Explaining the Business of Entertainment
If you want to know the “holy grail” for data scientists, I’ll tell you: Predicting box office performance of movie scripts. Here’s how it goes. An aspiring data scientist—ranging from bright undergraduate in computer science to a Ph.D. candidate in statistics to even tenured professors—looks for a new topic. They’re
Welcome to my first “weekly news round up”! This isn’t a comprehensive list of every story that premiered this week or last week or whenever it came out. (I may have just found it and wanted to share.) You have Twitter and access to Variety/Hollywood Reporter/Deadline so you don’t need
(This is Part I of a multi-part series answering the question: “How Much Money Did Disney Make on the Lucasfilm deal?” Previous sections are here: Part I: Introduction & “The Time Value of Money Explained” Appendix: Feature Film Finances Explained! Part II: Star Wars Movie Revenue So Far Part III:
Tomorrow, I’m going roll out part one of a potentially four (or more) part series analyzing The Walt Disney Company’s acquisition of Lucasfilm. I’m going to ask a simple, yet tough to answer question, how much money did Disney make off that deal? When I launched this website, I decided
Most organizations–from corporations to sports teams to armies to universities to government agencies to non-profits–think they use a sound process to make important decisions. But they aren’t. They are arriving at the easiest decisions. I’ll use a media example to show the worst process. Basically, political pundits opine and opine
The big buzzword in business is still “data”. Or better yet, “big data”. Or more complicated sounding, “analytics”. Better than just analytics is “advanced analytics” which is like analytics but more advanced. With all that data, a bunch of “algorithms” are figuring everything out. Take your pick. Sure other trends
Before I start writing on a new project, I often feel compelled to explain myself. Why am I putting my words to paper (or coded into bits, since you’re reading this on the web)? Why are my words worthy of your time to read? Why do I want to get