Tech giants extend ad dominance

FACEBOOK and Google’s share of the advertising market has risen to an unprecedented level of dominance, new figures show.

Combined, the technology goliaths accounted for 85 per cent – and rising – of all new online advertising spending last year, according to a report.

This means 85¢ of every new dollar spent on digital ads in the US went to the online duopoly, up from 76¢ the previous year.

The figures are revealed in the influential Internet Trends report published overnight on Wednesday by Mary Meeker of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, a US venture capital fund.

It provides further evidence of how the media sector has been up-ended and reshaped by the two US-based companies.

The same trend is dramatically altering the Australian media landscape.

This matters because digital will eclipse television as advertising’s biggest source of revenue this year, according to ZenithOptimedia, with the lion’s share going to Facebook and Google.

Digital advertising will attract 36.9 per cent or $US204.7 billion ($A276 billion) of all ad spending this year, up from 34 per cent last year.