May 21, 2025 | SIGN UP

Michael Bürgi
SENIOR EDITOR, MEDIA BUYING AND PLANNING

After thinking about last week's upfronts -- and getting an off-the-record observation from a media agency executive reacting to a LinkedIn post I wrote following NBCU's upfront presentation -- one thing is clear to me after the fact, even though it stared me (and everyone else attending) in the face: The comedic finales from the likes of Jimmy Kimmel (at Disney) and Seth Meyers (at NBCU) are the only truthful moments in these presentations. And they're not pretty truths.

Take Kimmel's comment pointing out that every year the networks keep providing less, but asking brands to pay more -- and they all do it [through their agencies]. Said this executive in response: "It’s funny, and quite sad at the same time. Everyone says they want better and more value, the effort is there as shown by the showy elements that woo and distract the masses from the work some of us put in to actually extract that value. A lot of clients don’t know how to interpret what we’re doing/showing because so much of the narrative is ingrained from years [of] that showy marketing."

That's a rather damning indictment of the complicity of this industry -- buy- and sell-side alike -- to be all in on the game, with few questioning it.