THB #120: The Future of The Future

Things I Am Trying Really Hard Not To Write About: Will Smith, Chris Rock, David Zaslav, Netflix (quarterly hysteria coming next Tuesday), Kilar, Box Office, Gossip, Johnny Depp, bad newsletters, Elon Musk, and the endless varieties of failure.

Conversations about CNN+, 2 weeks into its launch, provoked conversation and interesting thoughts for me, not about the new segment’s financial impact on the newly spun-off Warner Bros Discovery, but about how things may continue to come together in these very early days of streaming as a paradigm, aside from (and eventually reflecting on) the one mature business in streaming.

What must CNN+ be and what it should cost and how it fits into the overall plan… all trying to come to a conclusion when the cement is still spinning around in the mixer truck.

Today, I want to discuss what I would like to see as the future of streaming (5 years or so), without just making about my personal preferences.

Consumer behavior has - in every era of the last 5 dec…