Media and Subscriptions
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Distribution and Demand
Distribution on the Internet is free; what matters is controlling demand. AT&T and Verizon didn’t understand the distinction.
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AT&T’s Original Bad Deal, Discovery + WarnerMedia, The Streaming Landscape
AT&T bails on its streaming ambitions; they can’t undo the mistake of buying Time Warner, but merging WarnerMedia with Discovery is a nice recovery.
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Stripe’s Role, Competition and Differentiation, The Local News Opportunity
Differentiation can flow from the writer, but also from the subject. That is why the Substack model could help deliver the local news business model.
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Sovereign Writers and Substack
Substack is at the center of media controversy, most of which misses the point that sovereign writers — not Substack — are in control.
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Substack and the Media, The Substack Opportunity, Substack’s Business Challenges
Substack is a threat to the media, but its business prospects are threatened by the same forces threatening all of media.
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Disney’s Investor Day, Disney+ as Harvester, Disney’s Optionality
Disney’s investor day showed the power of differentiated IP and optionality.
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WarnerMedia to Stream Movies First Day, AT&T Versus HBO, Self-Disruption
WarnerMedia’s move to stream all of its movies on HBO Max appears to be value disruptive, but if the company is actually meaningfully responding to disruption, that was inevitable.