1/ Thoughts on Disney's Analyst Day.

Obviously a longtime Disney D2C bull; I was astounded, shocked by slate's quality, range, volume.

This is Disney going beyond a digital "Vault" plus originals. It is saying all of your favorite stories, more,

2/ Not just a stronger Disney+, but one that hugely raises the tablestakes of competition, growth, press coverage, notability.

Paramount+ plans new Star Trek year round. Feels quaint now. Peacock will have a Jurassic Park + Fast series eventually. Cool.

https://t.co/yaH4k4L1GA
3/ In "Content, Cars, and Comparisons in the 'Streaming Wars'", I wrote about how Disney $1B in content spend gets several billion of equivalent spend through its resonance

Mando was a top 5 show per @ParrotAnalytics in 2019. Disney thinks it can have 10 "Top 5s" a year.
4/ Trade talk can be misleading, but it takes only a cursory look at Twitter, the most popular shows of the past decade (Walking Dead, Thrones, Mando, Stranger Things), Disney's dominance at the box office (8 of top 10 in 2019) and wonder how to beat this

https://t.co/t8l0tQvuu1
5/ Roadmap doesn't just suck oxygen out of streaming wars (as Netflix did from 2014-18), it will enable Disney+ to rapidly grow its price

If I pay $54 a year to use Disney+ for 2 months, what happens when it's year-round?

Worth $15 month in 2023.

https://t.co/wyLkyzfqi8
6/ Disney obviously sandbagged its original 60-90MM estimate, but elevating this forecast to 230-260MM on the same time horizon, one year in, has to be the largest elevation at a company of this size... ever?
7/ Disney spoke about how much more popular Disney+ was with households without kids. That's key.

At the same time, half of those I know with kids... had set-up iPads for their kids to watch a four hour corporate event... out of enthusiasm for Disney+. That's unreplicable
8/ This is an impossibly great company. And still surprised.

From Oct 2019:
Disney, IP, and "Returns to Marginal Affinity"
https://t.co/8Rapc2gHi4
https://t.co/KDwt3Lh2c9
9/ Also important is to note the extraordinary talent Disney was able to attract despite (1) Capped backends; (2) IP constraints; (3) Disney+ centric distribution.

Darren Aronofsky making Disney+ docuseries? Patty Jenkins doing Star Wars? Amy Adams doing an Enchanted 2?

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1/“What would need to be true for you to….X”

Why is this the most powerful question you can ask when attempting to reach an agreement with another human being or organization?

A thread, co-written by @deanmbrody:


2/ First, “X” could be lots of things. Examples: What would need to be true for you to

- “Feel it's in our best interest for me to be CMO"
- “Feel that we’re in a good place as a company”
- “Feel that we’re on the same page”
- “Feel that we both got what we wanted from this deal

3/ Normally, we aren’t that direct. Example from startup/VC land:

Founders leave VC meetings thinking that every VC will invest, but they rarely do.

Worse over, the founders don’t know what they need to do in order to be fundable.

4/ So why should you ask the magic Q?

To get clarity.

You want to know where you stand, and what it takes to get what you want in a way that also gets them what they want.

It also holds them (mentally) accountable once the thing they need becomes true.

5/ Staying in the context of soliciting investors, the question is “what would need to be true for you to want to invest (or partner with us on this journey, etc)?”

Multiple responses to this question are likely to deliver a positive result.