Ad Agency CEOs Express Fear of Internet

Adweek is celebrating its 30th anniversary with a series of online video interviews with the great and good of the agency world. As you might expect, the interrogations are fairly reverential and the various CEOs who sat for the piece don't break a lot of news. But here and there some noises of anxiety have leaked through -- mostly, these guys are afraid of the future and the internet, and you can hear them pining for the old days. Here's a selection of highlights:

WPP boss Martin Sorrell: Says his biggest influences were his dad and the late ad lawyer Phil Riese -- neither were admen, curiously.

Goodby, Silverstein & Partners' Jeff Goodby: "The best thing about the advertising industry is that it should be very afraid that it could disappear in its current form. And that's a good thing. I think it's forcing everybody to ask themselves, what am I doing? Am I really lending any value to anything? Am I doing anything anybody cares about? Am I doing anything relevant? Could I wake up tomorrow and be totally irrelevant? ... I don't think we've come up with an assured direction forward like we used to have.

TBWA/Chiat/Day's Lee Clow: "Right now the internet is just a very annoying place in terms of people trying to advertise ... the ones who are doing dopey, flat-footed banners are probably wasting their money, but then again the ones who did dopey, flat-footed TV spots were probably wasting their money."

Bob Greenberg of R/GA: Get this man a haircut.

Group M's Irwin Gotlieb: "Frankly in the case of some product categories the consumer really has very little inclination to have a dialog."

Group M's Joe Uva: "We tend to get deals done that would have been very different to do in an electronically traded market."

Bob Jeffrey, CEO of JWT: Tells a funny story about dealing with bonkers client Donald Trump, who once sent Chiat/Day a rage-filled letter when Chiat was Trump's agency for casinos. "Jay took his own stationery and wrote back, Dear Donald, I hate to tell you but I think an insane person has gotten a hold of your stationery and you need to get involved in this as soon as possible, sincerely, Jay Chiat."

Jerry Della Femina: Tells a story of how he told a set of lies to the business press in order to give everyone the false impression that his shop was involved in pitches it had nothing to do with. "People will love you for it!"