☀️ UNI Animation Takes Massive Share of NETFLIX Views
AMAZON orders Kidman, Jamie Lee series / DISNEY sues for nearly $1B in India biz / YT copies SVODs in redesign
Mornin! This is Sean McNulty (connect with me on LinkedIn here if ya like), and here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on THURSDAY, September 19, 2024.
Where AI is expanding its horizons, and is now going to know just how much you hate your T-MOBILE service.
The company is giving OPENAI millions of customer interactions from its “T-Life” app, so at least ChatGPT will learn some creative new ways to curse people out, and up its ability to be passive-aggressive.
It’ll also hopefully help the company find new insights and recommendations to fix why people leave T-MOBILE — I just really hope one of the top issues isn’t “poor automated customer service,” and conclusions being “pay employees more to attract better talent,” because I don’t know that ChatGPT is developed enough yet to have that awkward of a conversation with T-MOBILE execs.
MORE GOOD NEWS: John Malone’s nephew is finally catching a break in life — Daniel Sanchez was added to the WBD board as it expands to 12 members. His career was mainly in tax law.
He is also on the boards of Uncle Johnny’s LIBERTY GLOBAL and LIBERTY LATAM, and was previously on the boards of Malone-invested companies like LGF and DISCOVERY (he left when the WBD deal was finalized).
NOW: This, ladies & gentlemen, is how you book a show. So — who’s getting the post-election day slot? #PlaceYourBets
THEN: Here are the Top 10 highest-paid athletes in the world from Sportico’s latest roundup of the Top 100.
4 of the Top 10 are backed by Middle East money, and there are 4 NBA players on there before we get to an NFL star — being more global has its benefits.
So yeah — NFL players, get ready for more long-haul flights in the season by later in the decade.
OH: One of my favorite podcasters is back! Former Recode Media pod host Peter Kafka now owns & runs his own #mediabiz pod on the VOX network, called Channels — a new pod episode is up now with YT CEO Neal Mohan, including a dive into the strategy behind YOUTUBE TV here in 2024.
WAKEUP BOX OFFICE POLL
PAR’s Transformers One looks to add the next shot of cash into the box office, looking at $30M+, so whaddaya got?
A THANKS: To the NYU Tisch Graduate Film program for the invitation to come speak yesterday — I always love any opportunity to come chat with the next generation of our industry (email me anytime seanmcnultynyc@gmail.com), and certainly a very smart bunch here — coming from a lot of different perspectives and backgrounds!
The kids told me this is called a selfie? 🤷♂️
NETFLIX H1 ‘24 Data Dump — Initial Observations
Well, Christmas came early this year . . . as NETFLIX did its bi-annual data dump about 2 months earlier than it has done previously. 🥳
Obviously a lot to parse through here to find the real insights (so make sure you’re a paid subscriber for more over the next week), but after nosing around for a bit, here are some impressions on the films side. Again, this data is only for releases through June 30, 2024, so there’s nothing on things like Axel F or the great hot dog “eating” contest of 2024.
But — one observation is blatantly clear . . . and it’s very positive for Hollywood studios!