Big Media's Big Creator Problem
"I don't think there are easy answers"
Next week, Mr. Beast’s Beast Games finally premieres on Amazon Prime. Whether the show works - from a viewership and financial perspective - could have a huge impact on the future of the media industry.
Or it could flame out badly.
But either way, the macro trends are undeniable. Creators are stealing time, and increasingly revenue, from media giants - from old schoolers like Paramount to even, yes Netflix.
The question is, do the big media companies have an answer? Do they even want to try?
I chatted with Doug Shapiro, Senior Advisor Boston Consulting Group, author of the newsletter The Mediator about this very subject on my Next in Creator Media podcast this week.
Shapiro, who previously logged stints at Time Warner and Banc of America, has been very vocal about this challenge/threat in his newsletter
“As there is only one pool of consumer time, the relationship between the corporate and creator media economies is largely zero sum. The growth in the latter mostly comes at the expense of the former,” he wrote recently.
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In other words, we’ve maxed out on media time - and the more we spend on one thing, it takes time from something else.
To be fair to Big Media, it’s not as though they haven’t tried, and often failed. Let’s recall:
Disney acquired Maker Studios for nearly $700 million a decade ago, before eventually shutting it down
Warner acquired Machinima, only to eventually shutter the gamer-focused network
Warner also had a piece of Fullscreen, which was eventually jettisoned during the AT&T selloff
The Comcast-owned E! network gave a show to popular YouTuber Grace Helbig, which bombed
To its credit, NBC actually gave Lily Singh a talk show after Late Night with Seth Meyers, and it never clicked with her audience
So it’s fair to say, when getting into bed with creators, the scars are real, and the hesitance justified.
Nowadays, you constantly hear from traditional media executives that what they produce is ‘real’ or ‘professional’ TV, and what creators do is - something lesser. Which of course ,(in their estimation) makes advertising in those channels less effective.
Clearly, the audience, particularly younger viewers, don’t see it that way.
“One of the things that happens, particularly when disruption occurs, is that new entrants will come in with new attributes, new features,” Shapiro told me. “And if those resonate with consumers, they will change the definition of quality.”
Shapiro used the analogy of Airbnb coming along to challenge the hotel industry - at one point, it sounded nuts for people to stay in someone’s house and not have housekeeping, a concierge, etc.
But today, it’s often the preferred vehicle for travelers. “It is changing the definition of lodging because it's introduced all these new attributes, like having a full working kitchen or being in a quaint neighborhood or having a driveway or room to entertain all these things, etc.”
The same is happening with social video, Shapiro wrote recently, as younger consumers are drawn to “attributes such as authenticity, relatability, digestibility” I.E. the opposite of slick.
So what should a big media mogul do? For instance, do the Disneys and Warners and Paramounts of the world need to:
Try to launch their own (expensive and risky) Beast type shows?
Put more creators on TV?
Test shorts form on their streaming services (as Disney is mulling, per CNBC)?
Play with algorithmic, feed like delivery?
Incubate more projects on social platforms?
“I don't think there are easy answers,” said Shapiro. “I think they definitely could make more concerted efforts to crossover.”
Maybe media companies should try again at repping creator ad inventory with TV, or developing channels and projects together?
“I think there's an argument that the MCN should come back probably in a new form,” Shapiro wrote (cue the anti MCN anger). “But where [media cos] actually own some of the equity. I know there's people trying to do that, where you own some of the equity in creators.”
However, one of the more interesting points Shapiro made was the need for “dopamine-driving” entertainment. God help us, but this upcoming generation may be addicted to the stimulation that comes from scrolling, feeds, virality, that sort of thing. How can TV compete there?
“Short form video has such a structural advantage in terms of optimizing dopamine,” Shapiro said. “It's really hard to compete with that when you're talking about any kind of long form narrative content.” Not that TV players shouldn’t try, even if it’s not their cup of tea. “In entertainment there is always a tension between art and commerce.”
Which brings me back to Beast Games, which I wrote recently may never see the light of day, given all the lawsuits and bad publicity. Clearly, that take was dumb.
Does the show have to work for media companies to take creators seriously? In some ways, there is no one like Mr. Beast, and therefore it’s really hard to judge any other creator project against one that Amazon is spending $100 million on (not to be a hater, but this looks like any other big game show on TV, like American Ninja Warrior or Survivor). Maybe it’s a smash hit. Maybe Beast’s aura is lost in long form television. It will be fascinating to watch. It’s worth asking, how does Mark Rober not have a TV show yet. Why didn’t Disney invest in Dude Perfect instead of a bunch of VCs?
It may be that putting creators on TV will just never make sense…but the media giants have got to try something. Hoping creators go away, or pooh-poohing their talent, isn’t a strategy.