Our weekly highlight of the news, focused not on the buzzy stories, but on the most important story for entertainment industry professionals.
Category: Most Important Story of the Week
Cresting the Covid Hill – As Many Films are Moving Earlier in the Year for the First Time in This Pandemic – The Most Important Story of the Week – 5 Mar 21
When the biggest story of the week is essentially the same story as the previous week–Paramount+ launched to customers this week after they announced specifics at the previous week’s investor’s day–then you know it is a quiet week for news. Despite this, dare I say this week had some stories that could be described as ...
Is Paramount Plus “Focused” on Winning? – The Most Important Story of the Week: 26-Feb-21
Sometimes, I can only fight it so much. As much as I want to pivot and pick a unique story from every other analyst, sometimes I just can’t. The top story is what it is. Yes, every columnist wrote about Paramount Plus investor presentation this week. But it really was the story of the week. ...
Kids Programming is “Easy Strategy” – Most Important Story of the Week – 19-Feb-21
Last week got away from me. Fine, I got away from it by diving down a data hole. Specifically, a Covid-19 data problem. For all the forecasting being done, few people are answering the query, “Hey, when will all this end?” I’ve seen answers ranging from “Never” to “2022” to “maybe a few weeks”. Hence ...
Another Aggregator Leaves Another Bundler – Explaining ViacomCBS Ending Their Apple TV Bundle – Most Important Story of the Week – 12 Feb 21
The goal this week? Keep this column under 2,000 words and not split into two parts. Can we do it? Sure. Even better? We can do it with a story most folked missed! The only challenge will be restraining myself on Covid-19 thoughts. Let’s get to it. (Sign up for my newsletter to get all ...
Earnings Reports Galore – Other Contenders for the Story of the Week – 5 Feb 21
Last week’s news was notable for how much “lots of news with no news” that came across my inbox. In other words, part of me thinks that following the news closely last week probably resulted in more misunderstanding than wisdom. Which we’ll get to, but first a few companies reported quarterly or annual earnings recently ...
Was Prime Video a Loss Leader or Loss Loser? – Most Important Story of the Week – 5 Feb 21
Jeff Bezos ending his run as CEO of Amazon is certainly neé clearly neé absolutely the biggest story in business this week. Is it also the biggest story in media, entertainment and communications broadly? Sure. Bezos is a man who built Amazon to be “the everything store”. That includes your video watching habits. As I’ll ...
Oh, Fine GameStop and Other Contenders for Most Important Story of Last Week – 1 Feb 21
For the last two weeks, my weekly column overflowed into two articles. I promise I won’t make this a habit…unless everyone likes it better. Let me know on Twitter. Meanwhile, here were the other stories vying for the top spot last week. But we’ll start with the story that had zero chance of making it. ...
Can Peacock’s “Live TV” Strategy Win the Streaming Wars? Yes – Most Important Story of the Week – 29 Jan 21
(Sign up for my newsletter to get all my writings and my favorite entertainment business picks from the last two weeks or so.) It’s rare–though not as rare as it seems–for a company to compete not just for the top spot in my weekly judgement of the most important story in entertainment, but to have ...
Price Discounts Continue in the Streaming Wars and Other Contenders for Most Important Story of the Week – 22 Jan 21
As The Stranger told The Dude, sometimes you eat the bear and sometimes the bear eats you. Such was last week’s weekly column for me. (By the way, check out this great article on the origins of the quote above.) I had a lot of thoughts percolating about the most popular topic in streaming–rightly Netflix–so ...
Netflix’s Step One Was to Break Even, The Next Step is to Generate Massive Cash Flow – Most Important Story of the Week – 22 Jan 21
(Sign up for my newsletter to get all my writings and my favorite entertainment business picks from the last two weeks or so. The last issue went out yesterday with my best reads of January.) When a Netflix earnings report comes out, it generates lots of news. Usually, though, they don’t claim the top spot ...