[steveh]

There's a second part now too: https://redef.com/original/56d0d7db63c0b49f224c5e9f

Conclusion:

If you were in it, the old television model was a godsend. Anyone with channel space could establish a feed and those that failed (or arrived too late) had the luxury of falling back on the feed-like Pay TV experience. What’s more, Pay TV dynamics meant that all customers were shared, just as easily found as they were lost, and participation ensured both years of locked-in revenue. Online will work very differently. Mass entertainment will shift to winner takes most, with the largest services monopolizing profits and social networks controlling the destiny of much of the remainder. There will be dozens of successful niche video distributors, but only those able to establish passionate, multi-media audience communities will realize significant value.

If the major media conglomerates are unable to succeed with the aforementioned over-the-top offerings, they will, according to them, thrive through competition between competing content buyers. Unfortunately, this view overestimates the likely number of sustainable long-term distributors and underestimates concentration of power. As a result, most will find their content modularized, relegated to simple inputs for those who do own a feed – which will make cost cutting, long Hollywood’s neglected half of the profit equation, crucial. As the American newspaper industry faced the decline of its own “feed” – an editorial bundle that carried attention from national news through to sports and crosswords – revenues dropped by more than 50% and expenses became the dominant profit lever. Thanks to still-significant production barriers and a greater share of consumer time, the video business will fare much better than print, but those banking on a lucrative sequel to Pay TV will find only disappointment.