Inside the debate over agentic advertising and standards

Ads Context Protocol, or “AdCP,” launched a little more than 100 days ago to much fanfare, great excitement, and high praise, while also prompting notable approbrium. Digiday attempted to gauge market engagement after the dust had settled, and backers have started to put in the hard yards. 

First, it’s worth a recap of what exactly AdCP is — for some, it’s an open-source bridge between today’s programmatic infrastructure and the dawn of the agentic era — or, as Digiday’s Tim Peterson phrased it, “openRTB for the agentic AI era” (see video below).

As mentioned, while proponents frame these protocols as open and democratizing, critics warn they could simply shift — rather than dismantle — existing power dynamics among platforms, intermediaries, and publishers.

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