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quickspinner · 4 years

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MLHolidays2k19 22. Snowman

Part 1 (18. Elves) Part 2 (19. Naughty or Nice) Part 3 (eek how did this happen)

One more part planned, but it’ll probably job on New Year’s Eve, for reasons that should become obvious.

Part 5 is up now!

It was a surprise snowy day in Paris. A couple inches lay on the ground and the city was losing its collective mind. Luka, however, wasn’t inclined to cancel his plans today, so he bundled his little niece up, promised her mothers he would make sure she stayed warm, shouldered a backpack full of all the nonsense the girls made him carry when he went out with Angie, and took her to Place des Vogues as he’d planned.

They’d been at the park for about fifteen minutes when Luka heard his name called and turned to find Marinette waving at him, carefully stepping through the snow. Luka smiled and waved back.

She was still cute as hell, wrapped up in a big grey puffy jacket with a hood lined with white fleece, making her blue eyes look bright and huge in her sweet face. She wore a fluffy pink scarf and pink mittens, her cheeks and nose were pink with the wind, and he was absolutely not going to look at her lips to see if they matched.

He turned away to check on Angie, who was fascinated with the footprints she left in the snow and was paying no attention to him whatsoever. Luka had been texting with Marinette over the last couple of days, but this was the first time he’d seen her in person since their dinner together and he was nervous. Before he’d gotten her note, he’d played that night over and over again in his mind, swinging between anger at himself for being so stupid, frustration with her for shutting him out without talking to him, and depression at the whole situation. He still wasn’t sure why he’d acted the way he had, honestly. He was impulsive occasionally, but in ways that resulted in unique experiences and funny stories to tell later, not jumping women he’d just met. Normally, he would have noticed that she was uncomfortable much sooner.

All he had come up with in all his thinking was that maybe that night he just hadn’t felt like being careful. Maybe he’d been feeling a little bit reckless on his first real night out after being cooped up taking care of Jules and Rose and Angie. He’d been feeling down and lonely even before they fell sick and maybe deep down he’d felt like he’d earned a little hedonistic selfishness. Maybe it was just bad timing that he’d met Marinette in that mood.

Don’t fuck it up, Juleka’s voice said in his head, and Luka sighed and tried to summon a genuine smile to greet Marinette.

It was easier than he expected, once he faced her bright eyes and cheerful expression. “Hi,” he said. “Glad you could make it.” He turned to Angie. “Can you say hi to Miss Marinette?” Luka prompted.

“Hi Miss Ma-ee-nette,” Angie chirped without looking up from the trail of footprints she was meticulously laying out in the snow.

Luka took a deep breath. “Listen, I know I said this over text already, but I just wanted to tell you in person, I’m really sorry about last time. I overstepped and I made you uncomfortable and I really can’t even express how sorry I am. Thank you for being willing to come out with me again. I had a really great time with you, and I hate that it ended the way it did.”

“Oh,” Marinette said, chinks turning a little pinker. “Well, I—thank you for saying that. Really, it’s forgiven, and I’m sorry too, I know it must have been confusing, after I kissed you back—“

“No,” he interrupted. “I didn’t give you a chance to think, you reacted in the moment and you rolled with it and there’s nothing wrong with that. You’re allowed to change your mind and you don’t owe me any explanations.”

Marinette nodded slowly. “I’m still sorry for ditching you without saying anything. If I hadn’t just chickened out maybe—well. We both made mistakes, and as far as I’m concerned, we have a clean slate.” She held out her hand. “Okay?”

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” he said, but he took her hand. “Thank you.” He felt her squeeze lightly and then let go. “I’m glad you came,” he said, sticking his hands in his pockets and turning to watch Angie. “You’re a brave soul to venture out in all this.” He nodded to the grey sky.

“I used to come play here every time it snowed,” Marinette giggled. “I wouldn’t miss it. I’m grateful for the excuse.”

Luka opened his mouth to reply when Angie suddenly came running back to him.

“Unca Loo-ka,” Angie said, tugging at his pant leg. “Nowman!” she pointed to the older kids who were currently on their knees, building a small snowman. She hugged his knee. “Nowman!”

“Yes, they’re building a snowman,” Luka agreed. “Do you want to build a snowman?” he asked, winking at Marinette when she giggled. “You have no idea how many times she’s made me sing that song,” he whispered.

“Nowman!” Angie bounced. “Wanna build a nowman!”

“Okay,” Luka said, pulling gloves out of his pocket. “Let’s build a snowman.” He grinned at Marinette. “You in?”

Marinette giggled. “Sure.”

It turned out it was hard to stay tense when you were building a snowman—just a small one, since they only had a few inches of snow to work with. They were almost finished when Marinette excused herself and zipped out of the park.

He was starting to be afraid she’d ditched them when she reappeared with a satisfied smile on her face.

“Every snowman needs accessories!” she giggled, holding up a handful of buttons and a baby carrot.

“Where did you get all that?” Luka asked, amused (and relieved).

“My secret,” she said, wrinkling her nose at him (so cute). She knelt in the snow and held the buttons out to Angie. “What color do you want to make his eyes?”

“There’s boo! There’s boo buttons and there’s a geen button and a red button—“

“Yes, Miss Marinette brought you lots of colors. Which ones are you going to choose?” Luka interrupted gently.

Angie picked two different shades of blue, and Marinette helped her put them in the snowman’s face, along with the little baby carrot nose. The remaining rainbow of buttons went down his front. Then both girls looked to Luka for approval, beaming, and their combined cuteness left him unable to do much more than offer a thumbs up. He pulled his phone out and whistled sharply to get Angie’s attention.

“Oh, Jules is gonna love that,” he chuckled, turning it so Marinette could look.

“You should’ve warned me, I would have moved,” Marinette blushed.

“I didn’t want you to move,” he said simply. “Besides, by the time you did Angie would have lost interest and wandered off.” He gestured towards the little toddler, who was back to marching in the fresh snow so she could look at her footprints. “I’ll delete it if it really bothers you, but you both look really cute, and you’re adorable together.” Her eyes widened slightly and her face went red and Luka cringed. “Sorry. Too much?”

“What? No! I mean, it’s fine, I can—I can take a compliment really.” She was turning pinker by the minute.

Luka bit back laughter and couldn’t help teasing her just a little. “Are you sure?” She gasped in outrage and he added, “You have the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen.” She went from pink to red and he couldn’t keep the laugh back anymore.

The pout she gave him just made him laugh harder. Eventually she couldn’t help giggling too, shoving him playfully.

“You’re awful,” she told him.

“I’m honest,” he chuckled. “Really.” The last of their laughter died away and they were left staring at each other with dopey grins on their faces. He wanted to touch her, to lift his hand and brush away the snowflakes landing on her cheek, but he didn’t dare.

Luka cleared his throat and turned away. “Angie, can you say thank you to Miss Marinette?”

“Tank you, Miss Ma-ee-nette!”

“You’re so welcome, sweetie,” Marinette cooed. “Oh, Luka she’s just so cute.” Then she looked at him and blushed. “Um, are you guys getting hungry? I know a good place to get something to eat and the best hot chocolate in Paris!”

“How can I resist that?” Luka answered, hopefully not too quickly. “Lunchtime, Angie.”

“Lunch!” Angie cried, turning and running towards them. “Wanna have lunch!”

“Woah,” Luka said, catching her before she ran right past him. “Hang on, tiger, at least hold my hand.” He took Angie’s hand, even though it meant he had to walk stooped over a bit.

Marinette giggled. “Will she let me? I’m shorter.”

That would certainly save him some aches and pains. “Angie, can Miss Marinette hold your hand?”

Angie thought about it for a second and then reached up to take Marinette’s hand.

Marinette smiled broadly. “Well all right then. Follow me!”

They made their slow way through the still-falling snow out of the park and across the street to a white building whose scrolling gold window decorations declared it to be a bakery. Marinette opened the door for them and motioned them in. Luka kicked his boots on the doorstep to try and knock some of the snow off, and picked up Angie so she wouldn’t track anything, propping her on his hip. He barely had time to take in the very pink but otherwise elegant bakery interior before Marinette dodged around him, calling, “Hi Maman! I brought some friends!”

��Hello again, Marinette,” the smiling woman at the counter said, looking up. “These are your friends? Welcome to Tom and Sabine’s,” she said politely to Luka and Angie, and then her professional smile widened into something more genuine as she waved at Angie. “I’m Sabine.”

“Nice to meet you, I’m Luka and this is my niece Angelique,” he replied. “Can you say hi, Angie?”

“Hi Angie,” Angie repeated obediently, and Luka sighed as both women giggled.

“Angie, can you say hi?” he tried again, and got the desired response this time. He grinned at Marinette. “You’d think eventually I’d remember to say it the right way. So this is where you disappeared to?”

“Surprise,” Marinette giggled. “I grew up here, so I just popped over and let Maman and Papa know we’d be by.”

“Tom’s in the back at the ovens at the moment,” Sabine told him, “But you’re very welcome.”

Luka was trying to figure out how to respond to that when Angie startled him by leaning out of his arms, so that he had to move quick to keep her from falling as she reached a hand toward a brightly colored display case full of treats. “Num nums! Want num nums!”

“Oh, no,” Luka grunted, levering her back against him. “Not until after lunch, baby.”

“Num nums! Num nums, Miss Ma-nette!” Angie turned pleadingly towards the other adult present, abandoning him as hopeless instantly.

“Oh, you heard Uncle Luka,” Marinette wagged her finger. “Num nums after lunch.”

Angie paused to consider. “Lunch. Want lunch, Unca Loo-ka! Lunch!”

“She’s a smart one,” Marinette giggled, as Luka rolled his eyes. “Come on, I set up something upstairs earlier. Thanks for hosting us, Maman,” she added, pausing to kiss her mother on the cheek.

“We’re always happy to see you, dear,” Sabine smiled. “It was nice to meet you two. Bye bye!” she waved at Angie, who recognized this cue and chirped “Bye bye!” in return.

“I’d forgotten you told me your parents owned a bakery,” Luka commented as he followed Marinette upstairs. “I think I’ve been here before in fact.”

Marinette giggled. “Best pastries in Paris if you ask me.”

They all shed coats and boots, and soon Luka was sitting at the tall kitchen table with Angie in his lap, shredding savory pastries into bite size pieces for her as he chatted with Marinette.

They were falling into that same easy, natural conversation they’d had before. Before long, Angie fell asleep with a piece of pastry still in her hand, and Luka laid her gently on the couch and before returning to sit at the table again as Marinette moved around the kitchen preparing two mugs of hot chocolate. He tried not to watch the sway of her hips or the back of her neck between her pigtails or the flash of her wrists beneath the long sleeves of her sweater. He took a deep breath and looked at his hands until Marinette slid a mug over into them.

“Thank you,” he smiled. She smiled back and for a moment they just sat quietly, sipping their hot chocolate. “That is good,” he grinned, and she winked at him.

It was all incredibly comfortable and domestic. He wondered if this was how Juleka felt every morning and felt a stab of envy. Not that he regretted anything, but he was starting to think maybe…

“Luka?” Marinette leaned forward and looked up into his face. “Are you all right.”

“Yeah,” he chuckled. “I’m...really happy, actually. So, um...tell me about how you met Juleka.”

Her eyes brightened and her smile widened and her whole face became animated as she told the story, and if there was any part of him that wasn’t already taken with her, that moment was enough to finish him.

“I’m doing all the talking,” she sighed, resting her cheek on her hand, and Luka had never felt Shakespeare in his heart until just that moment.

“I don’t mind,” Luka told her, but then he sighed. “I should really get Angie home,” Luka said, getting down from the table. “Jules will start to wonder if we’re not back.” Marinette got up and helped him gather Angie’s things to put in his backpack. “Thanks for coming out with us, and inviting us into your family’s home,” he said as he put his coat on. “I—I really like spending time with you, Marinette. I’d really like to do something like this again. Maybe just you and me, next time.” He grinned. “I mean I love Angie, but—” He stopped himself just before he said something unfortunate about needing more adult entertainment.

“Um,” Marinette looked down, playing with one pigtail. “Actually, my friend Alya, the one I was volunteering with? She’s throwing a party tomorrow for New Year’s Eve, and, um—” she paused, and looked up at his face. “I was wondering if you’d like to go with me?”

“I’d love to,” he blurted, before his brain caught up with him. “Ah, wait, I have a gig.”

“Oh, of course you would,” Marinette laughed, turning pink. “I should have thought of that. Of course people would want a band on New Years Eve, it must be a big night for you...”

“Hang on, hang on,” Luka said, pulling his phone out of his pocket to check the details. “I know we’re not playing until midnight, they have a headliner they’re bringing in and we’re just the opener, so…I could maybe come after, if that’s okay? I mean I totally understand if that’s too late, you could probably get another date—”

“No, no, I wasn’t going to ask anybody else, I just thought—I mean, if you want to come after that would be fine? It’s at the Grand Paris Hotel. Alya’s mom works there so she was able to get Alya a room for the party.”

“Oh, that works,” Luka said in surprise. “I’m playing the big party down in the grand ballroom, so if you just let me know what room, I can come right after I’m done.” He smiled at her. “I’ll be done at maybe 10:30?”

“Perfect,” Marinette smiled. “I’ll be waiting.”

“Okay,” he said, with a slow grin. “I’ll be there.”

“Okay,” she repeated, and then she blushed and rose up on her toes to kiss his cheek. “I had a good time today. Be safe on the way home, okay?”

He was a grown man and should not be tongue-tied by such a little thing. “See you soon, Marinette,” he managed, and maybe if he hadn’t been an idiot once already, he might have asked to kiss her for real, to feel her cheek under his hand and her soft lips under his.

As it was, he just curled his fingers closed at his side and smiled, and picked his sleeping niece up off the couch, tucking her under his coat. Marinette helped him zip it up over them both, and with a quick goodbye to her mother, Luka slipped out, a smile on his face and a strange fizzing in his veins. If it hadn’t been for Angie sleeping in his arms, he might have run all the way home.

@worlds-tiniest-spook-pastry

#quickspins #mlholidays2k19 #lukanette #i am lukanette trash i admit it #miraculous ladybug #miraculousladybug #luka couffaine #marinette dupain-cheng #ml fics #lukanette fic

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markmceachran · 7 years

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Header Bidding: The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

Whether you think it’s a fad, a “hack,” the new standard, or the latest shiny object, header bidding has had a significant and disruptive impact on the advertising technology ecosystem. It may only be a matter of time before Luma Partners adds header bidding wrappers as a new box to their (in)famous landscapes.

The promise of header bidding with multiple exchanges has yielded positive results for advertisers and publishers but it has come with a cost that, over time, might be too much to bear. Whether it survives the fray, or evolves into something new, header bidding has changed the game forever.

Header Bidding: The Good

In the movie starring Clint Eastwood, The Good guy is not necessarily altruistic in nature, but he’s really good at capitalizing on opportunities.

Header Bidding brings those opportunities by providing premium inventory into the programmatic marketplace. No longer are the best impressions locked away in the tower of publisher ad servers. They are now accessible via the myriad of sophisticated Seller-Side Platform (SSP), Exchange and Demand-Side Platform (DSP) technologies. This gives sellers more articulate controls over the rules of engagement for every transaction.

Retargeting, made easier by RTB, can now be applied at all inventory priority levels, improving yield for commerce sites. Elusive audiences could be more readily captured by private marketplaces and the open auction, inviting new advertisers to test, refine, and commit to new deals with new partners.

Meanwhile, demand side systems are given the opportunity to bring more premium buying contracts to their platforms. This could be why some publishers started seeing higher revenue with header bidding in play. During Advertising Week in New York, one publisher cited header bidding as being responsible for 50% lift in CPMs. These types of statistics have been echoed by several others in the industry. While this might not be the panacea that saves the online newspaper, it certainly helps keep a few more lights on.

Header Bidding: The Bad

Unfortunately, it’s not all roses and rainbows in this brave new world. Like Angel Eyes, The Bad guy, ad-tech providers would be wise to watch their flanks, because header bidding, like many new technologies, can come with the cost of adding new features to existing systems, building brand new systems, standing up additional infrastructure, or giving the end user a little more frustration online.

Exchanges and SSPs, having grown up in a world where every impression request had the intention of yielding a rendered ad, are now waking up to a reality where render rates range from 30%, all the way down to single digits. The hardware and bandwidth costs still closely align with the volume requests, but transaction fees only come into play when the ad is rendered to the page. Higher CPMs, and the corresponding fees, are doing their part to fend off the increased costs, but it’s a challenging balance that must be closely monitored.

DSPs have a similar problem in that the number of requests from each publisher is increasing quickly as the full ad stack is made available programmatically, regardless of the actual availability of each impression for purchase. This is compounded further by publishers using several exchanges at once, which brings redundant bid requests for a single ad slot to the DSP. It happens when multiple exchanges, vying for the same impression, reach out to the same set of partners for bids. With systems designed for the massive transaction load of unique requests from the established world of RTB, DSPs don’t have the mechanisms to identify or filter identical requests for the impression.

Publishers are not spared from the shake-up of header bidding. In their effort to cash in on the added competition, many are partnering with multiple exchanges. This has the subtle effect of increasing the overhead of their operations. Each Exchange and SSP has a different set of contracts, controls, and features. The learning curve can be steep if operations teams have to take them on all at once. And when a problem occurs through one of the partners, tracking it down can be an order of magnitude more difficult with each additional exchange added.

Finally, the end user has to take it on the chin with subtle hits to browser performance. The user’s experience, already hampered by inefficient blocks of 3rd party content, pixel drops, share buttons and videos, is further worsened by several parallel content requests to multiple exchanges for each ad spot on the page. Browsers generally have fewer than twenty swim lanes for downloading content. Adding another 15 or 20 asset requests per ad slot, header bidding is undoubtedly giving them the beachball.

Header Bidding: The Ugly

Tuco had the unfortunate and unscrupulous role as The Ugly in the Western. He makes a good analog for the short-circuited systems that bring life to header bidding.

DSPs, in an effort to streamline their operations and reign in their infrastructure costs may selectively suppress bid requests from certain sites through specific SSPs and exchanges. Industry insiders suggest that some may even remove a subset of exchanges completely. This tactic would tear at the heart of the harmony brought about by OpenRTB. No longer would supply and demand be ubiquitously connected through the exchanges. Buyers and sellers would have to return to the days of picking and choosing their partners based on what was available where. It’s a step backwards to the days of partnering with a few ad networks to monetize publisher inventory.

Auction mechanics have taken a strange twist. Most exchanges and SSPs leverage something akin to a second price auction when determining the clearing price of the rendered ad. Header bidding takes the clearing prices from each exchange and essentially runs another auction using first-price mechanics. With no set of rules governing the exchanges, some appear to have become simple bid pass-thrus, sending the bid into the header, rather than the second priced clearing value.

DSPs have also suggested that some exchanges are making multiple bid requests for the same impression. Exchanges are increase bid density to eek out a few dollars more for publishers in the face of stiff competition. Some have labeled this behavior “cheating,” but without governance or rules for what happens in the browser, there’s little incentive for publishers to dish out any punishments. This practice impacts DSP budget allocations across the exchanges, as well as causing trouble with media planning as some publishers appear to have as much as 5X the amount of inventory coming from the abusive exchange.

For DSPs and exchanges, header bidding increases operating costs. Dollars are not yet moving quickly enough into the space to make up for those costs. Smaller companies may not have deep enough pockets to stay in the game until the budgets shift.

Server side header bidding (SSHB), the latest advent against the tech, holds the promise to clean up some of the mess. Moving the exchange requests out of the browser and onto a server will improve performance for the end user. It could also create opportunities for the exchanges to take a margin on traffic that they are not directly monetizing. They might, however, do this by adding an additional toll to each transaction and intermediaries will have to adjust their fee structures to cover the costs. With exchanges being the most likely players to host SSHB, the solution relies on these industry adversaries to trust one another, a difficult challenge in a game where everyone is holding their cards close to the chest.

In the movie version of header bidding, everyone wants to be Eastwood’s Good guy. He rides away with half the loot. But with any new advertising technology solution, there will always be winners and losers. Assuming the ecosystem can come together and solve enough of the challenges presented by header bidding, certainly the publishers and advertisers stand to win. As different attempts evolve to solve the problems header bidding introduces, ad-tech providers could end up in something akin to the film’s wild stand-off in the cemetery.

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The post Header Bidding: The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly appeared first on Free Ideas.

http://j.mp/2jdYxF7 January 10, 2017 at 07:52AM

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