Hanna Kahlert | MIDiA Research

How can entertainment reintroduce scarcity in a time of attention over-saturation?

Hanna Kahlert

5 Oct 2022

Spoiler alert, to the disappointment of some: it is not going to be NFTs. Scarcity, real or artificial, is what drives value. The diamond industry is perhaps the most obvious example of managed scarcity driving high-margin revenues .

min read

The shift indoors
Entertainment audiences’ search for the affordable and the meaningful

Hanna Kahlert

September 2022

Apple TV

Netflix

Disney

The Covid-19 entertainment boom is over; we are now in a highly competitive attention recession characterised largely by the attention inflation driven from accelerating rates of multitasking. This is compounded by serious global events and a cost-of-living crisis which will reduce the money audiences have available to spend on digital entertainmen...

Culture booms creatively when under constraint
The rise of house music

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Hanna Kahlert

September 2022

Media and Marketing

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What happens when the “relentless toll” of the music industry meets the creator economy in a cost-of-living crisis?

Hanna Kahlert

29 Sep 2022

underground

cost-of-living

Music

The music industry is in a cultural crisis. It is more demanding than ever to be a successful artist, with the work required to meet the demands of social algorithms and to cut through the clutter being more competitive than ever, in addition to touring being hit hugely by the pandemic lockdown and ...

min read

Content is king, distribution is queen but retention is revolutionary

Tim Mulligan and Hanna Kahlert

September 2022

Free Report

Video

Music

Games

Retention is the new cornerstone of subscription in an era of accelerating disruption. On the 22nd of September, 2022, at 4:30 pm BST, MIDiA's lead video analyst, Tim Mulligan, will be joined by Nada Arnot, SVP of Marketing at BritBox, Nii Mantse Addy, CMO and Head of Marketing at Philo, Nina Laricheva, CEO of Marquee TV, and Hanna Kahlert, Media a...

The cost-of-living crisis will give rise to a new and powerful underground scene

Hanna Kahlert

21 Sep 2022

underground

recession

cost-of-living crisis

At this point, everyone – in entertainment and beyond – should be planning for a difficult financial winter. According to the Financial Times , an emergency government scheme capping energy bills has just been launched in the UK, which ministers “hope will prevent a wave of corporate collapse�...

min read

Social media platforms are now content platforms (and not all of them are competing the same way)

Hanna Kahlert

14 Sep 2022

Social media

UGC

Content

As we move into an autumn that is haunted by the cost-of-living crisis, entertainment propositions are being forced to increasingly compete for what is left of the pandemic-driven entertainment boom of attention and spend.

min read

"The meme made me do it": Why consumption often has nothing to do with what is being consumed

Hanna Kahlert

7 Sep 2022

meme

morbius

gentleminions

The powerhouse cast and director of Don’t Worry Darling gathered for the film’s premier this week in Venice, enjoying a five-minute standing ovation and critically acclaimed reviews. In the words of lead actor Harry Styles himself , “like, it feels like a movie.

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Lean-through consumption
Communities are key

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Hanna Kahlert

August 2022

Spotify

YouTube

Netflix

Entertainment consumption is increasingly shaped by context, as consumers are driven by attention saturation to overlap behaviours as well as choose between them. Different forms of entertainment are better suited to different contexts, with some lending themselves to more social behaviours than others.

TikTok
A fandom community powerhouse

Hanna Kahlert

August 2022

Media and Marketing

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The cost-of-living crisis is here; it just has not hit entertainment yet

Hanna Kahlert

31 Aug 2022

recession

cost-of-living

Entertainment

The attention crunch in the wake of ended lockdowns and resumption of ‘in real life’ (IRL) activities has not been as pronounced as feared. Hints of it have been visible in the drop in Netflix subscriptions in Q1 of this year, which was also attributed to the war in Ukraine and banning of Russia...

min read

Hate-watching: The rise of contextual consumption

Hanna Kahlert

24 Aug 2022

binge -viewing

hate watching

Netflix

In the over-saturated entertainment ecosystem , attention is the name of the game. All propositions are competing for the most focused attention, striving for more dynamic engagement , and trying to find and monetise superfans for all that they are worth.

min read

If the cultural ‘in’ cycle is speeding up, what will sustain entertainment?

Hanna Kahlert

19 Aug 2022

Entertainment

Cultural trends

attention recession

When the first season of Stranger Things entered the zeitgeist in 2016, its set, soundtrack, and all-around vibes fit perfectly with the 80’s cultural revival of the time. Americana ‘hipster’ was out, and retro was in; neon clothes took over the streets and House beats dominated the airwaves.

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Re-creating the creator economy

Mark Mulligan, Tim Mulligan, Karol Severin, Hanna Kahlert, Srishti Das, Kriss Thakrar, Ashleigh Millar, Tatiana Cirisano, Annie Langston and Richard Broadhurst

August 2022

Apple

Spotify

YouTube

Streaming first democratised the means of consumption, then distribution, and now production. Though the promise of the long tail may not have materialised quite as expected, long-tail and mid-tail creators are now a central component of the digital-entertainment economy.

Has the NFT and crypto hype met its match in an IRL cost-of-living crisis?

Hanna Kahlert

10 Aug 2022

crypto

etherium

NFT

Where have all the NFTs gone? Nine months ago, you could not go twenty minutes in the industry without hearing the term. The concept was intriguing, nebulous – a potential answer to the disquiet of a digital-entertainment industry seeking new clarity on the concepts of ownership and value in a str...

min read

If the future of entertainment is niche, how does the Meta approach fit in?

Hanna Kahlert

3 Aug 2022

Instagram

Kim Kardashian

Reels

The last week has undoubtedly been a hectic one for the developers of Instagram, which recently began trialling a TikTok-esque, video-first focus on its app to some users. The update was not well received, with Kylie Jenner and Kim Kardashian themselves coming out and sharing the plea to “make Ins...

min read

The rise of the lean-through superfan
Post-Covid trends of UGC creation and entertainment

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Hanna Kahlert

July 2022

Twitch

Instagram

TikTok

The Covid-driven entertainment boom is over, with ‘in real life’ activities taking back ground from the 12% of additional time freed by lockdown measures. The attention crunch is compounded by a cost-of-living crisis, driving consumers to make savvy choices about how much they spend, and on what.

The Morbius fandom misread

Hanna Kahlert

July 2022

Audience Insight

Media and Marketing

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The video attention reboot
How video is being impacted by the attention recession

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Tim Mulligan and Hanna Kahlert

July 2022

Creators

Netflix

roku

With the attention recession in full swing following the lockdown boom, video isalready feeling the pinch as evidenced by Netflix’s declining subscriber count.The mainstreaming of subscription video on demand (SVOD) pulled TV into the digital entertainment sphere, placing it at risk of further disruption from the attentionrecession.

Stranger Things, Queen’s Gambit, and Bridgerton
Finding the balance of creation and consumption

Cover image for Stranger Things, Queen’s Gambit, and Bridgerton

Tim Mulligan and Hanna Kahlert

July 2022

Netflix

Content strategy

Stranger Things

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