Explaining the Business of Entertainment
Entertainment topics simple and complex explored in-depth.
Here’s a list of companies. Think about how you feel about them: Netflix. Spotify. Dollar Shave Club. Here’s another list of companies. Think about how you feel about them: Comcast. Spectrum (formerly Time Warner Cable). Verizon. AT&T. Sprint. My guess is you love the first set of companies; you hate
My favorite Chuck Klosterman rant is in his book Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs about the phrase “apples to oranges”. In short, is anything actually more similar than apples and oranges? How is that a synonym for difference? He finishes his rant with the line, “in every meaningful way, they’re
If you want to know why I started this website, just take a look at the furor unleashed on the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences when it announced (via Twitter!) that it would add a new category called “Achievement in Popular Film”. First came the questions: “How would
Was I too strong in calling this series, “Debunking the M&A Tidal Wave in Media and Entertainment?” I don’t think so. I want emphasize the “think” in that previous sentences. I’ve thought about this a lot. I mean, asked myself many, many, many times, “Wait, are you sure there won’t
One of the challenges of “big data” is that it is so…big. For any given subject, we have so many ways to measure things. I can pull one set of data to prove my point; you can take the same set of data and pull a different metric to prove
It never ceases to amaze me how much more there is to learn about this crazy industry. I call myself the “entertainment strategy guy” and things still surprise me. Take M&A (mergers and acquisitions) in entertainment & media. For years, I thought I closely followed the trends of mergers and
(Check out my first post analyzing the M&A landscape here.) If you think we’re about to ride a wave of deal making, then grab your corporate strategy surfboard and let’s hit the entertainment and media waters! Tortured analogy aside, if you saw the chart from yesterday, you know one thing…
After the Justice Department lost their anti-trust lawsuit against AT&T–which allowed the merger with Time Warner to go through–a consensus emerged in the entertainment press that I would summarize like this: “The approval of this merger will start a wave of acquisitions and mergers in entertainment.” This isn’t a straw
(This is Part VI of a multi-part series answering the question: “How Much Money Did Disney Make on the Lucasfilm deal?” Previous and future 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
I love Han Solo. To put out my Star Wars bonafides—as if proving I’m a hardcore nerd makes me cooler—I’m the type of Star Wars fan who read the both the Han Solo trilogies, one from the 1980s and the other from the 1990s. Don’t believe me? Here’s my collection