So wh- where, where do you guys feel we're at in terms of the, the hype cycle here?

I, I'm pretty excited, right? I've really seeing AI starting to be used in interesting and engaging ways, and it feels to me like we're sort of at the end of the beginning, right? So the first era of AI, for me, was really being defined by, and I'll say the first three years of this AI journey we've been on, kind of fear, am I losing my job, uncertainty, what is my job, and sort of economic squeezing.

I just have to deliver more for less for my CFO.

And the whole mindset has been what is AI gonna do to me? And what I'm seeing now, what I'm seeing in speaking with CMOs and with good marketers around the world, is this sort of mindset shift from that what is AI gonna do to me to more what can I do with AI.

And great creative teams are putting out work and inventing new ways of doing things, which I find really compelling and exciting.

Now, that is a super positive spin on it, and of course I'm gonna put a positive spin on it.

But genuinely think that for all the challenges, all the concerns, all the fears, all the worries about AI, which are real, are still there, the potential for doing interesting things is really, really exciting, and I'm seeing that starting to manifest for real here on the beaches of Cannes.

... lot of businesses.

(laughs) Like, how do you feel and how do y- and how do you kind of stay motivated a- arou- I mean, is it disorienting? Does it stress you out? Is it exciting? Like how do you just engage with this just constant change?

At times, it's overwhelming, right? I think it's overwhelming for, for, for everyone.

The pace of technology has just...

the, the cycles of adoption of new technology just got faster and faster and faster.

The thing which keeps me going is I just find this stuff fascinating and going back to humans interact with things the way they want to.

And when you start looking at that and understanding it, it's just really, really endlessly interesting in what people are creating and doing.

And you look at the explosion of media from YouTube through to all these other platforms now, you know, TikTok and beyond and it's like, people are doing amazing things in whatever niche or whatever interest they have and it's like, "Why are they doing that? How do they do that?" And, and AI is the latest wave of transformation.

And what in, what in, in your role buying media for Google and, and, you know, broadly in the giant Google marketing apparatus, what is changing? Like what are the places that you're seeing the most change, heat, interest?

I know the feeling.

So, the attention recession, indeed one of my colleagues at Google spoke about this recently, is a very real thing.

And one of the challenges we face in marketing is we can all lament the way the world is going, but we have to market within the way the world is.... and people are spending more time scrolling, streaming, shopping, and searching on multiple devices concurrently.

One of the things I've seen and assume is that if someone's using just one device, they actually might be mindful to my marketing message.

Otherwise, they're really distracted, and it's rare that they are just using that one device.

So, how do you actually think about strategy in the attention recession?

Well, this is a genuinely longer conversation, but three quick things.

First of all, you have to be relevant.

I'm not sure I know the difference.

As a marketer, I really like creators.

So, the strength of YouTube has been these incredible creators who follow a topic and, and create content about that topic, whether it's Gotham Chess, around chess, or Mark Rober around sort of science experiments.

But people engage with those creators because of the content they're producing.

The contrast is with influencers, who, at its worst, travel the world with a selfie stick, making themselves the center of attention.

But it's kind of a hollow, vacuous, and empty relationship.

As a marketer, I want creators on my side, and Ben, you are absolutely a creator.

So, how do you guys work with creators?

I'm not sure I know the difference.

As a marketer, I really like creators.

So the strength of YouTube has been these incredible creators who follow a topic and, and create content about that topic, whether it's Gotham Chess, around chess, or Mark Rober around sort of science experiments.

But people engage with those creators because of the content they're producing.

The contrast is with influencers who, at its worst, travel the world with a selfie stick making themselves the center of attention.

But it's kind of a hollow, vacuous, and empty relationship.

As a marketer, I want creators on my side, and Ben, you are absolutely a creator.

So how do you guys work with creators?