THB #342: New Deal 4 - The Future, Part 2: The Bundle Goes À La Carte (Kinda)

Monetize EVERYTHING!!!!!

As I spend more and more time trying to come up with a roadmap for the future of the filmed entertainment industry, this is the guiding notion that keeps recurring.

In the big picture, it is the only real answer. Noah’s Ark it… and let God (aka The Consumer) sort it out.

Of course, that is an easy (ha ha) way to avoid the macro issues, which are led by the challenge of balancing subscription revenues and advertising-based revenues.

To this I say, tear down the walls… which is to say, tear down all the semantic distinctions that are currently being used to prop up a system that no longer fits its nomenclature. Legacy… Linear… FAST… AVOD…

Bundles À La Carte

The future of televised entertainment is levels of subscription that allow for ad avoidance and levels of ad-based programming.

That’s the whole thing.

Streaming is television. It’s not magic. It IS television… it’s HBO… it’s Netflix… it’s all of them.

The drama and endless schrai-ing about data… yes… god bless you data heads. Yes, I understand the importance of data. But no one on the consumer side pays for data… they pay for content. Better data management is better management. Yes!!! But this is a micro-issue, not the macro-issue. I believe that data can build hits, more out of library shows than new shows… but that targeting tool is fantastic. But it’s not why Netflix has 220 million subs. Take a breath. Data is undervalued in media coverage… but it’s an incredibly important part of the engine. Content is the fuel. Always will be.

But I digress…

In order to contain Everything, there are going to have to be a number of variations in platforms and bundles of platforms. Content owners are going to have to work both sides of the track at the same time… maximizing focus (and thus the value) of Content that the market deems to be of significant value, monetized via both subscription and ad-based platforms and offering up everything else they own in way that can earn some revenue and also be available to trend up to a higher revenue level.

Think of it like baseball, with the major leagues and the minor leagues.

Of course, all the unions are going to have to agree to this for it to work right. Not everything is inherently of equal commercial value. So you need compensation scales that reflect residual and partner payments on the higher level and on the lower level. It should be a true meritocracy. If it makes money, there should be a cut for the partners and talent. If it doesn’t make money, it should be all-but-free to stream.

And to be fair, there really should be a reconsideration of residuals for shows whose residual value have long been bargained away.

Here’s a completely made up notion…

Imagine there is a 3-layer system with layers within them out there.

TIER ONE - New Content, Top Library Content, Top Acquisition Content
Subscription - No Ads
Subscription 2 - Ads
Subscription 3 - Ads and content limits