1. “We Must All Hang Together Or Assuredly We Shall All Hang Separately”

After signing the Declaration of Independence some 248 years ago, Benjamin Franklin used the above quote to remind his co-Revolutionists of both the potential severity of their actions and the size of their adversary.

It’s a quote some of you may have heard me use in regards to the legacy media companies as they fitfully make their way into the streaming era.

It’s a plea that has largely fallen on deaf ears.

Why It Matters

The legacy media companies still largely operate as if two outdated premises remain true: They are each other’s main enemies and the so-called “Streaming Wars” will have a single winner.

Let’s unpack these delusions.

Other Legacy Media Companies Are Our Enemies. No. No they are not. You know who is your enemy? Google, Meta and Amazon. Followed by TikTok, Spotify, Nintendo and Sony.

That is who you are competing against.

They are, especially the first three, fabulously wealthy companies for whom television is, at best, a hobby business. They can (and will) eat your lunch with their big budgets, fully developed ad platforms and superior tech. Which means that yes, your shows might be better right now, but a few big ACH transfers and they won’t be.

But rather than band together and create a united front against your enemy, you continue to snipe amongst yourselves.

There are numerous examples in history of how well this worked out, ranging from the ancient Greek city-states and the Macedonians to Napoleon's conquest of the Holy Roman Empire. 

None of which ended well for the smaller internally-squabbling parties mind you. Even when those parties were as impressive as Athens and Sparta.

So there’s that, and you’ll note that I did not include Netflix in that enemies list. Despite their puzzling inclusion in the popular “FAANG” acronym, Netflix is just another media company. Meaning media is their whole business, not a side hustle. So get them on your side.

I bring up Netflix to illustrate point number two, which is the equally puzzling notion that The “Streaming Wars” Will Somehow Have A Single “Winner.”

No matter how many times the tech websites try and make it so.

The reason you are all in the mess you are in was that you were convinced that Netflix, aka “The Albanian Army” was somehow winning said streaming wars and that if you waved your magic wand and said “OTT” three times while holding your nose and spinning counterclockwise, you’d somehow be able to beat them at their own game.

So wed were you to this insane notion that you voluntarily gave up a system where you were raking in tens of billions of dollars each year in carriage and retrans fees because you were convinced you could beat out Netflix, Zucker’s “digital pennies” warning be damned.

And since I already brought it up, it’s worth re-examining the sheer stupidity of the thinking behind that decision. 

All consumers wanted back in the mid 10s was something that provided the same basic functionality as Netflix: stop watching on one device, pick it up hours or even days later on another, the ability to watch on a range of connected devices (phones, laptop, tablets) and an easy way to access the massive on-demand libraries the MVPDs had accumulated.

But no, you were all far too freaked out about how you would retrofit your advertising payday for a world where people might not be watching prime time in real time. And so you blew up a generationally successful business model to chase a shadow.

What You Need To Do About It

If you are one of the legacy media companies… oh, where to start.

Here’s an easy one— get your acts together on advertising. If there is one thing I am hearing at increasingly high volume levels this year from both brands and from everyone on the content/distribution end, it is their extreme frustration with the fact that you’ve been at this for ten years and yet nothing seems to have changed.

Sure, if you are in the thick of it, you likely see some incremental changes. 

But for everyone else, it just sounds like you keep saying the same nonsense year after year and nothing ever changes. 

And the thing is, it is not that hard. Pick a time—that is what a view is. Pick a way to measure that view. Pick two or three companies to do the measurement. Pick a way to combine measurement for linear and streaming buys. It’s not as if you don’t have options. Pick a default taxonomy for contextual targeting. 

But here’s the hard part: you all have to agree to stick to that agreement. No going behind everyone’s back to create your own little thing because you’re convinced that if you just get that right, well, then clearly you will win and everyone else will lose, and by “everyone else” you’re thinking Google, Meta and Amazon too. 

And that is not even remotely going to happen you insane glory-chasing bastards. You need to stay united. 

Because you know what happens when you’re not united? 

Venu. That’s what happens. 

Enough said.

So that is my plea for 2025. Because things are getting real. And if you don’t do something soon, those tech companies are going to pick you off one-by-one.

Until you’re the one who gets picked off.

So Hang Together!

2. 2024 Fearless Predictions Graded

I am going to be taking the next two weeks off. At which point it will be time yet again for TVREV’s 2025 Fearless Predictions. Let’s take a look at how 2024’s played out:

1.  On January 29th, Amazon Will Upend The TV Industry - ⬆️NAILED IT.⬆️ All those ad-supported users on Amazon drastically increased the amount of inventory, sending CPMs south.

2. Shoppable Content Becomes A Thing - ↔️SORT OF.↔️ It’s certainly being talked about a lot more over the past year.

3. Self-Serve Revolutionizes Local - ↔️SORT OF.↔️ Like shoppable it’s getting talked about a lot more and more companies have launched to make it happen

4. The OS Wars Continue -  ⬆️NAILED IT.⬆️ This was the year everyone else in the industry seemed to notice that the OS Wars were a thing. Including The Trade Desk. (Evan Shapiro also gets credit for spotting this trend in 2023.)

5. Sports Fans Are Increasingly Pissed Off - ⬆️NAILED IT.⬆️ One word: Venu. While VIZIO and others have made strides in terms of organizing sports content, fans still have too many hoops to jump through

6. Streaming Starts Experimenting With Longer Seasons - ⬇️WHIFF.⬇️ While I still think this will happen, none of the services has gone there yet.

7. Contextual Targeting Takes Off - ⬆️NAILED IT.⬆️ This is the year of Contextual and you can read all about it in TVREV’s new Special Report: The Contextual Revolution. Five Companies Rewriting The Rules Of CTV Advertising.

8. The Price Gap Between Ad-Supported and Ad-Free Tiers Gets Much Wider - ⬇️WHIFF.⬇️ It’s gotten a little wider and many bundle deals are ad-supported only, but no wide gaps… yet.

9. FASTs Become Even More Well Entrenched - ⬆️NAILED IT.⬆️ There may be way too many options on FAST, but it is definitely even more well-entrenched than December 2023

10. IPV6 Takes The Industry By Surprise - ⬇️WHIFF.⬇️ Technically true, as hardly anyone knows about it, but it’s way further from being a thing than we expected. 

Results: ⬆️Nailed: 5, ↔️Sort Of: 2, ⬇️Whiffed 3. Not a bad percentage. I’ll take it!

Wishing you all a joyous holiday and happy, healthy new year!