The Top 10 Highlights From The Annual Media Mogul Masterclass
The Annual Berkshire Meeting is great.
The Annual Media Mogul Masterclass is better.
Why?
The Berkshire meetings have become repetitive.
John Malone delivers. The raw truth.
Here are the Top 10 highlights:
We were misled by AT&T in the Warner-HBO purchase. We were naïve. We had to rely on public filings, you are talking about a subsidiary of a large public company, and the Warner business was in much worse shape.
Apple should buy Disney and sell ESPN to private equity.
We are in a period of rapid transition and the entire ecosystem (old media and broadband) has to be open to different creative ways of partnering with each other.
Anti-trust is the worst thing that could happen to Old Media. Without anti-trust, Big Tech would have just acquired these businesses for large premiums. With anti-trust, it’s survival of the fittest. This is why the old media ecosystem needs to work together against Big Tech.
The content library wars have subsided. Netflix won. Now Big Tech is coming after Live Sports.
Distributors do not make money on sports rights. Over time, inflated sports rights should normalize to distributor profitability.
Streaming isn’t working for Old Media. They need to re-think the entire model and add content licensing to the monetization model.
Comcast and Disney's negotiation ended up being a good deal for both parties.
Rates will be higher for longer and the Geopolitical situation is scary.
Instead of Media M&A, Murdoch and Malone are more interested in ranching.