity posts," Harris told attendees of OMMA Native on Tuesday morning.

Buzzfeed has generated a lot of its own buzz for an approach that blurs the lines between content and advertising, and combines pop culture listicles with longform journalism. Speaking at OMMA Native on Tuesday, Eric Harris, EVP, business operations, at Buzzfeed, discussed how EQ (emotional quotient) is more important to what it does than IQ—think everything from amusing cat photos to inspirational human stories. He also highlighted Buzzfeed’s use of “identity posts” aimed at sub segments of the population. In that vein, he showed an image of a lecture hall filled with right-handed desks that was aimed at left-handed readers. …

That is the seemingly counter intuitive metaphor BuzzFeed's Eric Harris used to explain the shift in content consumption that has occurred with the emergence of buzzy fews eeds like, you know, BuzzFeed, Facebook, whatever. Specifically, Harris told OMMA Native attendees that contemporary news consumption is more like "a Paris cafe" than, say, The New York Times.

"Native" advertising (note the quotation marks) defies -- or at the very least, lacks -- definition, and that's not necessarily a bad thing, according to OMMA Native programming chief Steve Smith. During his warm-up act for this morning's show in New York City, Smith tallied the number of variants on the native theme that he's been pitched to write about in the past year that all fall under the pitchers' banner of "native" -- everything from "integration," "custom builds," "leveraging social channels," and even "app load ads."

Speaking at OMMA Premium, Michael O'Connor, vp of operations, yield & analytic for AOL On, says versus traditional TV structure, digital advertisers/brands are ahead of the curve -- there is more marketing-related programming video. For example, O’Connor says brands in the digital space produce their own content. What does that mean? “They are ready to play.” The supply of premium digital video content is still small -- but desirable. What can be done to recitfy that? Ujjal Kohli, chief executive officer of Rhythm NewMedia, says if more video is created for mobile, specifically tablets -- …

Why is video the premium display brands wanted all along? Well, "If I could figure out a way to get people to stare at my banner ad for two minutes, I would win the Nobel Prize in advertising," joked Tony Mennuto, co-founder and CCO at creative agency MisterFace. Sitting on a Monday afternoon panel at OMMA Premium, Mennuto was basically suggesting that such a feat is achieved fairly often by online video advertising. Then, why is anyone still spending money on banner advertising? For one, it's a lot more expensive, Mennuto pointed out. Why are the prices still so high? …

We're back on the topic of attribution at OMMA Premium's programmatic panel, on Monday afternoon. "We're in trouble until we fix the attribution problem," Paul Rostkowski, President of Varick Media Management, said. "All this 'last ad view' stuff is just ridiculous," he said. Needless to say, "fixing" attribution -- the marketing model that attempts to attribute sales to multiple touch-points rather than the last ad consumers click or view -- is easier said than done. The problem often comes down to complexity. Addressing OMMA conference attendees, this summer, Chris Knoch, VP of Strategic Solutions at IgnitionOne -- which happens to …

Sorry IAB (or anyone trying to standardize display advertising), but creatives are still convinced that good ads don't fit into regulated ad units -- or at least those sitting on a Monday afternoon panel at OMMA Premium. No, good ads, "don't necessarily fit into one of the IAB shapes," said Douglas Rozen, Chief Innovation Officer at Meredith Xcelerated Marketing. "The [ads] that work the best in storytelling are not those." Rather, "We want to punch through the page!" Unfortunately, as Rozen admits, "It's really hard to [make those efforts mesh with] ad buying systems." For his part, Corey Gehrt, Strategy …