The Media Odyssey

Evan Shapiro: [00:00:00] How did you read CES from that side of the pond?

Marion Ranchet: On my couch, you mean. I have to say. Not much happened, or at least that's how I felt. I'm sure, you've seen, great tech big new TVs. I've seen a 60, 000 LG transparent TV. But I was waiting for, news around TV OS's, partnerships, more on the advertising side of things. And yeah, it's been on the low side, I would say, but yeah, there's a

Evan Shapiro: great, Yeah.

There's a couple of things. What's interesting is almost everyone in media who goes to CES and everybody in media was really there. No one goes to the floor. They'll do a tour and stuff like that, but most of them stay in the Cosmo area of Vidara complex where the media is centered and just hangs out there.

So that, that is one, it's two conferences, tech and media. The second is, yeah, I think it was just all a bunch of press releases full of bullshit. That's it. Signifying not that much that [00:01:00] there was a little bit of tech and video made announcement around project digits, which is this desktop processor that they launched.

There were some advertising stuff there. NBC, Universal, CableTown, Comcast, whatever the heck is happening to them right now, they announced universal ads, which allows small mid sized businesses to log onto the backend and buy advertising across their platforms, and now they're acting more like YouTube.

Which was a prediction I made in our prediction episode. Disney Magic they talked about that, but it was all repackaged bullshit, to be blunt. I think the one interesting piece of TV tech that was announced was the Google AI. So Google TV announced this TV set or operating system that basically scrapes the news for you.

And I find that, I found that interesting, and I think that is actually one of those. As I said in our prediction episodes, one of those kind of like unsexy elements of AI that's really going to infiltrate television as opposed to like rewriting screenplays and acting instead of actors. I think AI's involvement in [00:02:00] television is going to be around things like discovery, most notably.

But yeah I didn't think, it was great to see everyone. While to, side note, Los Angeles literally set itself on fire. While we were there. So there's a lot of concentration on people losing their homes or being evacuated and calling their spouses And making sure their dogs and their kids were okay, in the other order, kids and then dogs.

But yeah, I, I loved seeing everyone. I loved hanging out with everyone. I loved getting drunk with everyone. But there wasn't a lot of actual news coming out of CES.

Marion Ranchet: But I feel like last year was the same, right? I gotta pull up. I did a piece last year, again, from my couch, because I have this thing about going to Vegas after Christmas.

I'm doing dry Jan, so that doesn't fit my schedule, but so to say but I think it's, yeah, at the end of the day, those events it's just an opportunity for folks to to meet up, show their faces, but it's tough every year on year to be like, okay, this is the moment where there's going to be some innovative stuff.

So many [00:03:00] things are happening at any time of the week. Actually, you mentioned, Fubo Disney. We didn't need CS for that, like bam, first week of the year, there we go, right?

Evan Shapiro: Yeah and that was the, that was one of the biggest topics of conversations there was the Fubo Hulo Disney wrap up and what that signified for the industry.

Everybody had an opinion on it. It's funny, I saw Alan Woke our mutual friend while I was there and he said, look, this is going to be the death of venue. And he was right. I told that to other people without taking credit for it and, ultimately, today we just found out that he was proved to be right there.

And so I think that really does. Signify, the starters gun that and the O. M. G. I. P. G. merger really is the starter gun on what is going to be a year of tremendous movement in media M. and A. And I think media and tech M. and A. Simply because I think the regulatory environment is going to be more [00:04:00] friendly to it.

But also we are in a moment where big media is contracting and combining And there's, real motivation to basically eliminate competition so that you can focus on, the key elements of competition. I think a big part of why Disney decided to do this was so that they could compete with YouTube TV.

And now Hulu Live, FUBU, that combo is now, just behind YouTube TV. I think YouTube TV has around 8 million subscribers in the U. S. and Hulu had around 4. And now Fubo and Hulu together, or Fulu now has around six, six and a half million combined. So they're right on the heels of YouTube TV.

But let's put a pin in that for a second. Cause I think you wanted to ask me about so I about my my experiences there with the domestic goddess Martha Stewart.

Marion Ranchet: Yeah, I have to say I know. But on this side of the ocean, I don't know if she means much to [00:05:00] us or not as much as she means to you guys.

Super keen to hear a bit about that and also, What happened? What made you meet up with her?

Evan Shapiro: OMG Omnicom Media Group, which is about to become the largest advertising agency in the history of humankind after their merger, they asked me to present on stage with Shelley Palmer, icon in media punditry and they posited it as a toggling set of presentations, but then the CEO positioned it as a debate.

It really wasn't a debate, but we each presented around commerce, content, sports, and gaming. I talked about retail media, I talked about the creator economy, and I talked about gaming and specifically game ads in games. But then she Martha Stewart, went on stage with a bunch of really talented and brilliant executives from OMG to discuss those three topics and kind of counterpoint what we presented, and then I got to hang out with her.

As I said in my presentation, I [00:06:00] spent a couple minutes backstage with Martha Stewart, and now I'm high as a kite. But she, I think it's interesting. I think it's very fascinating that she's not as, noted in Europe as she is here. But what I said and what others said on stage is she really was the world's first.

Influencer creator before there was YouTube, before there was social media, she was putting out content basically about the things she did at home, which turned into this massive. She's the first self made female billionaire and she did that, based on the strength of her own personality and her own knowledge and frankly, the content that she put out.

She's about to celebrate her hundredth I'm just a huge fan and by the way I, did you watch the documentary Martha on Netflix?

Marion Ranchet: No.

Evan Shapiro: Good watch. A really good solid watch. I'll do that. But it was a really, it was wonderful to meet her I just had a great time.

I also was able to throw a [00:07:00] party with Comscore where I got a tattoo,

Marion Ranchet: I saw that on LinkedIn. Is that a real tattoo? The kind that doesn't go away?

Evan Shapiro: I can neither confirm nor deny whether this is a real tattoo or not. But it is, it's upside down here, I don't know how to do it. And there's my pit. But but it's a J in a heart, and I have a wife, two daughters, a brother, and a mother whose all their names start with the letter J, so I figured that's what I would get.

Marion Ranchet: Huh. So two, two things, huh? It's either you haven't showered in a few days.

Evan Shapiro: Which is a good call. I don't usually shower. Okay,

Marion Ranchet: or you've done it and actually I've I've seen that happen at a party a few years back already.

Yeah, who knows? It was

Evan Shapiro: Vegas,

Marion Ranchet: yeah, and I've actually heard, so I've never been to Vegas, believe it or not. But I've heard about the barbershop during CES. And that's, yeah, what happens there stays there.

Evan Shapiro: Yeah, we had a good time. So we threw a party with Comscore we threw a great party with our friends at [00:08:00] DirecTV to celebrate MyFree, which is their fast service, which I think we talked about during our predictions episode, but, is your prediction of more free TV.

Coming to the pay TV ecosystem and, they just launched, I think around a hundred channels on the front end of their platform. That was a great party. And that was a really good party. Like we had some high profile guests there, including a Bob Ross impersonator, Charlie Collier from Roku showed up.

It was a really good time. Had dinner with my friends from Atelier and we had a really good You've been to one of my salons that I do at these events where, I tend to, hate these dinners where you only talk to one person on one side or one person on the other. So I curate these dinners at these events where there's one prompt for the room and everybody has to have one conversation, no side conversations.

No phones.

Marion Ranchet: You're quite strict on that. You caught me last time, like I was texting about something by the end of the dinner. I had some [00:09:00] family thing with my kids to manage, but you were on my back.

Evan Shapiro: Yeah. It's just, to me, it's about being present. And I do make exceptions for, kids emergencies and in this case, some fire emergencies.

But the prompt this time was the first time I ever, so usually I ask prompts like name the first piece of content that you remember that inspired you. If you could fix one thing about our industry, what would that be? This prompt was on the heels of our top 10 predictions. I said, prediction season is over.

Now, let's get into manifestation season. And so the prompt for the room that everybody had to answer was, what would be the one wish? What would be the one thing you would manifest for our industry in the coming year, if you could? And there was some really great stuff there. It was a good group.

We had a great dinner. Yeah, I had a great time. It was actually, I, as CES goes. It was a pretty, I had a pretty chill time. I did my things, I went to my events, and then I spent a lot of time in my [00:10:00] fabulous suite doing work and Zoom calls and writing articles and prepping for this Pudge.

Marion Ranchet: Okay. Okay, cool. So I said it last year. I said, yes, I'll come in 2025. Okay, let's make it happen in 2026.

Evan Shapiro: Okay, good.