Accordingto Harvard’s Nathan Nunn and Yale’s Nancy Qian, 22% of the increase in population growth after 1700 could be attributed to the potato. Requiring no tools, potatoes were easy to grow – and that fact, combined with the vegetable’s health benefits,… Continue Reading →
Whenever a prospective investor used to contact me, he or she assumed that we were printing money because the vast majority of our “lifestyle” (food, travel, etc.) videos looked as if there was a marketer footing the bill for them… Continue Reading →
Advance Publications’ Conde Nast underwent some cost-cutting measures after the 2008-09 economic meltdown. It’s now looking to maximize the value of its portfolio in countless ways. But while the company has gotten a lot of press for the creation and… Continue Reading →
When Henry Blodget announced that Amazon’s Jeff Bezos had led a $5 million investment round in Business Insider, PaidContent’s founder Rafat Ali tweeted about the “Dawn of fat content startups.” Indeed, Business Insider ($19 million), Buzzfeed ($46 million), Cheezburger ($37… Continue Reading →
It’s inevitable that everybody and anybody will play armchair quarterback with YouTube’s decision to spend $300 million on content ($100 million on production, $200 million on promotion). The irony is that by democratizing video content creation and consumption, YouTube unearthed… Continue Reading →
Most entrepreneurs these days are influenced by the likes of Steve Jobs or Mark Zuckerberg, but that is because they’re building tech companies. For those who are building media companies, there’s a good chance that they look up to the… Continue Reading →
According to eMarketer, online-video advertising spending is expected to top $4.1 billion this year, up 41% from 2012. (This and all the following stats were first cited in a Wall Street Journal piece by Suzanne Vranica.) Any way you look at it,… Continue Reading →
Clash of the Titans: Evolving Roles for Silicon Valley and Hollywood If Hollywood sometimes believes that it’s the center of the world, then Silicon Valley is a firm believer that it’s the center of the universe. That’s why the storyline… Continue Reading →
Are teens spending less time on Facebook? Likely. Ultimately, the problem with being the latest shiny toy in techland is that eventually a shinier toy comes along. That, in a nutshell, is the dark cloud looming over Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook:… Continue Reading →
In January 2011, Orange acquired 49% of French company DailyMotion for $78 million. Last month, it paid $80.6 million for the remaining 51%. While the $168 million total consideration is a tenth of what Google paid for YouTube, it does mark the… Continue Reading →
This past week I was talking to a media executive and told him about our 2010 decision to shift away from generic lifestyle content (skewed towards females) towards pop culture infotainment that men were interested in. He looked at me… Continue Reading →
In life, you’re either wrong — or you’re right until you’re wrong. Unless you’re blessed with a distinguished editorial voice from the get-go, finding one’s point of view is arguably the toughest challenge for any media company. In 2006, I… Continue Reading →
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