Tracey L. Freed

Freed describes her practice as the cross-section of entertainment and technology, where her focus is on transactions. One of her specialties is brokering deals for entertainment studios who want to license their content to digital platforms. She also works with digital studios, multi-platform networks, and the next generation of content creators.

She’s heavily involved in influencer marketing, as traditional commercial advertisements lose reach and brands are seeking new ways to grow that reach to audiences. Brands are now making deals with social media influencers who have large followings to get their advertising messages out through platforms such as Instagram or various lifestyle blogs.

“I think folks are definitely developing stuff for platforms that are social networks, like Facebook and Snap,” Freed said. Even social media outlets are shifting, she said, as Facebook develops premium content and more brands grow their presence on YouTube channels.

A lot of Freed’s work surrounds creating deals in “behavioral advertising” and big data. Her clients are licensing the data or types of software to better serve advertisers, she said, because markets can be broken into specific segments from coffee drinkers to luxury travelers. “Monetizing audiences is huge, and that intersects with privacy and regulatory issues,” she said.

Freed also works as an adjunct professor at Loyola Law School, where she teaches a class on digital media and another on artificial intelligence. In the AI class, she discusses questions such as, “Who owns intellectual property when the property was created by a machine?”

Freed said she’s long tried to explain to her parents what she does for a living, “and they would nod their heads and not really know what you’re saying,” she laughed. Then her parents saw a “60 Minutes” piece on a man who used Facebook and behavioral targeting as part of President Donald Trump’s campaign to target specific voters. “And my parents said, ‘This is interesting, did you see this guy?’” To which Freed replied, “I’ve been doing this since 2008 and now you understand it!”

— L.J. Williamson