 My name is Andres Martinez. I'm the editorial director of Future Tense, and I'm a professor of practice at the Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University. As many of you know, Future Tense is a collaboration between New America, the DC think tank, Slate Magazine, and Arizona State University. We explore the impact of technology on society. Today's event is going to be, is going to consist of two acts. We're going to have a one-on-one conversation with Michael Burns. And then close to the half hour, we're going to switch gears and have a round table or more of these sort of Brady box discussion with folks who cover the industry. And we're going to talk about streaming, the streaming wars and where, where, where all that's headed. But first off, I want to welcome Michael Burns. Michael really, really excited and happy that you could do this with us. I know you're busy. Michael is the vice chairman at Lionsgate. He is known. He's been in that role since 2000. He is known in the industry for helping to position Lionsgate as one of the real innovators when it comes to content creation in Hollywood. And he was involved with the, with the acquisition of the stars network. And also with the, the collaboration that, that Lionsgate has with three arts entertainment. And I should mention here that we at Future Tense have a fiction project that is working closely with, with three arts. It's a speculative fiction on slate and work with three arts to try to get some of those stories adapted for other media. And that's, that's a very exciting collaboration that we have that's, that's going very well. So I definitely wanted to mention that. I also saw that yesterday, stars acquired one of the seasons of slow burn which slate created as a podcast, the Watergate story. But I thought that was, that was funny that that happened. I saw that yesterday. So it's another sort of tie in with a with a big star, Julia Roberts Roberts, one of my slave colleagues that were now coworkers. So I thought that was great. And most important of all, I should mention, Michael, you're a Sun Devil, you're an ASU alum class of 1980. So that's, that's really excited. And in that conjunction, I wanted to ask you about, I understand you had a role as a, as a active and influential Sun Devil in Hollywood, you had a role in the recent announcement that ASU is going to have the Sydney Plotier New American Film School. And this is sort of a relaunch and a more ambitious version of a film school that the university is going to have that's going to be centered in Mesa and Arizona and on our campus in the Phoenix area, but also in Los Angeles in our center that ASU has acquired the old Harold examiner building and have a lot of programs in downtown in the lake, which is, which is really going to be terrific starting a year or two, including the Cronkite school but maybe just if we could just start off by, if you could talk a little bit about what you think the significance is of ASU having the Sydney Plotier New American Film School, your role in that and it's sort of a way it's a promotional to a certain extent for those of us at the university but I do I actually wanted to start this conversation with the topic of inclusive storytelling. I mean, future tense is all about looking at the impact of technology on things, but obviously one of the big stories of 2020 is the sort of this reckoning that we're having as a society on social justice racial justice issues. And I think it's, if we're going to talk about storytelling we have to talk about whose stories are we telling. And so, again, thank you for being with us and brought invitation to talk about that that school and then the broader story of how you see the industry taking the heart or not perhaps that the lessons of 2020 and what kind of changes might we see and, and in terms of who stories are we telling and who's represented on the screen. Okay, let me just, I had a small role in the, and getting the Sydney Plotier and his family behind attaching their name to the film school. And that really came about certain, certainly purposely. But anyway, what I was having dinner with my dear friend Billy freakin and sherry Lansing sherry is the first woman to run a studio way back when Billy is a director that's done some great movies the exorcist and, and the French connection and you know, they're very dear friends of mine. And I, I would say once a month go to a dinner party at their house this is, you know, before the world shut down. And a number of years ago I sat next to Joanna and Sydney Poitier, and got to know them a little bit. And then, then fast forward a number of years and I was talking to Michael Crow, a fellow by the name of Adam college who teaches out here is great this film spark program. And I was talking about they were talking about they're going to they bought that building in downtown LA which is a fantastic building. And we talked about, you know, what are we going to do, how are we going to name it and then we talked about the Cronkite school and then we talked about Saturday or Conner the law school. And, and they talked about, you know, inclusive and the idea of diversity and which I've been a big proponent of for a very long time, and the industry really has to catch up. And they said, what do you think. And I said, look, I got a name that would be great I have no idea whether he would do it, but Sydney Poitier would be fantastic I've met him once or twice. So, you know, then they went through the, the process internally and said that that would be a great addition and augment the launch of the school out here. And it may say and in Phoenix so I called up Sherry and she put you back in touch with the Poitier family and, and I gave them the pitch of why I thought that would be fantastic and after a little a few weeks back and forth and Michael got involved and Steve Tepper got involved and, and ultimately, the Poitier family agreed to do it. And that was exciting so that was just a small role but I thought that was a great get for the university. And as far as, as far as diversity, you know, if you go back years and years ago I think the industry does terrible job, or has done terrible job in the past I think we're getting better the Academy is getting better as far as people of color and, and diverse members but I helped organize with Lionsgate and initiative with Kamala Harris who's an old friend of mine at the time. I'm not even sure she was a US Senator at that point but she and I she's a graduate of Howard University my strong belief is to to for us to see these candidates that ultimately enter the industry you have to get to them early. And what I mean by that is have them become interns. So I went to business school at UCLA so work with the university there with a fellow by the name of Sanjay and Al Osborne who was the one of the deans and we ultimately figured out accommodation so we we opened up a bunch of I think we started off with a dozen interns to predominantly black colleges, Howard University is which is where Kamala went, and we launched that program and it was very successful. We didn't do it, obviously this past summer because of the pandemic, but we think we'll continue to do that so. And I also think if you take a look at stars, which is something a company that we own stars is very much about show runners African Americans, people of color. And not trying to be all things to all people. But if you look at the, the programming history whether it's power we have an upcoming series with them called blind spotting. We have a great number of our leads and our shows are people of color. And so we are really, really making a gigantic effort there and the industry is certainly doing their best as well but we can all do better. Right. And do you think that, you know, it's going to be interesting to see like what are the lasting impacts of 2020 on on so many different fronts. And on the question of diversity and representation. I mean that that's that's a society wide reckoning. You know we're seeing it in academia, corporate America is going through I think what's what's a very, you know, constructive self examination and then the question is, you know, is this sort of a moment and then it fades or is there sort of lasting change I mean, and on this question 510 years from now and I was looking over the weekend at some of the figures of and clearly you guys are stand out. But this for Hollywood this has been a question now for a number of years, you know, even prior to 2020 obviously with a lot of debate around the nominations for the Oscars and so forth and how do you think we can evaluate whether this will be a true you know there'll be a true shift as a result of the last, you know, year or two in Hollywood's case. You know, 510 years from now when we look back what are some of the benchmarks I mean I think it's I think it's your, your, your right to say that a lot of this is path involves pathways and mentoring and access for folks and obviously that's on the academic side, you know, President Michael Crow and ASU is very invested in but as you as you progress, you know, 510 years from now what should we be looking for. If we're going to evaluate whether the, a lot of the soul searching from 2020 really had lasting permanent impact or not. I think it's changed forever I think that we're not going to go backwards from here. The question is how quickly we can go forward. So, I don't I, when people sort of, I never understood why people, including us I guess didn't recognize earlier but we were a little we were we ended up I think we've done 20 Tyler Perry movies when we did our first Tyler Perry movie. He was in Hollywood really knew who he was I mean he was basically selling DVDs out of the trunk of his car. And, you know, Tyler is now turned out to be this, this force to be reckoned with. We are doing this program 1619 a bunch of different ways on that that's going to be controversial on some side but we think that that is a story that should be told that Pulitzer Prize winning series. That take a look at the movie going population, it used to be that African Americans were 5% of the movie going population and call it 13% of the US population and then over the last few years that that that group really started going to the movies and it was close to they stayed at the same 13% of the population. It was about 20% of the movie going population and then when it came to genre movies even a higher percentage, the same same sort of trend exists with Hispanics. And, and so we are really paying attention to this and I think the entire industry is and I don't think that's going to change the same way that I think that the pandemic sort of the premium VOD day in date with theaters in many cases and this and now a 17 day window in many ways I don't I don't think that ever changes. So, you know, it's like that, that that Latin expression X male a bono out of bad comes good. And I think that, you know, that in this current scenario that a fair amount of good is going to come out of a bad. Thanks. And, you know, obviously we could we could spend more than an hour on this topic of diversity, but I do want to shift gears and touch upon what you were also getting at when we think about what what's going to remain with us from the previous year and in the case of the pandemic the sort of behavioral changes that were sort of forced upon us by circumstance. You know, I think when we talk about future entertainment, a question that's uppermost and everyone is, you know, are we all going to go back to the movie theaters with the same gusto that we, you know, used to go in 2018 2019, or is some of the sort of behavioral shift going to, you know, when you're making your planning do you assume that we're going to go back to that or is it going to be more that going to the movie theaters is going to become a rare thing that we're going to reserve for very, very special occasions, even once the all clear is sounded whenever that is on the on the sort of public health front, how do you how do you think of that. I think that people are going to go back to the movies I think people are sick of being trapped in their houses. I can tell you that kids kind of find them that they believe they're bulletproof. I think that's certainly going to help a lot and I think that if you look for like leading indicators, you know, look at you don't look farther than the box office in China last weekend. So, and so you just seeing huge numbers at some of these countries that are reopening. And I think that people will go back and I think that, you know, the one of the fastest growing demographics for theater going was older Americans I'm reading this book right now 2030 by this professor out of Wharton, and he was talking about, you know, the aging population. And it is aging in this country and that and, you know, you're seeing population growing pretty significantly places like Africa but not so much in America so this, this grain American population is going to be a is going to be a story for some and I think that that part of the population the older Americans are probably, I think it's very vaccine dependent in many ways to returning kids are going to turn come back in droves is my take. And I think maybe maybe they're going to be sick I hope that's the case with my 14 year old I hope that they're sick of video games. Although I understand Lionsgate is also in in the gaming space right. We're not in the gaming space but it's more about licensing our intellectual property like John Wick. We're not, I wouldn't consider us game developers we're again using the world class IP that we have and figuring out a way to monetize that and create great content typically with a partner. And a lot of your in your materials describing the collection of, you know, content properties that is Lionsgate you talk about the, you know, feature film division and television. And is, are we, are we going to get to the point where the sort of boundaries between TV and film are going to collapse into one it's sort of, and maybe again I'm still hung up on the sort of the experience of it on streaming where I feel like it's becoming a fuzzy line but well yeah no that's true, you know, I was thinking about we have a popular show on Netflix Dear White People that started out as a film for us. Blind spotting which I think will be a hit on stars. Again was a feature film star project for us that segway now into a to a television series intellectual property is intellectual property and great intellectual property can play and and many many different, many different ways and it never seems to die I mean we're doing another dirty dancing actually with Jennifer great. It was an old pal of mine but so there's a. There's certainly an opportunity to reformat recreate reimagine great intellectual property and and we're doing that there's and their authors were big up big on source material we're shooting with Mark Forrester. The last movie we did with Mark Forrester, he directed monster ball for us now 20 years later, he's doing the follow up to wonder which is called white bird we're shooting that in the Czech Republic. So, I think that that you'll always have that opportunity. You know, in terms of the, what's happening domestically and talking about representation you were talking about, you know, I think you were suggesting that in some ways that market forces are also playing a role because you know, studios should cater to and the content creators should cater to who the audience is and it's fascinating to me how, you know, when you think about sort of global picture and you were I think you were you were looting to the it's an industry that that is, you know, fully globalized I was looking at some numbers because, as I mentioned earlier to you I'm teaching a class on sport and globalization and sport is a industry that's not globalized the way Hollywood is I think prior to the year prior to the pandemic about three quarters of box office revenue for big Hollywood studios came from overseas. And in 1990 it was only like 35%. So, and the US economy accounts for about 24% of the world economy so that is kind of, you know, as it should be that three quarters come from outside. I guess one question I have is, how is that affecting the kind of content that that you're making for me. And how is that changing sort of your entire approach to what you do. Well, I, we're always looking at, you know, content from, you know, from a movie standpoint obviously you wanted to work in this market first. You have, you definitely take a look at how that something will play around the world and that could be either television shows or content this to the show power that we have on on stars and the power universe is a giant hit also in in the UK. I'm also a believer, as I said I'm reading this book and this 2030 I'm a huge believer and there's a giant opportunity in Africa, particularly as, as mobility gets there and, and you don't have to worry about the infrastructure of cable being later for that matter fiber optic so we're looking at all of that but there are shows you know we're we're based in a show I watched a show last night which was terrific not my show called industry which is on HBO. And you know then you'll also set shows in another great show you should watch it particularly your interest in sports I don't know if you've seen Ted Lasso. I love it. It's, it's, it's terrific you know but you've got that you know you get a little bit of the UK and a lot of Americana. And so that is a. So there's more of that going to continue to go on we're looking at I think it wouldn't be surprising to see stars producing one or two shows a season, local content in that particular country, because you want to have yes you want to have some American television shows and, but you also want to have a local content whether it be library productable movies or also brand new shows that are that are being shot in that particular region. So one thing I know, I don't quite understand to the extent that I'm sure my colleagues who are going to join in a discussion for the second segment who follow the industry to me it's it's a. It feels like you have this this studio which produces shows and I'm sure some of them you produce for your stars network but you also sell a lot of your movies and television shows to other platforms and I wonder. Is that kind of model something that is going to become anachronistic it feels like, you know, Netflix, creating its own content and then, you know, NBC universal creating peacock and saying well we don't want the office on Netflix anymore let's let's keep it all within our bailiwick here. It feels like we're recreating sort of like the early days of, you know, in a very high tech manner, but the early days of sort of like the marriage of content and distribution and the studio systems and, you know, we're going to get to the to a point where there's going to be some prime universe of creators who can only play in that sandbox and Netflix and peacock and HBO Max and and where do you. Is that a threat or an opportunity for you I just, how's this going to play itself out in the next five 10 years. I think that you're going to see, again, remember that we sort of like to zig when everybody else is zagging. So, I've been quoted years and years ago which is we want to be a benevolent arms deal in the world of content so what I mean by that is that we'll make shows develop that could ultimately end up on stars or they could end up on on Hulu or they could end up on Apple plus we have shows basically everywhere great show by the way called mythic quest on Apple Apple plus really terrific show and and then we have obviously something like is always extraordinary playlist on NBC. And we just announced we're doing First Ladies which was with showtime so we are capitalist, but we for a show that we think fits very well on stars they they usually have a pretty good role in making that show in stars is now in 52 countries outside of America so I think that we are going to continue to see others hoard their own product for their own platform. And that bodes well for us because what that means is that our library continues to get more valuable because everybody's desperate to have that that product. And that gives us a pretty good opportunity to have multiple bids so when you have, you don't have to be an economics major to know that when you have limited supply and increased demand that usually works out pretty well for the for the for the content that so we have the opportunity to license that much more frequently and at higher prices than we ever have in the past. And do you think that makes sense that it might bode well for you. Do you think it'll bode well for sort of the quality of television across the the board. You know, a lot of people like to say we're living in the golden age of TV and and I guess we've been saying that for a while and you've mentioned some, you know, going back to like mad men which which you all were responsible for and you know we could go on and on and there's just made there's not enough time to watch all the great stuff that's available. But at you know if a lot of these studios start hoarding their, their own stuff and lockdown talent in long term exclusive deals might is, you think there's a danger that that could affect the quality of offerings if people are kind of, you know, locked into a different Bayley Wicks and can't collaborate with each other or is each one of these universes diverse and large enough that that's not an issue. I mean back in the day that you know the US government decided that this vertical integration constituted a big problem and I guess there are plenty of arguments these days to be made that it's a different world we're not talking about studios owning actual physical movie theaters but conceptually I guess you know you could draw some analogies. Are you optimistic about kind of like that this golden age will continue to flourish and we'll see more of it or are there moving threats to to that. I think it's, I think it's, you know, you talked about the golden age of content I don't think it's a golden age of movie stars or television stars I think it's that it's now the golden age of writers and show runners talented writers and show runners, because if you take a look at the hit shows that are out there. You know, great, great television, which I think it's got some of the best writing in the history of the business right now, but you have look at the no one knew anybody on the mad men cast when that show launched. And I could give you example after example when you're our lead again and Zoe's extraordinary playlist no one had ever. I mean, maybe it's been seen her in a few small parts but not exactly a recognizable star she is now. So we have. Again, if you have the right I watched a pilot we did the other night called minks it's just a great pilot and I think we'll probably have a lot of interest from a lot of different places for that. I think that it's not so much about the movie stars getting tied up or the television stars getting tied up. It's about finding finding the right platform for them. And, and then also the reason that I think that there's availability and whether why these a lot of people are doing these shows even like for example Julia Roberts is going to do the show that you mentioned earlier for where she's playing Martha Mitchell that you know it's not a you know it's not like the old days it's not a seven eight year commitment. So we'll do the limited series and in some cases it'll be those series will be extended if everybody wants to do it like for example the big little lies and I think that started off as one season and now it's going into season four. That is a that's that that's the new way that the television shows are sort of, you know, exploding. So you mentioned that stars is not trying to be all things to all people and that in some ways can lead to sort of, you know, real cutting edge, interesting programming but you know what as as a Hollywood power broker leader big shot pick your term like how how many streaming services do folks like you and holly would expect you know the rest of us to to subscribe to I mean what what is a this is. I think it's going to be I think it's going to be four or five four or five I am. I watched the television show the other night my son, my 12 year old wanted to watch this show and it was on discovery. And I hadn't watched this television show with a lot of commercials in a long time it was exhausting. It was exhausting. But if you take a look at what's happening that you know people are now it's ingrained in them to watch these non commercials high end premium content. Without commercial break so I you know if I again I don't know one knows anything that's that's including me but I will tell you that I do believe that people will subscribe to four or five video services. If there are shows on that that that service that they love and they fall in love with it say it's like stars is again not trying to be anything to all people they were looking. My strategy was to deliver great shows to audience who had previously been overlooked. And, you know that could have been women, you know we thought there was an opportunity with a show like Outlander which does incredibly well or Spanish princess or white princess. So, we're trying to find the right product for for audiences that are desperate to find kind of shows that they want I like Netflix a lot. But I was banging around there the other day trying to figure out if there's anything else I wanted to watch, and I ended up, I ended up subscribing to hulu, because I wanted to watch this show, the industry. So, and so I heard so much about it and then I will be, I'm sure I will be on hulu for a while. Watching shows that are available on on hulu I think I saw a show. I can't remember if it was the great or maybe normal people, but the writing and again if you look at those shows there that look at normal people you've never seen either one of those two actors. And that we have that show overseas for for stars but again this is a, you know, a brand new set of actors that responded to the material it was based on a book. Yeah. That's amazing. I've had to sign up to two streaming services that I had no intention of signing up to because of this because of stick on me with the sport. So like CBS went off and acquired the Champions League rights. I'm a soccer fan and so suddenly I have to add CBS so that was and then peacock with the with the Premier League. But I mean I guess the last question related to this is, is the is the next trend going to be that we're going to we're going to have sort of streaming bundlers coming on to. Yeah, if you saw what YouTube announced the other day which was four or five premium services bundled at YouTube TV. That is a precursor what's going to happen so I think what happens again, I prefaced this by saying that no one knows anything but it certainly looks like history is repeating itself like the old cable companies, which is I think you'll see. I think you'll see somebody will say I like a show on stars. I like, I like a show on HBO. I want a music service so I'm going to have Apple or Spotify or YouTube music or Amazon music. And I'm going to. I also like a show. I like Apple plus. And so I think you'll have four or five. I think it'll be a couple of these guys including us will get together and say hey, we'll be part of the bundle. So, maybe not get as high economics if somebody bought it directly, but it will lower churn dramatically people don't like getting four or five bills and forgetting that they've subscribed to something so for sure. There will be these mini bundles of over the top services. And I believe that stars will be a part of many of those. And if you can lower the churn which is fairly significant because a lot of people say I want to watch my show, I'm done with my show, I move on I come back when the show comes back on the air. So that is, that's going to be the future. That's why those mini bundles are going to happen. I mean, it does sound suspiciously like the old cable operators history history repeats itself. The last question I can't I can't let you go without having you tell us your favorite TV show on your favorite movie of all time. Well, movies are. Look, I love. Sort of a sucker for such I love it's a wonderful life. I love butch casting a Sundance kid, the son of a Paradiso, you know, fantastic I like some of the series I love the John Wick series for us. You know, I, those are just a few of my movies. Television series I've discovered recently, because we're all stuck at home. I thought picky blinders was fabulous. But that show was great as I mentioned I like the great as well I liked, like normal people. And I started watching the industry last night which I'm very excited about there's there's a show on stars, it's kind of dark it's sort of the underbelly of Cape Cod called high town. That shows coming back for its second season it's it's superb violent but superb. And I did like Ted last so very much I thought it was very heartfelt. It was a great attitude to pandemic. If you like that show if you like that show the same sort of mentality watch. Watch a mythic quest on the apple plus that's that's our show on Apple. Well, Michael, time has flown by. And I know you're you're busy. We're going to shift. We're all busy. We're all busy. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for being with us and we'll keep we're going to keep watching and and maybe we can have a conversation like this. Again, in a year or two and see where things are. Thank you so much for having me. Thanks a lot by you guys. Bye bye. We now have our second conversation with a stellar panel of people who know a lot more about entertainment today and tomorrow than I do. So if you want to go ahead. I was joking earlier that when we used to do events live this is when these folks would be coming up to the stage and taking their seats now they just have to turn on their camera. And with me is Brandon Tensley. He's the national. He's a national politics writer for CNN, focused on the intersection of culture and politics. If Michael Burns is an alum of ours on the ASU side. Brandon is an alum on the new America side. He was with with our team in New America a while back and it's great to see you again Brandon. Sarah Lashapel is a Bloomberg opinion columnist and has writes a lot about the industry and about streaming and sort of big mergers and deals in the industry and also beyond and Bryn Sandberg is a senior writer at the Hollywood reporter. So also very well versed on these topics. So really really excited that we can we can flesh through some of these issues and really eager to hear from you kind of where you see things going. Brandon why don't I start with you. How many streaming services do you have. Oh man that's a good question. Let me think. So HBO Max, Netflix, Hulu, Disney plus four. I think that sounds about right. So I actually I feel like that's actually like pretty much on average. I think I read something that said that the average number of people that people on average have, I think for subscriptions to these sorts of services. But I feel like, you know, sort of like what Michael Burns was saying my, I sort of gravitate toward different ones like there'll be a period where I'm very much on Hulu. You know, like last summer, when I was sort of like getting into old teen dramas from like the 90s you know Hulu has Dawson's Creek, it has Buffy the vampire slayer so I spent a lot of time on Hulu. And then sometimes you know Disney plus will add something they added Cinderella with Whitney Houston and Brandy so I was on that a couple weeks ago for you know Nostalgia. So yeah I definitely sort of migrate between platforms depending on what's up there. And Tara and Brent, are you guys in the fourish ballpark or over under. I have to use all of them for my job so covering the streaming space you have to test them all out but I think like a lot of people and Netflix has become my sort of base subscription it's the one I naturally turn on first and I think that shows the power of Netflix and the challenge for these other companies and trying to unseat Netflix as that sort of main subscription that you just can't see a reason to unsubscribe to. Yeah I will second that I feel like I've always had Netflix and and just I feel like casually amongst my friends, it's sort of known every it's sort of the assumption is that everybody has Netflix and then it's like what what services do you add on top of that. And, and, and I will also echo what Brandon was saying I do migrate between different services at different times I had Disney plus at one point. I'm not sure if I'm going to get rid of it I plan to get it again when the next you know big show comes out that I'm interested in watching. Same with who I think they had the Britney Spears dock recently that everyone was talking about and I was like oh gotta get back on that so I think that's sort of the way that until there's some sort of, you know, many cable, you know, new cable bundle like you were like you and Michael were talking about I think that's what people might do. I'm interested in this question of what what if, you know whether we can assume that there's a default service that, you know, can be sort of a shared water cooler, even though on that platform we might not still be watching the same shows and I've run into this in teaching, teaching of course this semester and wanted to sign some some documentaries and but you know I don't want like students to have to pay for things on top of everything else and but it's like is it reasonable to assign something that's on Netflix and it feels like kind of because probably but you know you don't want to over so you don't want to. So Taro, why don't. There's so many ways we could we could get into this but I'm very intrigued you, you've been writing and about Roku. And of all the names in this ecosystem that Roku is one I know nothing about and it keeps kind of like you just you feel like it's it's it feels very 2013 or something but then it keeps popping back and, and it might be an example of like the this convergence of entities that we associate with content on one side and then it's and then hardware technology plays kind of like changing lanes I don't know what what is the Roku story. Tell us about larger trends if anything and what is the Roku story in a minute. Sure, so you're right that Roku really started as a hardware company they sold the Roku player which then became the Roku stick. But then the main thing that they do is they have an operating system and it's one of the more popular operating systems that's on smart TVs now. And so, just like you have the ecosystem with Apple TV and Amazon fire Roku is a competitor and in fact Roku is has a significantly larger share than either of those companies it's the leader in this space. But like you said there's a lot of cross pollination happening everyone's eyeing the money attached to content and advertising as Michael Burns kind of referenced. So Roku is really betting their future growth on something called the Roku channel, which is a free streaming service. And the idea is it's supported by advertising so you don't have to pay anything for it there's no subscription, as long as you have either a Roku television or a Roku stick you can stream for free. Is it the stuff that you want to see that's the big question a lot of these free ad supported services like Pluto and to be, you know they're not premium. They're not Netflix they're not Disney Plus, but you don't have to pay for them they're really convenient so that's where these companies are trying to segue Roku so far has been very successful and telling at least Wall Street investors this story they're worth almost $60 billion. So it's just a matter of what is this you know how does it shake out in the future just as you guys were just talking about you know how many apps how many services and how many devices are people going to have. Well the other interesting thing is that could be just recently acquired or sorry Roku acquired Quibi's library right in an attempt to have some more original content. And so, brand thinking about the takeaways from 2020 this crazy year we had, and the ongoing pandemic. What would you, what would be your best guess about, you know, some of the shifts that will be permanent in terms of our behavior in terms of how the industry does things. Maybe it's maybe it's an acceleration of trends but, you know, for sitting here in 2025 2030 saying, Well this, this, this is a result of that pandemic we went through like what, what do you think is going to stick. And this is something that of course you, Michael brought up just the, the, you know straight to streaming, you know movies going straight to, you know, direct to consumer as opposed to having that the actual window and I think that that is actually an acceleration of, you know, a trend that we were already doing and I think, in some ways, a lot of these major, some of these major studios were really wanting to do that for some time and the pandemic sort of gave them the perfect excuse to accelerate that we saw that with Warner Brothers, and putting a lot of their, you know, major release is this year's, you know, direct to HBO Max and then also giving them, putting them in theaters as well but of course, you know, if you know we're still in this pandemic who knows how long exactly it's going to last. You know, most people are going to feel safer probably watching that from the comfort of their own home with their own family or their own, you know, pods and not putting themselves at risk. But we also saw that that, that really frustrated some, some top talent, some of their, you know, biggest directors and stars were saying, Hey, you know, we, we made this project, I, you know, the big screen we want, you know, especially with somebody like Denny Villeneuve making a movie, you know, that was a movie that, that he wanted to have in the wanted people to be able to watch it in theaters, and not on on a small screen at first. And so then that set off this sort of these negotiations with with top talent and and Warner Brothers sort of trying to appease them and and say, you know, this is just what we have to do during this time but I do think that that we're going to see that continue. And that's part of the one of the Reddit investment, the subreddits on around Wall Street bets one of their targets would have nostalgia stocks was was AMC which which felt representative of something. And Michael Burns was very seemed very bullish at the idea that we were all going to rush back to theaters. Are you going to rush back to theaters or what's your what's your sense of, of how we're going to change our ways permanently as a result of this year, if at all. Yeah, so I'm absolutely going to run back to theaters. I was I was just thinking about this the other week where you know, one thing I love about where I live in DC is I'm, you know, a 15 minute walk from one of the one of the sort of indie theaters will theaters that plays sort of like indie movies as well. And it has like a nice sort of like bar area inside. And so you can sort of, if you go with a bunch of friends you can talk about the movie afterward you know it has this sort of communal feel. And that's something that I don't think that you can replicate you know, no matter how many streaming services you sign up for. There are things that you just can't sort of put into somebody's apartment or put into a sort of work virtual experience. You know, I think I agreed with what Michael Burns was saying that, you know, the pandemic's only going to go on but for so long I think before people start feeling comfortable and safe. Going back to theaters they're they're sort of tired of just sort of having to do everything virtually like over zoom. You know, they can only only bring but so much joy. I think before people are ready to go back to something that feels a little, a little more personal, a little more communal. So in terms of trends, you know, I, I hope I think the bigger worry might be, you know, whether theaters certain theaters can survive, as opposed to whether people want to go back to theaters. I think those are slightly two different things, but I don't think that people are going to all of a sudden, you know, from a year of being cooped up at home be like I'm done with theaters. Yeah, I'm with you on that. Do you brand and buy into this. I mean the term sounds kind of hokey but I sort of instinctively I'm willing to go along with it of a golden age of TV just in terms of like the quality that we have but does that resonate with you and as you think of like all of these streaming services and all these choices and I was struck by Michael you know saying that stars is not trying to be all things to all people. How do you sense that the landscape in terms of like the, the variety of content and whether you feel like we're, we have enough choice and enough, I mean this connects to the diversity issue. What are you talking about, because, or are there still like big avenues that are not being pursued for lack of opportunities or how do you how do you think about that. Yeah, I'll try to summarize it succinctly but you know I think that there are a couple of different pieces I think there's the quantitative aspect which I feel like you guys are talking about in the earlier years about sort of who are the people sort of who are signing up to work on these different projects. And there's also the qualitative aspect in terms of you know what are the actual stories that are being portrayed. I think that that's something that, you know, that can't be put into numbers necessarily. I think a sort of easy example is you know when hidden figures came out several years ago, you know as a movie that I love seeing in theaters I remember the movie was actually sold out. And you know it's a very sort of warm heartfelt movie. And there's also just that very sort of infamous scene for lack of a better word where somebody you know desegregates the bathrooms with a crowbar. That was very much not true. And it sort of goes back to you know there are still these sorts of negotiations I guess about you know if we want to have this sort of movie, then we also need to still on some level cater to a particular sort of narrative or audience or whatever. And so I think that's something that might be a little bit harder to, maybe not harder but something that is less obvious to certain to some viewers to address as we talk about you know a diversity on screen. But it's something that I think can be helped, you know, not just by saying like oh we're telling a story about, you know, some particular racial racial or ethnic group, but also like who is actually behind sort of like writing that producing what kind of input do do the actors have those sorts of things. So you know I do think that I agree to fight over and I do think that it's it's getting better. You know I just I spent all of the weekend watching it's a sin on HBO just arrived on HBO Max we came out in the UK about a month ago. It's fantastic and you know the sort of story that I think is just it's it's wrenching but also very funny and sensual and you know there were some actual laugh out loud moments and things like that. You know who knows how widespread that will become in terms of you know pink becoming a point of conversation I can't imagine that you know regrettably like people are going to be like yay and British produce crisis or series about the AIDS crisis is going to have a lot of sort of mainstream momentum but I hope it does, because it's the perfect example of being masterfully well made brilliant performances a great soundtrack all these different components that go into having that sort of content, but it's also a matter of, I think you know does it have the sort of institutional sort of backing doesn't have people sort of talking about the movie talking about the series and you know how it's different on a bunch of different levels. So you know I am I am hopeful and I think it's getting better. But I think that they're also, there's also a ways to go. Looking at the, some of the questions from the audience and apologies I haven't been very good at getting to these. They do overlap a lot with but but Allison Hinchman, who's watching on zoom has a question about someone related in terms of like, when we talk about diversity but again sort of on the on the on the global from a global perspective, she's asking how you panel see the growth of foreign streaming services like Vicki, which I confess I'm not familiar with, and co co co co so I'm, again I'm not familiar with that one impacting the American market industry so foreign streaming services and Tara brand I mean feel free to weigh in on on what Brandon was talking about and also, you know, this this the sort of give and take and the influence of foreign streaming services and the demand for programming overseas and and you know, you guys are in touch with people in the industry a lot we heard Michael's perspective, but feel free to add anything you want. On that question that I posed to him about, you know, how hard, you know how much will the industry take the heart, a lot of what you know, we wrestled with this society in 2020 in terms of making you know lasting changes and addressing issues of diversity and representation. So, big question with both her like the domestic and foreign angle but Tara you want to you want to go first. I know Brandon might be better placed answer sort of the content perspective and like the decision making around that but from what I've seen on sort of the corporate business side is that it's going to take diversity and representation and the highest ranks of these studios and these companies in order to solve the other issue which is how we figure out how we make money from streaming how this becomes a sustainable industry and a business and you know for so long it's been such an exclusive group of people running this space and the more that you bring in other people into this industry, the better these services are going to be the better chance you have a building something that really serves the masses because right now they're struggling with all of these niche services and the prices that come along with them and no one's really figured out a way and how to reach everybody and the international market is going to be extremely important which is why Netflix and Disney Plus are putting so much effort into that so that's kind of how I see it from that perspective. Yeah, and I would say as far as the content the foreign streaming services question I'm not familiar with those two that that were mentioned but what I do know is that the streamers, particularly Netflix, Netflix are very invested in growing globally and if you look at Netflix, they, you know, their their domestic growth has sort of, you know, slowed and they're really looking at growing overseas and what that has meant for them is actually investing in local language originals and you know they have offices all over the world they I think they built trying to remember the last I know they built a big headquarters I think in Spain and you know they they they have the secondary offices where they have people who live there speak the language, you know know the culture and and are creating content that's going to appeal to to those viewers. So I know that that's definitely a huge, huge growth area for the streamers and I think will continue to be as far as the question about diversity. The one thing I wanted to add was, I feel like conversations that I have had with agents managers, you know, people in Hollywood who are who are getting people jobs. They will tell me that they feel like they're out outwardly there's a desire from expressed by the studios and the streamers to you know want to hire people of color and tell their stories, but then also behind the scenes you have, you know when they're actually staffing a show say they're looking for writers and a manager says hey I have this, you know, you know this person of, you know writer of color who is who would be great and they want to know well what if they, what have they done it and so you sort of have to have already gotten the work to be able to get the job it's this catch 22. So they're sort of frustrated saying well you have to give people to you know you got to let people get their foot in the door and then they can they can you know grow into that that person for you but Howard, you're saying you want to do this, but but you're not really doing it so that I just wanted to bring up that that is that that tension is still very much there. And I think will continue to be there. Unfortunately. And really quickly that like that actually reminds me the example of, you know, Judas and the black Messiah just came out a couple weeks ago on HBO Max and you know it has this really interesting frustrating sort of backstory in terms of you know, the director has had how long it took to get that movie made in terms of getting studio backing and things like that. Even though you know, Ryan Coogler who directed Black Panther was one of the producers, even though another producer was backing funding about half of the movie. But still you hear these questions of you know like oh like, even if this story resonates domestically in the US is this something that's going to appeal to an international market. Which you know sort of papers over the fact that you know the Black Panther the Black Panthers were a global phenomenon right. You know it's a history that that took place in a lot of different national contexts. And so very much like what Bren was saying it's like, you know you can come sort of, you know, prepared, you know, have you know, you're fully prepared to present this movie idea. But still, you know people are just I think hesitant to actually to go into into creating it and I think that speaks more to sort of various sort of ingrained biases about whether we whether people think of this is the right time for a movie whether it's whether people like this movie, you know a lot of things in scare quotes, because I think you know people say one thing, but they're actually operating, according to something else. Yeah that's very true. One thing that it's you know we have about four minutes here and I can't believe we haven't gotten into this but you know when we think of who the players are and Tara was, you know, reminding us that Roku was you know initially in the hardware side but you know when you step back and you look at the streaming services of course it's kind of like the, you know the old California industry civil war between northern California tech companies and content Hollywood Southern California they're all kind of mixed in now. And Amazon and Apple, you know I think I feel like people who cover these things often talk about Apple. Amazon perhaps a lesser extent but certainly Apple is like they're kind of dabbling in this, you know and, and you know they can afford to dabble in anything they want and it helps the brand and it gets people to use their devices although they're going to use their devices anyway. But there's always a sense that you know they are, you know they can outspend anybody, I mean they can. And if they really wanted to make this, you know less of a hobby and more of their like one of their core businesses, watch out traditional studios in Southern California. And I think there's lots of thoughts on that unlike the, you know the weirdness of having like, you know, Silicon Valley tech companies and I guess Amazon, which however we want to describe it, kind of entering that space, being a player, but maybe not fully deciding to own the space I mean, how is that going to shake out Tara do you have thoughts on that. I think Amazon must flip it around and say you know because of their sheer size and financial prowess they get away with offering kind of subpar offerings you know Apple TV plus doesn't have a whole lot on it, and you know they came up to the market with this. But you know I think because these companies just they're so smart and they know that they don't have to rush into this the way that the cable network operators do, and businesses that are heavily tied to the box office they can kind of just tiptoe and see where this goes because, like I said no one has figured out how this becomes a profitable long term profitable venture and so they're just not really in a rush and that takes me back to just you know one point on the movie theaters. I think that when we're when they're looking at you know Apple and Amazon are looking at the future of this industry. I think the reason people are so bullish on streaming and less so on movie theaters comes back to this idea that you know a lot of people like the movies, but it would seem to me that the number of people who profess sort of emotional attachment to, or cultural movie theaters is disproportionate disproportionate to the number of people who actually regularly go. And that was a trend over the last 20 years and the pandemic just kind of intensified that but it didn't start it. So I think that's why these streamers are just waiting to see you know what what's the next stage of that how quickly does this transition happen back to the living room where we're kind of building our own in house movie theaters with big screen TVs and sound bars and things like that. And then Brandon. Yeah, well there's that. I feel like there's always that joke going around about how you know Amazon just wants you to buy more toilet paper and so they're just using their shows to get you to buy more things on Prime. I don't know how much truth there is to that but I do think that they, this is a, you know, a relatively small project for them when you look at the, you know, the size of their their their company and same with Apple. What I'm just going to mention that I think is is is more challenging for for those two is that they, they don't have a library of content like when Disney, you know, launched Disney Disney plus they could, they just brought all their old movies and show, you know, got them back from wherever they were, they were streaming Netflix Hulu, wherever, and then they launched with this, you know, they had this, you know, huge arsenal and then you look at Amazon and an Apple and they have had to build of course Amazon's had a bit more time. But when Apple launched, it was pretty underwhelming, I think I mean they had Morning Show they had you know they had the big stars in a couple projects but they did not have the, you know, the library that you would need to have consumers stick around so that's something that they're going to continue. And especially, as you mentioned, Andres, you know with vertical integration and with each of these companies sort of, you know, siloed and buying back all their, all their own content. It doesn't leave much for for the Amazon's and the apples to actually get a hold of. Do you think that that vertical integration is going to become a concern for people in DC and like regulators that I see Tara shaking her head. Yes, potentially I think the, the, the other thing though is there, there are, I mean, what do we have seven, eight major companies now I think if you start seeing other, you know, mergers then then I think that's a bigger issue I think where it is where it stands right now it seems like there are still options you know we talked about how many different services we're all having to decide you know if we want to subscribe to but but I'd be curious if Tara Brandon you The Democrats are definitely, you know, putting a microscope on the tech giants right now and I think that if they start to scoop up some of these weaker players, it's definitely going to turn into a bigger story of do you have to break up or do something to prevent them from being too powerful in the space and as much as we have a lot of options and streaming as a consumer. It's not really saving anyone money. And so I think that's where there's going to be a little bit of a sticking point in this space is sure you have plenty of options but if you need to subscribe to all of them. So is your bill outland just at that point, and especially when you know someone like Comcast is also supplying your Internet and charging whatever they charge for Internet so I think there is going to be a little bit of thorniness around this issue to come as these mergers, inevitably happen. Brandon, I'm shocked at the hour so you're going to get the last word. Do you have thoughts on on like the distinctive role that the tech giants are playing in this space the Amazon and Apple. And also, you know, you're sitting in DC is this integration and the marriage of content and distribution something that you think we ought to be worried about and that will. I mean, there's such a long list of issues that you know people in Congress and some of these federal agencies concerned they have about some of these tech players that they're streaming services might not be top of the list but is that might that be an issue like it did in the 20s and 30s when the studio system was dismantled earlier. Yeah, I mean I agree with what Tara and Bren were saying I don't have much to add except you know I do think that you know, over the past what five 10 years. I think there's just been more mentioned for conversations around what these sorts of mergers are looking like and the implications of that. And I think the content in terms of the sort of stuff that actually gets created. And what Bren was saying you know made me think of in terms of you know, Apple, Amazon studios like that but in terms of, you know, how do they sort of how can they try to differentiate I mean I think that's an animated question for for a lot of these different platforms. And when you don't start out with this just trove of intellectual property existing intellectual property. And it becomes harder to compete you know like when Disney and December sort of announced, you know all these different new like Marvel shows and I think some there's some discussion about trying to create more you know more Star Wars, sort of like series and things like that. You know I think it sort of gets gets at the point of, you know, what are, there's a belief and you know probably not unfunded belief that you know there there's existing sort of interest in these sorts of things. So why not lean into creating it at the same time that sort of cuts against you know people who want to take bigger swings maybe be more ambitious with the types of stories that are being created. But you know when you just have these sort of these gargantuan companies were able to just keep sort of mining the same. In ways just putting different spins on on content, you know that that's going to affect how other companies how other platforms how other stories are going to be able to jump into the conversation and actually play the game. Yeah, no. And it's so interesting how the model right now is that we have to acquire these. All you can eat buffet straight for each one of these platforms and whereas I think a lot of us might want to buy you know, one show or one movie here and one show and then we have to play this game of we sign up for a period and then we try to move on as as was mentioned and I still am kind of tethered to cable tube and that's mostly for news and sports I think that's another part of the puzzle that it'll be interesting to see how it plays out. But I am past the hour mode so Angela would be very upset because that's a big no no, but I feel I at some level I feel like we were just getting started there's so much to talk about. And apologies that we didn't get to it all but thank you guys so much for doing this with us and hopefully we can do it again soon. Thanks. Thanks for listening in.