Mornin! This is Sean McNulty (connect with me on LinkedIn here if ya like), and here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on WEDNESDAY, December 25, 2024.
Where yes, it’s a Christmas Day edition of The Wakeup! I asked Richard what he wanted this year, and he said a newsletter. 🤷♂️
Thus:
I will not be asking Richard what he wants for Christmas next year.
I really hope my niece likes the McLean Stephenson-autographed VHS box set of Hello, Larry season 1 that I was previously planning to give Richard.
AND: To my U.K. readers, hope you’ve been enjoying your Loire Cremant 🍾 to celebrate the holidays this year — ALDI had to take the step to limit customers to just 2 bottles each of the seemingly quite popular $6 #NotChampagne this month.
FINALLY: Seth Cohen’s dream has come together in 2024 for the first time since 2005. . . a happy holiday to you all, whichever you are celebrating!
EVERYBODY’S AN EXPERT, 2024 Edition
So, about 3 years ago . . . there was seemingly an unusual amount of predictions being made by research firms of . . . varying reputations about the numbers we should be expecting to see in our fair business in a few years — aka, right about now.
In a move I can only explain as my Jersey side coming out (Oh yeah, buddy?! Let’s see how good ya are come 2024!), I started collecting the links . . . and there’s no time like the holidays to tell people how you really feel show people up.
So, here are some of the greatest hits from my collection of research, as I hand out my 2024 Everyone’s An Expert Awards (working title), starting with something more recent . . . but then finishing up with some whoppers, as well as how my own predictions fared in 2024.
The “That Was Fast! 😬” Award goes to:
Jan. 2024 — MOFFETTNATHANSON estimated YOUTUBE TV had 6.9M subscribers.
Feb. 2024 — YOUTUBE TV announces it has over 8M subscribers.
Looking ahead — MN predicted in March that YT TV would have 12M subs in 2026.
We’ll see what that new $83 a month price point does for sub growth.
The “Proud As a Peacock! 🦚” Award goes to:
Jan 2021 — MACQUARIE RESEARCH predicts 52M PEACOCK subscribers by 2024
Actual number: 34M by the end of Q1 2024
The “Password Crackdowns, amirite? 🙄” Award goes to:
Oct. 2022 — MOFFETTNATHANSON prediction for NETFLIX US/CAN subscriber growth in 2023: 2%
Actual number: 7.8%
The “Bob Iger Says ‘Thanks, Buddy’ 😏” Award goes to:
Feb. 2021 — DIGITAL TV RESEARCH predicts DISNEY+ subscribers will surpass NETFLIX subscribers globally by 2026.
Okay yes, to be fair . . . 2026 isn’t here yet, but here’s where things stand:
NETFLIX: 283M
DISNEY+ (including HOTSTAR): 158M
Get to work, DISNEY Streaming!
The “Now Do HULU too! 🙏” Award goes to:
Oct 2021 — MOFFETTNATHANSON predicted 65M HULU subs by end of 2024
Q3 2024: 52M
The “Your TV is Bigger Than Your Eyes! 👀” Award goes to:
April 2021 — STRATEGY ANALYTICS predicted that 72M homes globally would have 8K resolution TVs by . . . pretty much now (“by 2025”).
Do you know anyone who has an 8K TV?
I can’t even find any pieces in 2024 tracking 8K TV sales.
Best I saw was something at the end of 2023, projecting . . . 600k 8K TV sales in 2024.
The “Remember FUBO Hype? 🥴” Award goes to:
August 2021 — FUBO CEO David Gandler predicted that the company can get to “anywhere between 3 million and 5 million” subscribers by 2026.
Q3 2024 total subs: 1.6M in North America (and 387k globally — but FUBO made just $9M from these folks in Q3 so . . . I’m not counting these)
The “Icebergs Melt Faster Than Ya Think 🤔” Award goes to:
Nov 2021: MOFFETTNATHANSON predicted the TV bundle will decline to 73M subs in 2024.
LEICHTMAN RESEARCH put the number around 71M going into 2024.
AND FINALLY . . .
The “Someone Actually Paid For This Research Award 😂” goes to:
June 2022: MCKINSEY predicted that metaverse spending will hit $5 Trillion by 2030.
As far as I can tell, it has not updated this projection — but hey, we still have a good 5 years to go!
OKAY, MY TURN
Never let it be said Wakeup guy can dish it but can’t take it . . .
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