Who

Randall Rothenberg is the former advertising columnist for the New York Times, an author, and the CEO of the Internet Advertising Bureau.

Backstory

Rothenberg grew up in the ad business—both his parents were advertising researchers—and he spent much of the 1980s covering the trade as the Times's advertising columnist. In 1997, he was named the interim editor of Esquire following the resignation of Ed Kosner. When he was passed over for the permanent role in favor of David Granger, Rothenberg signed on as a contributing editor at Wired and as a consulting editor at Bloomberg Business News. He later joined the consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton, where he oversaw the quarterly strategy+business. In 2006, he took his current position as CEO of the Internet Advertising Bureau, or IAB, the trade group that publishes market research, cheerleads online advertising, and generally strives to boost revenues for its 300-plus members such as Google, the New York Times Company, CBS, MTV and Conde Nast. As part of his job, Rothenberg also organizes a handful of trade conferences that attract the industry's biggest players.

In print

In 1995, Rothenberg published Where The Suckers Moon: An Advertising Story, which follows an account review held by Subaru and the resultant, ill-fated ad campaign. Although it's now more than a decade old, it remains one of the best chronicles of the modern-day ad biz.

Personal

Rothenberg (or "R2" as he calls himself) has been married to Susan Roy since 1985. In addition to an East 61st Street apartment, they have a home on Shelter Island.

True story

It was Rothenberg who outed CBS PR guy Gil Schwartz as the man behind author Stanley Bing in 1996.