AdDeck began with a simple idea: build a site that explains advertising formats clearly, and actually runs ads itself — learning the craft by doing it in the open.
This is the blog that goes alongside it. The plan is to post a few times a week, mixing three things:
- Industry news — what's moving in advertising and media, in plain English and without the hype.
- Explainers — the how and why behind formats, metrics, and the wider ad ecosystem, written the way I wish someone had explained them to me.
- Notes from running the site — the practical lessons, dead-ends, and small wins from building AdDeck and putting real ads on it.
It covers both sides of the fence: digital formats with their interactive examples, and the print formats that shaped a lot of how advertising still works today.
A quick word on why I bother writing it down. Explaining something forces you to understand it properly — you spot the gaps the moment you try to put it into words. And the messy process of learning tends to be more useful to read than the tidy final answer. If any of it helps someone finding their way through the same territory, even better.
More soon.