Daily Archives: August 3, 2017

Alexi Lalas is always armed with a quip. During an interview Tuesday, he had one ready when he was asked about the significance of the game Wednesday between the MLS All-Stars and Spanish superpower Real Madrid.

This will dictate the success of this league for the next 20 years to come, Lalas said, somehow keeping a straight face. This result will be something that will be talked about and discussed and dissected for the next 20 years as to how relevant we are, not just as a soccer-playing nation but as a nation.

Of course, the question of significance always comes up when a club from MLS or a team of its All-Stars steps up in class to face foreign competition. And theres no better competition than Real Madrid, which was without superstar Cristiano Ronaldo but couldnt put the All-Stars away in a 1-1 tie after 90 minutes before winning the penalty shootout 4-2. Borja Mayoral scored in the 59th minute for Real Madrid, and MLS Dom Dwyer answered in the 87th to send the game to the shootout in front of a sell-out crowd of 61,428.

Real Madrid stars Gareth Bale, Karim Benzema and Marcelo didnt start but entered in the 61st minute.

It was a fun night, said Dwyer, who plays for Orlando City. Obviously, I was very excited to get a goal. Just a real pleasure to be here.

Real Madrid, short-handed or not, is one of the most powerful teams on the globe and not a hastily assembled side like the MLS team. Lalas pointed out how the comparisons always happen with these soccer spectacles, but the events really dont indicate much of anything one way or another about where MLS is competitively.

Everyones going to attach significance or non-significance to the result, said Lalas, an analyst for Fox who made 96 appearances for the U.S. national team. Its simply an opportunity to celebrate what weve accomplished and to show people where were going. And then when it comes to the opponent, youre playing one of the biggest teams in the world and an incredible brand, so its just a fun day out.

Whether or not the game signified much, MLS is making some progress on and off the field.

The league and Adidas announced a six-year extension of their apparel deal through 2024, an agreement worth a reported $700 million to MLS.

And on the field, MLS has shown some improvement and managed to recruit more well-known international stars. Commissioner Don Garber said one reason for that is foreign players can come to MLS and not worry about losing their national-team spots just because they play in the United States.

Its about having the right environments, Garber said.

The environment for this game included a downpour at kickoff and featured the obligatory soccer fanfest outside Soldier Field. The fans were treated to a flyover after the national anthem, the kind of glitzy show American sports do best.

Fire midfielder and MLS captain Bastian Schweinsteiger wasnt ready to make any declarations based on Wednesday.

Its not easy to compare, he said.

Follow me on Twitter @BrianSandalow.

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Even without Cristiano Ronaldo, Real Madrid a big deal

MLS All-Stars vs. Real Madrid: What you need to know

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Hard to judge MLS progress based on All-Star Game against Real Madrid - Chicago Sun-Times

Advertisershave long lamented Snapchats lack of third-party data to track return on ad spend.But now that Snapchat is adopting a marketing mix modeling program, which measures the value of all marketing inputs, media buyers are more willing to guide clients to open their purse strings.

On Tuesday, Snap announced The Snap MMM Partner Program, which gives marketers access to third-party measurement data from Neustar MarketShare, Analytics Partners, MMA and Nielsen. The new data will let marketers isolate and track specific Snapchat ad formats and their return on ad spend and sales lift. Those metrics are crucial to determine the success of past campaigns and compare ads across social media channels. This partnership will afford Snapchat advertisers even more flexibility and precision in measuring their campaigns, reads Snapchats blog.

David Song, managing director at Barker Advertising, said the new program convinces him that his clients, which include brands like SlimFast and Aston Martin, should try Snapchat, a platform he avoided recommending before. Snapchat was never seen as a serious platform for our clients. We focus a ton on ROI, and we couldnt justify a big enough spend before to advise our clients to buy the platform, he said. Now that [Snapchat] is willing and able to do MMM, its a much easier proposition to recommend them to clients.

It brings a level of instant credibility that Snapchat desperately needs, said Stephen Boidock, director of marketing and business development at Drumroll. It will definitely help marketers justify spendingsomemoney on the platform.

The move comes at a time when Snapchat shares continue to drop, and marketers shift their focus to platforms that have more robust analytics. Since Instagram replicated Snapchats Stories in August 2016, marketers have started to favor the former, partly due to Instagramsdedicated followings, but also because Snapchat couldnt prove sales.

Now more than ever, marketers are demanding a certain level of ROI and analytics, said JC Uva, managing director at MediaLink, and that hasnt been one of [Snapchats]key attributes. Before the announcement, Snapchat had 15 measurement partners such as Moat, DoubleClick, Oracle Data Cloud and Millward Brown that assessed viewability metrics, app impressions, reach and targeting, but not foot traffic or return on investment. Meanwhile, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest have had MMM programs. It also didnt help that Snapchat ads are known to be more expensive than those on other platforms such as Instagram. While a bidding auction determines the pricing of Snap Ads, Snap Lenses can cost upward of $300,000 for a day, and Snap Geofilter CPMs can range from 27 cents to $48.

The fact that Snap didnt have robust analytics and ROI on ad spend previouslymade it a tougher sell for some clients, said Lisa Evia, president of Havas Media Chicago.

Luggage brand Away, for instance, was on Snapchat but turned its priority to Instagram because it offered more transparency, engagement and analytics, said Away co-founder Jen Rubio. Now, it doesnt have a Snapchat presence at all.

However, Snapchats new MMM program has the potential to turn things around. If Snapchat can prove it has great ROI, said Rubio, its not off the table for us. Scott Linzer, who oversees paid social as vp at iCrossing, also sees potential. With Snap innovating and finding data partnerships to provide more platform insight, he said, there is reason to be optimistic.

Song said if the new data proves Snapchat has strong ROI, he will advise his clients to spend between $150,000 and $300,000 on ad formats, three times more than the amount he would suggest for trying any new channel for the first time.

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ROI-focused ad buyers see progress on Snapchat's measurement shortcomings - Digiday

Posted: 7:39 p.m. Wednesday, August 02, 2017

Straus dismissed the claim by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick that he refuses to meet with him, saying his door is open.

Brushing aside concerns that they are not moving swiftly enough to enact Gov. Greg Abbotts 20-point agenda, Texas House members opened the second half of the special session Wednesday with a flurry of activity Wednesday.

We made good progress, and were only half the way through, House Speaker Joe Straus told the American-Statesman.

Ive been spending my time, the first half of the 30-day session, trying to get the House in a place to consider the items that the governor has placed on the agenda, said Straus, a San Antonio Republican. We work more slowly than the Senate does because we listen to people and we try to get the details right. And so the House committees have been meeting and have shown some good progress, moving many of the items that are on the call.

Still, the House has given final passage to bills that address just four of Abbotts priorities, compared with18 for the Senate.

READ: Special legislative session: Why Joe Straus might have the upper hand

Straus addressed the running criticism of his leadership from Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who presides over the Senate and decries Straus as a moderate and potential obstacle to the conservative agenda he shares with the governor. Patrick insisted again this week that Straus refuses to meet with him to work out a seamless way to do the peoples business.

But I am going to say this one more time my door is open, the speaker has my phone number. He knows where I am most of the time, Patrick said Tuesday evening on a Facebook Live video stream with Michael Quinn Sullivan of Empower Texans and Jim Graham of Texas Right to Life, two relentless Straus critics.

I dont care about our differences. I dont care about anything thats been said in the past. I want to sit down and find a way to complete the governors agenda, which is my agenda and is the peoples agenda, Patrick said.

Straus dismissed the criticism.

Theres no resistance to meeting him, Straus said. My doors always open to anyone who wants to have a constructive conversation about issues facing the state of Texas, and Ive always expected that we would be having meetings at the appropriate time.

Bathroom bill

Straus has indicated he opposes a measure favored by Patrick that would pre-empt schools and local jurisdictions from making their own transgender friendly bathroom rules.

But, its sponsor, Rep. Ron Simmons, R-Carrollton, said he considered that bill an outlier the only one he knows of that Straus explicitly opposes, and so its not surprising to me that that has not moved expeditiously.

Simmons said there had been an effort to discourage members to sign on to his bill and so he only had about 50 members willing to do so, far fewer than in the regular session.

Of his other bill onschool choice for special needs students also part of Abbotts agenda Simmons said, Im not sure it will get voted out of committee. He said he holds out a faint hope that it might advance if there is some grand bargain on education.

The governor wants school finance and were going to do that; were going to pass our plan on Friday, said Rep. Dan Huberty, R-Houston, chairman of the Public Education Committee. I think its very clear that the House has not agreed on the voucher issue, but we have a solution to help special needs students.

READ: Senate clears most Abbott priorities, shifting attention to House

The House is doing what it should do, which is being deliberative, thoughtful and being sure that legislation that we would pass is sound policy that would benefit the citizens of the state of Texas, said Rep. Byron Cook, R-Corsicana, chairman of the State Affairs Committee. The House is not built for speed.

This is the House, said Rep. Craig Goldman, R-Fort Worth, who chairs the House Republican Caucus Policy Committee. We will use all 30 days. Theres plenty of time.

Goldman said it looks like the bill he is carrying for the governor to pre-empt local cellphone ordinances is unlikely to make it out of committee.

Nothing nefarious, he said; theres just too much opposition from local police and elected officials who hold great sway with House members.

Goldmans other bill the House version of the Senates already-passed mail-in ballot fraud bill was left pending Wednesday by the Elections Committee. TheSenate bill has been sent to the House. The committee did approve on a 5-2 vote House Bill 47, by Rep. Mike Schofield, R-Katy, which would make lying on an application for a mail-in ballot, applying without the voters knowledge and permission, and altering the application without the voters request punishable by up to two years in state jail.

Showboating

Both Abbott and Patrick had said property tax reform is their top priority.

The House Ways and Means Committee last week approved a bill that would require cities and counties to get voter approval for tax increases of 6 percent or more. While the Patrick-backed Senate version sets the rollback rate at 4 percent, the bill passed by the Houses tax-writing committee represents a significant departure from the regular session, when the same lawmakers opted to leave untouched the current rollback rate of 8 percent.

The House version, sponsored by Rep. Dennis Bonnen, R-Angleton, the chair of Ways and Means, must still be approved by the agenda-setting Calendars Committee before heading to the House floor.

On Wednesday, the House approved several other bills related to property taxes. HB 32 by Bonnen aims to increase transparency around the appraisal and rate-setting processes to encourage taxpayers to become more involved in the process.

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Amid all the other activity, Rep. Sarah Davis, R-West University Place, chairwoman of the House Committee on General Investigating and Ethics, and Rep. Lyle Larson, R-San Antonio, led anews conference Wednesday calling on the governor to expand the call for the special session to include ethics reform.

The governors office, concerned that the House hasnt been sufficiently single-minded in pursuit of his agenda, wasnt pleased.

Instead of working to advance items on the special session agenda that could reform property taxes, fix school finance, increase teacher pay and reduce regulations, Reps. Davis and Larson are showboating over proposals that are not on the governors call, Abbott press secretary John Wittman said in a statement. Their constituents deserve better.

But Rep. Cecil Bell, R-Magnolia, a staunch conservative, pronounced himself pleased as he left Wednesdays session that the House was getting on track.

Were in better shape today than we were yesterday, Bell said. We are hearing bills that are consistent with the call.

We talked about taxation today. We talked about appraisal districts and we voted on them and that is progress in the right direction, Bell said. We just need to keep doing that.

Staff writers Johnathan Silver and Sean Collins Walsh contributed to this report.

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At halfway mark, House Speaker Straus cites special session progress - MyStatesman.com

Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt on Wednesday praised significant improvements in the nation's air quality, even as he moves to roll back regulations aimed at making further gains.

An EPA report released Wednesday shows that in the 45 years since passage of the Clean Air Act, emissions of six harmful pollutants declined by a combined 73 percent even as U.S. economic output tripled.

The biggest gains were made cutting emissions of lead and sulfur dioxide, which declined 99 percent and 85 percent, respectively, between 1990 and 2016.

"Despite this success, there is more work to be done," Pruitt said in a statement. "Nearly 40 percent of Americans are still living in areas classified as 'non-attainment' for failing to achieve national standards. EPA will continue to work with states, tribes, and local air agencies to help more areas of the country come into compliance."

According to the report, the least progress has been made in reducing ground-level ozone, which is down by 22 percent since 1990.

Ground-level ozone is created when common pollutants emitted by cars, power plants, oil refineries, chemical plants and other sources react in the atmosphere to sunlight. It can cause serious breathing problems among sensitive groups of people, contributing to thousands of premature deaths each year.

Since his appointment by President Donald Trump earlier this year, Pruitt has moved to block or delay several Obama-era regulations aimed at reducing pollutants caused by burning fossil fuels.

Follow Associated Press environmental writer Michael Biesecker at http://www.Twitter.com/mbieseck

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EPA praises progress on cleaner air amid regulatory rollback - ABC News