Concepts

Future Media Business Models

Figuring out how to make money in media in the future.

  • Dithering and Open Versus Free

    Announcing the new Dithering podcast, and why it is important to fight for the open ecosystem that Spotify is trying to aggregate.


  • Ghost 3.0, An Interview with Ghost CEO John O’Nolan

    There is a new offering in the subscription space: Ghost. John O’Nolan, the founder and CEO of the Ghost Foundation, explains what makes Ghost unique.


  • Substack Raises Series A, An Interview With Substack Co-Founders Christopher Best and Hamish McKenzie

    An interview with Substack Co-Founders Christopher Best and Hamish McKenzie, who recently raised a Series A to enable newsletters from Andreessen Horowitz.


  • Disney and the Future of TV

    TV is moving from a world where distribution dictates business models to one where business models need to fit the jobs consumers want done. That is the best way to understand Disney’s latest announcement.


  • The BuzzFeed Lesson

    The lesson of BuzzFeed is that dominant Aggregators like Facebook have no incentive to act against their self interest and support suppliers.


  • More on Amazon’s “HQ2”, Two New Paywalls, Subscription Fatigue?

    More details are out about Amazon’s site selections, including a 3rd city. Then, two new sites have paywalls, but the paywalls are different in important ways. Plus, why I think “subscription fatigue” both is and isn’t a thing.


  • Faceless Publishers

    The missing piece when it comes to the future of media are faceless publishers. Vox Media’s deal with The Ringer shows the way.


  • The Local News Business Model

    Subscriptions are the future of local news: the key, though, is getting rid of newspapers.


  • Grantland and the (Surprising) Future of Publishing

    ESPN’s decision to close Grantland seems to be more evidence that there is no future outside of massive scale or one-man operations. Bill Simmons’ recent successes, though, suggest that the answer could be the exact opposite.