“I’m sure that when they designed the business model for HBO it wasn’t with the intention of pleasing writers, but it’s a happy consequence.” —
Aaron Sorkin
Sorkin apparently took his new show to HBO because it focuses on quality over ratings. Seems like HBO is doing a good job of combining content and distribution pieces: HBO Go and the HBO brand are big draws for content producers.
Also: all of HBO’s growth is now coming from overseas distribution: domestic subs flat around 40M, international subs up to 42M, from 28M in 2007.
And: “Game of Thrones” is getting 50% more per episode than “Sopranos” did from international syndication.
Does this mean that the market for “premium content” in the US is topped out? I don’t think so. It’s just that additional growth is likely to be via HBO Go and other digital platforms.
‘Thrones’ Unites Thrusts of HBO’s Strategy - WSJ.com
[video]
“New Yorkers lose their minds when it comes to brunch. Crain’s recently reported that we make 35% more Google searches per capita for “brunch spots” than any other city. And while we feel personally persecuted waiting 10 minutes for the F train, we happily endure Soviet-style lines for a stack of pancakes.” —
Amazing NYC stereotypes article.
That line in the photo? I see it every weekend from my apartment.
The Brunch Exceptions - WSJ.com
Over the past few weeks I’ve been lucky to see a few great guest speakers at school:
Consistent across each of the talks was a discussion of the ways these leaders contribute to fostering and managing innovation — which seems to have a lot of commonality from Fortune 500s to startups — and how entwined innovation is with culture.
I found a great encapsulation of this in Dorsey’s response to a question about focusing on barriers to entry at a startup’s inception: he doesn’t.
“The biggest competitor for any startup at the beginning is themselves,” Dorsey said; a nugget even more salient in the context of what McKinney said is his main preoccupation at H-P: fighting off “corporate antibodies” who would quash innovation in favor of the status quo. Which is to say, some of the biggest challenges in entrepreneurship are internal.
At P&G, Estruth repeatedly noted that because the company never hires outsiders its corporate culture is uniquely uniform: employees can “finish each other’s sentences” no matter where in the world they are. That enables Futureworks to hand projects off to individual business units with minimal friction. (He admits that, as a trade-off, he has to fight against “groupthink” as well.)
Under some definitions of competitive advantage, superior internal capabilities is a big one — especially in the fast-changing worlds of digital media and technology. That Dorsey would focus more on the workings of his teams than McKinney and Estruth is not surprising, given the much smaller sizes of Twitter and Square vs. H-P and P&G.
Indeed, the challenges of how to manage internal teams diverges when talking about organizations of massively different scale. Dorsey talked about his role as an “editor” at Square and at Twitter, “reviewing, asking clarifying questions, etc.” I interpret this as saying that, because management can see more clearly across a smaller organization, everyone on Dorsey’s teams are moving in generally the right direction and they just need to be guided occasionally.
McKinney, on the other hand, said his other major initiative at H-P is to get everyone at the company — tens of thousands of people — to treat innovation as part of their job and not something concentrated with management. He’s put in place a number of systems to help, including a central repository for ideas from anyone in the company. It attracts 2,500 submissions per year.
There’s a saying I like that I think sums all this up (often attributed to Peter Drucker): “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.”
“In February, more than a third of all online-display ads in the U.S. appeared on Facebook, according to comScore Inc. That’s more than three times as many as its closest rival, Yahoo Inc., had.” —
Impressive. Wonder how much of the volume has to do with low price?
Making Facebook Ads More Buyer-Friendly - WSJ.com
[video]
And this; especially #3.
What bubble?
See also this.
Wonder how many more will be added to this list inside of 12 months.
(via How The NYTimes’ Paywall Compares To Those Of Other Big Papers | paidContent)
“Charging for digital news is no panacea. It’s a platform for a growth, and the beginning of a new business model. Most newspaper company CEOs have done the math, and with the current trajectory of print ad decline, modest digital ad growth and no digital circulation money, they have no hope of sustaining their businesses into 2015. That’s a bleak, but fair, conclusion.” —
Extremely well said. The NYT’s paywall is a beginning, not an end — unless tragedy befalls the company before it can adequately build on this beginning. Hopefully, the paywall also means that NYT’s management understands the dire situation they’re in (hey Carlos Slim!).
Onto the next question: what will the pricing be? Any margin of error on pricing and the situation may deteriorate even more quickly. Again, hopefully the Times will be open to adapting quickly if needed.
Imminent NYT Pay Fence Divides World into Core Customers — and Others - Ken Doctor - Seeking Alpha
“All the money that’s going to be lost is money that can be lost by people who can lose money, so who cares?” — Diller on tech bubble: ‘We’re puffing it up pretty nicely’ | SXSW - CNET Blogs
Helpful guide to baseball fans.
via www.interpretationbydesign.com
Proud to say I have, uh, graced that court with my own version of what 13x championship squash looks like. Go Bantams!
ESPN just ended their SportsCenter show with a recap of Trinity College’s victory over Harvard in the Collegiate Squash Championship. The “coverage” of the tourney amounted to what appeared to be a feed from an overhead security camera. Or, as ESPN put it, “the blimp shot.” Heh.
Agree, except I like the boomerang guy — you just have to know when to deploy his ordinance to the ground, so to speak.
via stepherss & queanali: ilovecharts
![I would like this in my residence, please.
thedailywhat:
Raising Children Right of the Day: Inspired by S. Rivas’ Reynolds Home Calvin & Hobbes playroom mural, Redditor poerhouse painted this incredible C&H nursery mural for his unborn daughter.
He says “the plan is to insert a ‘Wattersonized’ version of her once she’s two or three (and we know what she looks like),” but I agree with Redditor hockymickle , who counters “I kind of like it with just Hobbes. It implies that she’s in Calvin’s role without having to draw her in there.”
[reddit.]](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lhakm6al6W1qzpwi0o1_500.jpg)
I would like this in my residence, please.
Raising Children Right of the Day: Inspired by S. Rivas’ Reynolds Home Calvin & Hobbes playroom mural, Redditor poerhouse painted this incredible C&H nursery mural for his unborn daughter.
He says “the plan is to insert a ‘Wattersonized’ version of her once she’s two or three (and we know what she looks like),” but I agree with Redditor hockymickle , who counters “I kind of like it with just Hobbes. It implies that she’s in Calvin’s role without having to draw her in there.”
[reddit.]
(Source: thedailywhat)