Speaker 1: Welcome to Strictly Business Varieties, podcast featuring conversations with industry
Speaker 1: leaders about the business of entertainment. Less than twenty four
Speaker 1: hours before this episode was scheduled to publish, Variety learned
Speaker 1: that Conde Nast Entertainment President Don Ostroff has taken a
Speaker 1: new job as chief Content officer for Spotify. This wasn't
Speaker 1: something Ostrof divulged at the time of her interview with
Speaker 1: Variety co editor in chief Andrew Wallenstein earlier this month,
Speaker 1: so this conversation does not touch on that next chapter.
Speaker 1: But we've decided to publish this interview with Ostrof nonetheless
Speaker 1: because it serves as a good retrospective of her tenure
Speaker 1: at a company facing some fascinating challenges. Thanks for coming in, Dawn,
Speaker 1: Thank you for having me. And we should warn the
Speaker 1: viewers you've got to touch you laryngitis, but we've pumped
Speaker 1: you full of drugs and you're gonna make it through. Well.
Speaker 1: I hope I do. Yeah, my daughter says, my voice
Speaker 1: sounds sexy, so we'll go with that's our interpretation. That
Speaker 1: helps in the podcast. What is it like at Conde
Speaker 1: Nast in terms of trying to get viewers that you
Speaker 1: used to try to get on the TV side. Well,
Speaker 1: I think the way we approached the Conde Nast is saying,
Speaker 1: how can we be good storytellers on all platforms, which,
Speaker 1: of course are you know, magazines, print our first business, um,
Speaker 1: feature films, television, and of course then the digital business.
Speaker 1: And that is really what we set out to do,
Speaker 1: is create a studio that makes content across all these
Speaker 1: different platforms. When you look at digital in its own right,
Speaker 1: you can see that there are many different versions of
Speaker 1: digital depending on what the platform is. And so it's
Speaker 1: become a priority for us to be able to make
Speaker 1: the content that is worthy of the viewers eyeballs um,
Speaker 1: that people will talk about and it will be must
Speaker 1: see viral videos um. And it's across all of our brands,
Speaker 1: but it's also on every digital video platform that is
Speaker 1: out there. The good news is is that the trends
Speaker 1: bode well for where for you where you stand. You
Speaker 1: were still in the TV business at a time where
Speaker 1: you were starting to see a very real drift of
Speaker 1: particularly younger viewers to the digital program sorry digital platforms.
Speaker 1: Where you now program? Are you finding that with these
Speaker 1: brands that people really know more from the magazine world
Speaker 1: that you're able to bring these fleeing younger viewers. Yes,
Speaker 1: we actually if you if you were to look at
Speaker 1: our demographics now, the audience we have in digital video
Speaker 1: is young twelve to BALI forty, The digital text business
Speaker 1: of our website is a little bit older, and then
Speaker 1: of course print is even a little bit older than that.
Speaker 1: So what we're able to do is really expand what
Speaker 1: the brands mean two different generations, but also make the
Speaker 1: brands relevant to the gen Z and the millennials, which
Speaker 1: is very hard to do these days. And being able
Speaker 1: to take license with what the brand verticals are has
Speaker 1: been a key to our success. And then reinventing formats
Speaker 1: that have worked on linear television but looking at them
Speaker 1: through a different lens for these digital platforms have been
Speaker 1: incredibly helpful. Give an example of it. So an example
Speaker 1: of that would be UM. For example. If you look
Speaker 1: at Entertainment UM and you look at UM interview shows, right,
Speaker 1: and you look at a late night show like let's
Speaker 1: say Jimmy Kimmel or UM or fallon UM, and you're
Speaker 1: typically seeing an interview show as a television viewer, as
Speaker 1: a voire of two people having a conversation and you're
Speaker 1: watching that conversation. But in the digital space, we always
Speaker 1: make it much more personal. It's much more um, it's
Speaker 1: you're you're much more included in behind the curtain. And
Speaker 1: so like seventy three questions would be a great example.
Speaker 1: Not only do we have the celebrity who's being interviewed
Speaker 1: speaking directly to the camera and our director is asking
Speaker 1: the questions as more of a friend, and the questions
Speaker 1: are very sort of you know, um, it could be
Speaker 1: very fun and not on topic at all for anything
Speaker 1: that they're particularly promoting. But it also takes place in
Speaker 1: the celebrities home. So while the celebrity is walking through
Speaker 1: their home as if they were just going through you know, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, meaning a friend and sort of taking them
Speaker 1: through the house, we the viewer on that ride with
Speaker 1: them and hearing all of the different, you know, kinds
Speaker 1: of questions that you may or may not hear on
Speaker 1: a late night talk show. But the point is is
Speaker 1: that the celebrities are used to having um, a different
Speaker 1: kind of relationship with the with the viewer and the
Speaker 1: consumer in the digital space, right if it's Twitter or
Speaker 1: if it's YouTube, I mean, they speak to or Instagram
Speaker 1: they speak directly to them, and that's the expectation in video,
Speaker 1: and so the viewer has, you know, that one on one,
Speaker 1: they feel like they're on the inside, and that makes
Speaker 1: it it feel like it's a different same same format,
Speaker 1: same concept, but really in execution, totally different. And in
Speaker 1: terms of using magazine brands, I gotta say, it's interesting
Speaker 1: to me that you know, you're talking about brands that
Speaker 1: are literally a century old, incredible magazine brands. Do they
Speaker 1: have the ability though, to be sort of the call
Speaker 1: of entry for younger viewers who may not have grown
Speaker 1: up reading g Q and Vogue. It's it's it's to me,
Speaker 1: it feels like there's a real risk there and trying
Speaker 1: to make these older brands newly relevant. But you know,
Speaker 1: it's funny and because even at Lifetime we face this.
Speaker 1: You know, you you you create a brand, and the
Speaker 1: c W also you create a brand, and you have
Speaker 1: to make sure that the brand moves with the generations
Speaker 1: that come up as as as as they start to
Speaker 1: to move forward, because if you don't, you don't stay relevant.
Speaker 1: And relevancy is so critical to the success and the
Speaker 1: future of these brands, and so let's take Lamor for example.
Speaker 1: You know, Glamor has existed for many many years as
Speaker 1: you know, a woman's magazine and has stood from many
Speaker 1: different things. But in the video space, you can take
Speaker 1: so much more risk and you can take so much
Speaker 1: more leeway with what that means. And we have a
Speaker 1: series that's one of our franchises called you Know You
Speaker 1: Sang My Song, and it literally takes all of these
Speaker 1: different artists Pink, Demilovado, Katy Perry, and what we do
Speaker 1: is we play them cover songs from YouTube videos. Um
Speaker 1: so it's average people who are singing their songs and
Speaker 1: we played for them and get them to critique the
Speaker 1: people who are just you know, the us or the means,
Speaker 1: you know, trying to emulate them, and then we play
Speaker 1: it back for that average person watching Pink watch them
Speaker 1: and it's driven millions of views, I mean ten million
Speaker 1: views per episode. And you would say, okay, well is
Speaker 1: that a Glamour series? Well, it is a Glamour series
Speaker 1: because it's really about inspiration and aspiration and that's so
Speaker 1: much of what Glamours alwaystood for. Is it this exact
Speaker 1: version of what they've always done in the magazine in
Speaker 1: terms of inspiring people, maybe not, but it really works
Speaker 1: and it's a new way to look at glamor can be.
Speaker 1: So what I'm curious about is you're sort of working
Speaker 1: the video arm of what was known for most of
Speaker 1: its time as a publishing business, which has its challenges,
Speaker 1: and so what is the pressure on you in terms
Speaker 1: of making the economics work in a way that helps
Speaker 1: the whole company? Uh, Because I would imagine, and maybe
Speaker 1: I'm wrong, that it's still the traditional revenue streams for
Speaker 1: these companies that are sort of carrying them right now, Well,
Speaker 1: you'd be surprised at how quickly that's shifted. Really. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is going to be one of the first years
Speaker 1: that we really see a significant shift. And if you
Speaker 1: look at digital and video together and that will be
Speaker 1: the majority of the revenue for our company on the
Speaker 1: at side. Um and if you look at our five
Speaker 1: year plan, you'll see the video becomes a more prominent player.
Speaker 1: And the opportunities that we have in video are quite
Speaker 1: are quite grand. I mean, we have brands that never
Speaker 1: became cable networks and if you look back, they probably
Speaker 1: should have been and they probably would have been very
Speaker 1: successful given the verticals that all these brands play in
Speaker 1: UM and I think we have an opportunity to almost
Speaker 1: leapfrog over what was missed, which was cable, and create
Speaker 1: those kinds of verticals and channels in the digital space
Speaker 1: where the next generation, who really will be familiar with
Speaker 1: our brands through digital video, will really know what a
Speaker 1: D is, will know what bone app is, will know
Speaker 1: g Q and Vogue and any of our big brands
Speaker 1: and what they really stand for because they will have
Speaker 1: grown up on that programming. And you know, I'll give
Speaker 1: you a great example. We do a show with a
Speaker 1: d architectural digest called open House, and open House is
Speaker 1: you know, celebrities taking you on a tour of their home,
Speaker 1: and the episodes do very well. But we decided to
Speaker 1: do an episode with z Now. Z is a DJ
Speaker 1: that is incredibly popular world over and z bought an
Speaker 1: amazing house in the Hollywood Hills. So we did this
Speaker 1: video and it did fourteen million views in a matter
Speaker 1: of three days. Okay, and so just within our own company,
Speaker 1: we were curious, like, who's watching this video? We all
Speaker 1: went home asked our kids have you seen this video?
Speaker 1: Every one of the kids, who were teenagers, twenties had
Speaker 1: seen the video and the follow up question was who
Speaker 1: made the video? Do you know whose video it was?
Speaker 1: And they all knew it was a D because a
Speaker 1: D was on you know, the watermark was on the
Speaker 1: screen the whole time, and they all said, a D.
Speaker 1: So now a D has relevancy to this next generation.
Speaker 1: They wound up watching the next episode, which was an
Speaker 1: older episode which was Robert Downey Jr. And they all
Speaker 1: loved that episode. And then Claudia Schiffer came on, which
Speaker 1: was an episode we had done before that many of
Speaker 1: them didn't know who she was, but you know, the
Speaker 1: Z episode is what brought them all in. And now
Speaker 1: all of these people know what a D is because
Speaker 1: we made it relevant to them. And that's a good
Speaker 1: example of how you can take something that you know
Speaker 1: would never necessarily be known to any of this, you know,
Speaker 1: to to these younger viewers and make it relevant and
Speaker 1: important to them. What is it like though, strictly with
Speaker 1: regards to content for digital platforms monetizing it at a
Speaker 1: time where the prevailing narrative is the big platforms like
Speaker 1: Facebook and Google are vacuuming most of the dollars out
Speaker 1: of this, and it's you guys and maybe other publishing
Speaker 1: companies or the vices or buzzfees of the world fighting
Speaker 1: over the scraps right well, it depends, you know, on
Speaker 1: the in the digital text world, there is much less
Speaker 1: of the advertising dollars um available when you look at
Speaker 1: the digital video side of the business right now, of
Speaker 1: the advertising revenue spent on digital video will be left
Speaker 1: over for others um. And that's a projection over the
Speaker 1: next five years, and so that's a significant amount of
Speaker 1: money when you start to consider how much advertising dollars
Speaker 1: are really moving into the digital the digital video space um.
Speaker 1: And then when you also take into account that we
Speaker 1: are a premium producer really with brands that are well
Speaker 1: known and trusted, which is incredibly important right now. That
Speaker 1: also scales significantly with the thirty five series that we
Speaker 1: have in the digital space that are considered to be hits.
Speaker 1: Each episode does somewhere between two and ten million views,
Speaker 1: which by any television network would be considered to be
Speaker 1: a hit, um, you know, within a week um. And
Speaker 1: so you can see how a considerable amount of the
Speaker 1: fifty of that amount of money will will start to
Speaker 1: really trickle down to the players who are you know,
Speaker 1: trusted uh premium producers, and I think that we will
Speaker 1: be right there in that sweet spot and for Conde
Speaker 1: Nast Entertainment. I mean, you've been at this now for
Speaker 1: seven years, and I'm curious has its played out as
Speaker 1: you thought of what are you guys at the place?
Speaker 1: Growth wise you thought you'd be. Yeah, it's a little
Speaker 1: bit less than seven years because I joined the company
Speaker 1: in like November eleven, so we really get started untill
Speaker 1: we just brought on a few people because we were
Speaker 1: a true startup. We had nothing when we started, UM
Speaker 1: and we didn't launch the digital video business until March
Speaker 1: of so that's you know, it's been it's been just
Speaker 1: you know, probably four years. UM. But I do UM.
Speaker 1: I think we are shocked at how far we are. UM.
Speaker 1: I don't think anybody could have predicted that the business
Speaker 1: would have grown as rapidly, that the business will have
Speaker 1: would have changed so quickly, that the revolution would have
Speaker 1: really happened in such a way that you know, we
Speaker 1: wake up and we see fifty of the eighteen to
Speaker 1: thirty four year old twelve to thirty four year old
Speaker 1: demographics disappearing from from television, and the eyeballs are going
Speaker 1: to digital video and millions of people are watching these
Speaker 1: videos within a week. It is just I think it's
Speaker 1: it's it's eye opening, and I think it took us
Speaker 1: all by surprise. And of course Conde Nast is not
Speaker 1: just doing digital video. You've got producing for TV and
Speaker 1: film on your plate as well. And what's interesting about
Speaker 1: Conde Nasa is you're sitting on this treasure trove of
Speaker 1: ideas that have come out of the magazine, stories that
Speaker 1: have been written, and you're able to adapt that into
Speaker 1: film and TV. Um. I'm actually curious just that versus
Speaker 1: what you're doing in digital What is there any tail
Speaker 1: wagging the dog here? Is there any one element of
Speaker 1: the business that leads the way. Yeah, you know, it's
Speaker 1: really been again fascinating. I don't know if I could
Speaker 1: have predicted this. The feature business has been pretty much
Speaker 1: the articles that are either in the archives or that
Speaker 1: have come out that have incredible stories about really relevant topics. Um.
Speaker 1: And so we've been fortunate enough to make five movies now. UM,
Speaker 1: and I would say that you know, all of those movies,
Speaker 1: for the most part, I had some connection to an
Speaker 1: article or to a brand itself. Um. When you look
Speaker 1: at what we've been able to do on the television side,
Speaker 1: particularly with unscripted. It's been a combination of some things
Speaker 1: that have come from articles directly, some original ideas that
Speaker 1: did not come from anything that had to do with
Speaker 1: Condie Nast at all, but it was original ideas, and
Speaker 1: some ideas are starting to come from the digital space
Speaker 1: that have been huge successes UM as digital series that
Speaker 1: have migrated over now to linear television, most expensive As
Speaker 1: being an example. It started as a g Q short
Speaker 1: form series two Chains basically is the Robin Leech of
Speaker 1: today and it's lifestyles of the rich and famous for
Speaker 1: lack of a better way to describe it, um but
Speaker 1: the series and the digital space did over two fifteen
Speaker 1: million views. Viceland bought it as a long form series.
Speaker 1: We make it differently obviously for long form, but the
Speaker 1: same concept UM and we're seeing that happen more and
Speaker 1: more with some of our other franchises that they're starting
Speaker 1: to migrate over to linear UM. So I do think
Speaker 1: that we wouldn't have necessarily predicted that there would be
Speaker 1: so much overlap, but there is a considerable amount of overlap,
Speaker 1: and then they're always just original ideas. The digital ideas
Speaker 1: do not necessarily come from the magazines. Those are usually
Speaker 1: ideas that come from people who are experts on any
Speaker 1: given platform, experts on YouTube, experts on Snapchat, experts on Facebook,
Speaker 1: experts and syndication um, and so those ideas really do
Speaker 1: come from the creators themselves. Different generation of creators, I
Speaker 1: want to add, not yet, not the type of creators
Speaker 1: that we would have seen in the linear side of
Speaker 1: the business beat, either through film and television. This is
Speaker 1: a new generation of creators who really look at things
Speaker 1: very differently, and they've been able to make anything they
Speaker 1: want and put it out for the world to see
Speaker 1: and iterate their creative vision in a very different way
Speaker 1: than the way we've been able to to immerse and
Speaker 1: and and and and nurture our creators on the traditional side.
Speaker 1: What's I've been like for you because your career you
Speaker 1: spend most of the time shepherding these traditional long form things,
Speaker 1: and that you're saying, you're programming to a platform where
Speaker 1: the old rules just don't apply, So how are you
Speaker 1: learning the new rules? It has been an m b
Speaker 1: A for me. I mean it, and it's so humbling
Speaker 1: because honestly, I came into this opportunity thinking I can
Speaker 1: do this because if you have success on traditional and
Speaker 1: you you know, gossip Girl at one point was the
Speaker 1: biggest show in the country. Right every young person talked
Speaker 1: about it, you know, read everything that they could get
Speaker 1: their hands on about about our cast. Um. But it
Speaker 1: really was eye opening to understand that the way in
Speaker 1: which we make the content for the digital space has
Speaker 1: nothing to do with the way we would create television ideas. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, it's it. There's there's a understanding of what
Speaker 1: the viewer expectation is when they're watching content on any
Speaker 1: one of those platforms, and you have to really adhere
Speaker 1: to be either a format that is the expectation, or
Speaker 1: a storytelling style or a way in which you shoot
Speaker 1: something that really does help determ and if something is
Speaker 1: going to be a success or not and qualities quality,
Speaker 1: So it has to be good and has to be
Speaker 1: worthy of people's time. But it really is very very
Speaker 1: specific about how the storyteller and how the director really
Speaker 1: does bring that story to life on those platforms. But
Speaker 1: I also want to get back to this question of
Speaker 1: what's what's what's driving the train here at Condonas Entertainment.
Speaker 1: Is it selling long form or is it new form?
Speaker 1: And I'm curious from a revenue perspective and just from
Speaker 1: an energy and what you're spending your time on day
Speaker 1: to day. Well, I can tell you my time has
Speaker 1: spent you know, across the board. The digital business for
Speaker 1: us is a real business. It is profitable, it's been
Speaker 1: profitable for a few years, and it is really a
Speaker 1: big part of the future of the company. There was
Speaker 1: no doubt for our company. The digital video business is
Speaker 1: really a sound business model that has huge amount of
Speaker 1: upside for us. We did twelve billion views last year.
Speaker 1: Our business model has always been about monetization, so we
Speaker 1: have really made the content where we know we can monetize,
Speaker 1: and so we've been very very clear. You know, a
Speaker 1: lot of our competitors or colleagues started their businesses with
Speaker 1: investors who really felt that it was all about scale
Speaker 1: and the monetization will come. We did not have the
Speaker 1: luxury of that. We were funded by our parent company
Speaker 1: and our mandate was to be able to scale and
Speaker 1: be profitable at the same time, and so we really
Speaker 1: had to look at our business model very differently, and
Speaker 1: as a result, we've been able to probably get to
Speaker 1: a place where you know, the business as as a
Speaker 1: standalone business or as a as a significant part of
Speaker 1: our existing business is a real proposition for our company,
Speaker 1: and that was our goal when we started. How do
Speaker 1: we make this a real business for the future, and
Speaker 1: how do we keep the brands relevant for the next
Speaker 1: generations to come? And I feel like we've been able
Speaker 1: to achieve both of those things. So when you ask
Speaker 1: if we would have thought that we would be here
Speaker 1: six years in, you know, the truth is, I don't
Speaker 1: know if we ever could have predicted that what we
Speaker 1: thought would happen would actually happen, and it actually happened
Speaker 1: faster than we ever could have imagined. But our goals
Speaker 1: of being able to really be profitable and be a
Speaker 1: significant part of the business and help keep these brands
Speaker 1: alive definitely did come to pass in the past, you know,
Speaker 1: in over the six years. Well, on the other end
Speaker 1: of the spectrum, you know, the movie business. You've got
Speaker 1: this Robert Redford movie coming out this fall, Old Man
Speaker 1: and the Gun. I gotta say, I'm curious, and I
Speaker 1: know it's not your first movie at Conde Nast. Why
Speaker 1: even be in the theatrical business when it feels like
Speaker 1: if you're not making like a two hundred million dollar
Speaker 1: movie you get lost. Yes, and again that's something that
Speaker 1: just happened over the past few years. Right. So when
Speaker 1: we started this business, Argo UM had won the Academy
Speaker 1: Award like the year before. Argo came from one of
Speaker 1: our magazines, from Wired, And so that's the example of
Speaker 1: why we started the business. Because although the article was
Speaker 1: in our magazine and the company you know, obviously paid
Speaker 1: for the research, the legal you know, all the different
Speaker 1: elements that go into these magazines and spent months on
Speaker 1: the investigation, you know, they had no participation creatively or
Speaker 1: financially in the movie. So that's why we started the
Speaker 1: business UM and the business in the industry has changed significantly.
Speaker 1: That being said, there's always going to be an audience
Speaker 1: for adult movies that are great about great stories, great characters,
Speaker 1: that are really important topics. And I think that there's
Speaker 1: nobody who does those types of stories better than our company.
Speaker 1: And so those are the types of movies that we
Speaker 1: have been making. That being said, you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: surprising because we do have you know, movies at Netflix,
Speaker 1: we hopefully will sell movies to Amazon UM and the
Speaker 1: movies that we are also making for theatricals are a
Speaker 1: broader range than what you would just think of UM
Speaker 1: as counting as properties. We have some comedies with some
Speaker 1: horror films, so UM a genre film sci fi. So
Speaker 1: we really do have movies that are across a wider
Speaker 1: spectrum and I do believe that that is going to
Speaker 1: be a significant part of our business. The industry has
Speaker 1: opened up because you now have these different platforms that
Speaker 1: you can sell other types of movies too, So hopefully
Speaker 1: it will make our business even more robust because there
Speaker 1: are more choices. On the television side, it's just insatiable.
Speaker 1: I mean, be it either on the scripted side or
Speaker 1: the unscripted side, there's so much opportunity. We've gone into
Speaker 1: a first look with Anonymous and paramount UM, and I
Speaker 1: think that our articles and our type of storytelling on
Speaker 1: the scripted side is incredibly well suited for what they've
Speaker 1: been able to do in the industry and they feel
Speaker 1: the same of us UM. And then the non scripted side,
Speaker 1: we've had amazing success. We have eight series that are
Speaker 1: either on the air in production. UM Last Chance You
Speaker 1: has been nominated for numerous awards. Fastest Cars, which is
Speaker 1: on Netflix now um is a big it for them,
Speaker 1: and we have a series that we're shooting around the world. Um.
Speaker 1: So it's a business that sixty seven billion dollars is
Speaker 1: going to be spent this year alone on long form production.
Speaker 1: So you can't look at the business and say there's
Speaker 1: not a big piece of the pie um for everybody,
Speaker 1: because sixty seven billion dollars is a lot of money,
Speaker 1: um in production dollars. So we hope to be in
Speaker 1: there getting um, you know, a significant chunk. I think
Speaker 1: the i P that we have really is an entree
Speaker 1: to a lot of opportunity for us. So it sounds like,
Speaker 1: whether it's film or TV, you're gonna be doing a
Speaker 1: lot of selling uh to a lot of the streaming services,
Speaker 1: which is obviously that opportunity is only going to grow,
Speaker 1: I'm but it also sounds like you're not necessarily giving
Speaker 1: up on theatrical that even if you're not making two
Speaker 1: million dollar movies, you've got some things up your sleeve
Speaker 1: that you think could still work. Yes, And I think
Speaker 1: we you know, we make different things for different reasons,
Speaker 1: right Um. Obviously having a big box office hit is
Speaker 1: certainly on our roadmap, you know, and does that look
Speaker 1: like a big ten pole movie could be, could be.
Speaker 1: You know, we have The Street and Smith Library, which
Speaker 1: is Doc Savage in the Shadow, So we do have
Speaker 1: some I P that is in the superhero world. But
Speaker 1: the reality is that you know, comedies, you know, um
Speaker 1: genre films are also you know, breaking out and can
Speaker 1: be very profitable. And so really our goal is to
Speaker 1: make sure that we are at least diverse enough in
Speaker 1: the types of movies that we make to be able
Speaker 1: to be everywhere that the audience wants to be. And
Speaker 1: if the storytelling is good enough and if the film
Speaker 1: is good enough, you know, it's it's what it's always been,
Speaker 1: you know, people will go seek great entertainment. Moving back
Speaker 1: to the digital side, Uh, you just announced that your
Speaker 1: new fronts that you're gonna You're already out there on
Speaker 1: the platforms like YouTube and Facebook and whatnot with brands
Speaker 1: like Vogue and g Cube, but now you're gonna take
Speaker 1: some of those Conde Nast brands and put them on
Speaker 1: O T T platforms where in connected TV will be
Speaker 1: able to watch all sorts of say content from Wired.
Speaker 1: Maybe charge for that. Talk about that, because to me
Speaker 1: that feels like a real stretch from how we've come
Speaker 1: to understand these brands. So what we've built is an
Speaker 1: incredible library for most of our brands, and the library
Speaker 1: of content you know, has driven millions and millions of
Speaker 1: views on the platforms as you as you said, um,
Speaker 1: but it is the perfect base for these O T
Speaker 1: T channels. And then on top of the library that
Speaker 1: we already have, will start to make original content for
Speaker 1: the O T T channels as we start to understand
Speaker 1: what the viewers expectations are watching the content, probably from
Speaker 1: their living room on an O T T channel. Um.
Speaker 1: And then from there the programming will get more sophisticated
Speaker 1: and get more expensive. I'm sure, but the idea is
Speaker 1: that we now have verticals that are relevant to a
Speaker 1: younger demographic. They probably will be UM on on on
Speaker 1: a tile with a lot of other tiles, and you know,
Speaker 1: how do you select what you're going to watch? They
Speaker 1: will at least know what Wired programming is about. They
Speaker 1: will know what Bone app content is about or g
Speaker 1: Q because they will have watched those channels. We have
Speaker 1: millions and millions of subscribers on our YouTube channel, so
Speaker 1: we know we already have a built an audience. So
Speaker 1: it's just taking that audience and now starting to expand
Speaker 1: and filter what we're what we're programming for an O
Speaker 1: T T platform. But we've done a lot of the
Speaker 1: groundwork in terms of building the content library, building the subscribers,
Speaker 1: building the viewer base, and now how do we just
Speaker 1: elevate it and bring it onto another platform. But man,
Speaker 1: that discovery challenge that scares me a little bit because
Speaker 1: you know, use the word tiles. Viewers have a lot
Speaker 1: of tiles to sort through, and with brands that they
Speaker 1: may be more used to seeing and connected TV than
Speaker 1: they do brands. But we do have a huge leg
Speaker 1: up and I'll tell you the two reasons. One is
Speaker 1: because at least their brands, their brands that are well known. UM,
Speaker 1: We've got a lot of people who are competing on
Speaker 1: UM for the shelf space on O T T that
Speaker 1: for the brands are not well known. These are at
Speaker 1: least brand names that people will recognize, so there's going
Speaker 1: to be at least the likelihood that they will check
Speaker 1: it out. And then we have built these audiences twelve
Speaker 1: billion views last year, a loan of people who know
Speaker 1: what these brands are about in digital video, and so
Speaker 1: I have to believe that with the base of all
Speaker 1: of those viewers and then all the subscribers that we
Speaker 1: have on these different platforms, we'll be able to migrate
Speaker 1: some of them. Now, well, we have to build those
Speaker 1: up and and start from scratch again. Of course we will,
Speaker 1: but at least we have some foundation there that's not
Speaker 1: really making a start from ground zero. We may be
Speaker 1: starting from like the second level, um, and then we
Speaker 1: just have to be able to delight and inspire and
Speaker 1: entertain the viewer to come back over and over again.
Speaker 1: And that's really the challenge. Well, it's gonna be an
Speaker 1: interesting challenge to see you pursue in the coming year.
Speaker 1: It sounds like you've got a lot on your plate
Speaker 1: and wish you luck with that. Thank you so much,
Speaker 1: and he's great to be here. Thanks thanks for listening.
Speaker 1: Be sure to tune in next week for another episode
Speaker 1: of Strictly Business. M