Ok what's it all about?

I have found many of the interviews and articles written at this years "All Things D" conference interesting. I love how Reed Hastings is now loved by everyone by his own admission due to him carrying and delivering media companies large checks. Investors are all looking at the new big thing to invest in and to talk up the ones they have already taken the gamble with. It got me thinking...what is the internet really going to shake out to be? Is there a tech bubble?

Well first of all I love innovation. I have always been one of those early adopters, first in line for the new shiny Apple thing, in Vegas they would call me a sucker, hell, in Vegas they DO call me a sucker. If we look at the progression of the entertainment industry, it has been fraught with nervousness. Bob Iger correctly reminisced that when VHS came to market, people were calling the end of cinema as everyone would watch movies at home. In fact, movie attendance didn't drop, but a new audience that was not going to the movies was captured at home. Innovation is always good, but at the end of the day, what it really comes down to is can you successfully run a business and make money?

There are so many companies out there with huge audiences online, who are not making a penny. There are phenoms like Twitter, that claim to bring down governments but really are just a vehicle to sell more tickets for Ashton Kutcher's new movie, (and even then it doesn't work egh Ashton?). If you really need to know what I am up to, and what I have to say continuously in under 140 characters then you're a sad b*stard, let's face it. FourSquare...OK I'm just checking into the Gym, the restaurant, the coffee shop...it's a bit of fun, but WHY??? I get all that and more on Facebook...hold on ...Facebook!!!

Now Facebook is a real thing. By that what I mean is, I get it, I get the business, I get how they're going to make money, it's a Google. At ATD Eric Schmidt said that there are really a "gang of four" companies on the internet, Google, Facebook, Amazon and Apple:

Google - Doh, when you become a part of the lexicon, you're not going anywhere.

Facebook - It's like MySpace but with all your friends, no hookers hitting you up, and social tools, just get more advertising there and it's done.

Amazon - Check my credit card bill, home run, they got me, one click purchase never looked so good.

Apple - I bow to the gods of Apple; Jobs, Cook, Ive ...these people are gods to me and can adopt me any day!

But what's missing from the list? The content king? Where's content?

Hulu. First of all the wow was in the execution. It was/is flawless. I see the problem being that the partners don't really want to play ball, in fact, I think they would rather be attracting all the traffic to their own destinations or iPad apps. Just like cable, everyone is fighting for premium licensing fees and Hulu struggles to make ends meet on their sales.

Netflix. Let's be honest, no matter what Reed says, Netflix is the Comcast of the internet. It's a brilliant company, but again has to write huge checks to studios to distribute their content. They will only love you whilst the checks roll in.

But what about original content? I think it's time for a shift in perspective when it comes to original content. For a start, there's You Tube home made content. As brilliant as you Tube is, (and I am imagining that Eric Schmidt was rolling YT into Google in his gang of four), there is only a certain market for dog on skateboard or a fruit insulting other fruit. So YT goes out and buys Next New Networks, a company formed by friends and ex-bosses of mine, Jed Simmons and Fred Siebert. This is a smart move and signals that YT is getting into original content. The problem is the perception, that the content should be short form, low budget content. I think the time, it's a changing.

Sony's "Crackle", is actively looking to make new content, but have you actually watched or even heard of anything they've made? It's time to start looking at original online content just like normal cable content. You make programming that attract an audience and you market it. There seems to be this lingering "Web 2.0" idea that nothing on the web actually needs marketing..."people will just find it". Not true, if you make something, market it to the audience you're making it for. There's also this crazy thought that all marketing should be online. It's like saying cable companies would only advertise on cable.

At AOL I took a kids cartoon, and built it up through promotion and marketing both offline and online, sold it from online to TV, build a licensing business around it with 22 separate licenses worth million of dollars, all in under two years. One small, never heard of before kids property, front cover of Variety! Am I a genius, (those of you who know me will attest the answer is no), it's just the way you do it.

Anyhow, rant over for now. The future for the internet is simple:

Commerce

Community

Content

Search

Commerce...it's ubiquitous, Community...Facebook, Search... Google. The fact is no one has become the original content king yet, and that's a territory worth grabbing.

That's all for now.

Mal

I'm back

Well it's been over a year and I have finally been able to get back into this blogger account. Mainly for my own amusement, but also for anyone who is interested, I am going to start my rants and raves about life, the universe, the industry and anything else that comes my way.

The man who knows nothing is back. I'm glad to say that over the past year I have learnt a few things...how to mess up a carefully planned proposal in Paris by flubbing the words and coming out with the immortal line, "you wanna make it permanent". I also found out how hard it is to get back into the work place when you have not been "on the scene" for three years, even though I ran the most successful reverse merger fund in recent history through the largest recession and financial collapse in recent global history.

So let's examine the work environment:

A brief history in time...ran international programming for Hollywood Studio, launched three TV networks, two online networks, produced thousands of hours of TV, won two Emmy's, nominated for three, raised $85MM and turned it into the most successful reverse merger in SPAC history for a valuation of $173MM...and yet apparently there's nothing out there?

Not that every headhunter/job should be beating a path to my door...but you would think there would be some exciting things floating around. In my opinion my mistake is in effect, to disappear from the industry PR machine. When I ran KOL and RED at AOL, I must admit I was in the press a lot...but to be fair, we had a lot to talk about. When I left and ran the SPAC fund, there wasn't an opportunity to "PR myself", and so to the entertainment industry the profile faded.

So if the headhunters are not calling, and there's not big gig in sight, what do you do? Many people have said I should go and set something up and run it. The problem being that the one thing that really turns my lights on is original online content, and it's tough to raise money for that. VC's either think they know it and it's failed, or don't understand it so it's failed. The existing business model is broken, and I would need someone to really drink the cool aid to back me, and so far that person alludes me. The other problem is that the original online content world, unfortunately, is full of failures. Companies that did not sort on the one thing that you have to be able to do...make a profit. It is no use if your online blog is getting a million people reading and viewing it, if you can't sell the impressions and make a profit. The most basic part of business, it costs me $1 to do so I need to sell it for $2 to make a profit. Now call me crazy, but even without an MBA, I think I can work out that one.

Also, for some reason, people have this "web 1.5" attitude that whatever you do on the web will magically find an audience and then virally spread like wildfire and get a huge audience. Well I tend to go for the "web 3.625" version of, when you build a product you have to let people know it's there and market it. At KOL and RED I built the whole business on the back on online content and made a lot of original content. Off the back of that I built a business valued at over $150MM after three years, and an estimated five year value of $500MM.

It's a little bit like NBC launching and marketing a programming slate, and nobody watching...oh hold on, bad example. But, if you want to launch successful online content you have to have a successful marketing strategy.

So anyhow, back to jobs. Is it time for me to retire, buy a small radio station in Carmel and play "Misty"?

Are we living in the land of giants?

I have two nephews, Charlie and Toby, who are 13 and 14 respectively. They are both tall! I am not talking tall for their age...they are tall. Charlie the 14 year old is almost as tall as me and I am 6'1". I was walking through New York today noticing that the kids who are grabbing their last days of freedom before school starts, are all huge! I think this next generation is living in the land of giants!

OK so it's been a long time...

...apologies, things have been busy. So today let's talk social networking. Everyone used to talk about the revolutionary "Friendster", are you on Friendster, have your "friended me", things like that. The only problem was, it wasn't a great service and didn't attract enough people to gain mass. For example... AIM, owned and created by AOL, based on simple file server "pings", grew to such a mass, that it will always be around. The thinking is, everyone know is on my buddy list, therefore I will use it! MySpace, came along and it really blew Friendster out of the water. EVERYONE got a MySpace account. The problem there was, MySpace wasn't just MySpace, it became, everyone who wants to get at my space, and the social networking SPAM started. I got, on average 5 friend invites from busty blond women who "travel to DC, or NY" every day. I think they worked in a certain area of the entertainment industry! Now as much as I love pretty young things, these were not my idea of "Friends" and I certainly didn't go looking for them. MySpace grew to a huge level, and it looked like they would become the unbeatable "google" of social networking...but along came Facebook.

At first, Facebook was only open to students, but when they decided to open the gates, for some reason, everyone I knew, immediately signed up. Admittedly the UI was much better than MySpace, and it became a very quick addiction to myself and many of my friends.

So why did everyone immediately sign up for Facebook? People abandoned MySpace and jumped ship, it seemed almost overnight? What made this social network (we'll call David) beat the much larger network (Goliath)?? What makes a social network work????

A couple of weeks ago I e-mailed a cross section of people from my address book and invited them to a mobile app called "looped". It's a cool idea, you register and when you want people to knew where you are, you log on, it shows your location and the location of friends of yours, in your network who want to be found. Out of the 100 people I mailed, 4 signed up, and only two used it, and since then they and me have stopped. It just doesn't have the "magic sauce" to attract the mass needed to sustain and grow a social network. IF it did, it would be really cool, to walk down to Union Sq and find other friends in the near vicinity and grab a coffee. But it doesn't.

What makes a social network work. BTW, anyone with the correct answer and formula congratulations you are now very very rich, or should be :)

Lose It update

Well it's getting tougher on the weight loss. I am down to 197lbs, which for me is a milestone because my weight has a 1 in front of it and for the past 12 years it's had a 2 lol. I maintain 3 miles a day in the gym plus full work out, sometimes more, but have hit the hard last 15 lbs that everyone told me I would. Still keeping a religious count of all my calories on "Lose It", on the iPhone and it will get me to where  I want to be I am sure. Onwards!!!!!

Update - Paul Schmidi Schmidman

Family will probably be arranging a memorial in LA around September. As I learn more details I will pass on.

Paul "Schmidi" Schmidman - RIP

Yesterday I learnt of the sad news that Paul Schmidman, a friend and colleague from AOL had taken his life.  Sometimes you feel you know someone really well, sometimes you feel like you know someone quite well, but in Schmidi's case, as much as I spent hours and hours with him in, in-depth discussion, I really did not know the guy. The truth is, no one did, he is an enigma.  For those who knew Schmidi you know he had what could be called an "alternate" universe, where situations and stories blurred the edges of reality.  The thing that we did know, he was not a malicious person, but he sure did some crazy things. Schmidi we will miss you.