MIDiA Blog

Read our latest daily deep dives, hot takes, and exciting updates about the entertainment world. Check out the latest insight from your favourite analyst, or search by coverage areas - music, entertainment and fandom, creator economy and social.

What Netflix needs to do next

Cover image for What Netflix needs to do next

Tim Mulligan

25 Oct 2023

Business Strategy

Netflix’s Q3 2023 numbers were better than expected, with quarterly revenue up by 7.8% year on year to reach $8.5 billion, and operating margin now up to an impressive 22.4%. The company attributed its revenue growth to three areas: firstly, an increase in average paid memberships, which is due to the paid sharing rollout in June (where it prompted password sharers to subscribe to retain access); secondly, a strong content line up and thirdly, a strong global expansion in streaming subscriptions.

3 min read

There are no elite artists without elite artist development

Cover image for There are no elite artists without elite artist development

Kriss Thakrar

24 Oct 2023

artist development

Creator economy

A recent interview with Mariah the Scientist saw her speak about the struggle of performing for only the second time in front of a crowd at one of the world’s biggest festivals, Rolling Loud. She shared that she “wasn’t good at it”, “did not know what she was doing”, and ultimately suffered from the consequences of all the criticism that followed.

5 min read

Two-tier licensing is about to become a reality

Cover image for Two-tier licensing is about to become a reality

Mark Mulligan

24 Oct 2023

Streaming Royalties

With the dust still far from settled on the UMG / Deezer streaming royalty proposal, something even bigger is coming: Spotify is turning the concept into reality in Q1 2024. The behind-the-scenes conversations have been ongoing for some time, but the details were stated publicly on panels at last week’s ADE conference, meaning that the information is now firmly in the public domain.

4 min read

Can subscriptions keep the lights on for social?

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Hanna Kahlert

19 Oct 2023

user-generated content

Digital advertising has long been the financial backbone of the digital world. It has underpinned the business models of the likes of Google and Meta, and its absence has been the value proposition of subscriptions, which now dominate digital entertainment.

6 min read

How Taylor Swift has ushered in an era of direct distribution for media fusion

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Tim Mulligan

19 Oct 2023

Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour Concert Film

Cinematic releases of music concerts are nothing new, with the likes of the Beatles Help! film of 1965 ushering in a new era of mass participation for global fanbases beyond the concert arena. When Covid shut down the live music scene in 2020-2021, there was a brief flurry of interest in delivering virtual concerts for fans seeking a proxy for the live experience that went on hiatus.

4 min read

Spotify versus Apple Podcasts: The podcast analytics race has begun

Cover image for Spotify versus Apple Podcasts: The podcast analytics race has begun

Annie Langston

18 Oct 2023

First announced at Podcast Movement in August 2023, Spotify is now rolling out new features and analytics tools to aid podcast discovery. While Apple Podcast’s recent updates target a specific type of creator — creators with subscriptions (and therefore, established audiences) — Spotify is casting a wider creator net and focusing on empowering lesser-known creators to customise their pages.

4 min read

What music could gain from social platform subscriptions

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Tatiana Cirisano

17 Oct 2023

Last week, Epic Games’ comments about “low margins” in the creator economy prompted a burning question : What happens when consumer creations become more popular than the core content they draw from? Consumers increasingly express their fandom through creation, and we believe this will be one of the music industry’s next growth drivers.

3 min read

How Kwebbelkop AI is pushing the frontiers of generative-AI content creation on YouTube

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Ben Woods

16 Oct 2023

The incoming wave of generative-AI content has the potential to dominate social video platforms and reshape the creator economy. As a support act, AI can help content creators improve their production values and reduce time spent creating.

7 min read

Music has become a ‘just-in-time’ economy

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Mark Mulligan

16 Oct 2023

The modern day economy is built upon ‘just-in-time’ supply chains. This framework has enabled the benefits of consumerism that we have come to enjoy, such as next day delivery, out of season foods on our shelves, and the digital devices we live our lives through.

5 min read

Sony is tapping its core media fusion opportunity. Here is why:

Cover image for Sony is tapping its core media fusion opportunity. Here is why:

Tim Mulligan

11 Oct 2023

cross entertainment

In March 2023, MIDiA wrote a report on the increasing media fusion emerging between gamers and video streaming. In rebooting video fandom we argued that gamers were now both shaping and being targeted by streaming services keen to expand their reach (and revenue) across the digital entertainment landscape.

3 min read

Streaming is missing cultural moments, and superstars know it

Cover image for Streaming is missing cultural moments, and superstars know it

Kriss Thakrar

11 Oct 2023

In the modern music industry, a near constant supply of music is expected to succeed on streaming platforms . Drake is one of the best examples of this: since 2015 he has released an album every year, in addition to two collaborative albums, adding up to 200 tracks.

3 min read

Tech’s failure to crack live audio could be radio’s opportunity

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Annie Langston

9 Oct 2023

Another live audio app bites the dust. A year after its launch, Amazon Amp is shutting down, being buried alongside Spotify Live and Clubhouse (at least in its original form). While Amp recruited major celebrities, like Nicki Minaj and Pusha T, to host shows, it was not immune to industry-wide layoffs that have hit other live audio divisions.

4 min read

Are the ongoing layoffs in games indicative of a wider issue in the games industry?

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Karol Severin

6 Oct 2023

The layoffs wildfire that struck the games industry at the start of 2023 does not seem to be stopping - the most recent being Epic Games last week. Firstly, on a personal level, it has been really sad and upsetting to see all these people being laid off in 2023 – especially when the reasons behind these layoffs are really not through any fault of their own.

5 min read

How AI can empower creators by cutting through content saturation

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Ben Woods

5 Oct 2023

When YouTube’s chief executive Neal Mohan recently revealed a suite of AI tools to support creators, he aimed to drastically reduce the time it takes to produce content. Among those innovations were AI-driven topic suggestions for videos; AI generated photo and video backgrounds for short-form content; AI support for selecting copyright-free music; simplified video editing and an AI-powered dubbing tool to help creators expand beyond their core markets.

3 min read

Does culture become a commodity, or do commodities become culture?

Cover image for Does culture become a commodity, or do commodities become culture?

Hanna Kahlert

5 Oct 2023

Cultural trends

More than three fourths of audiences believe that the music they listen to reflects who they are. This rises to more than four fifths of people aged 25-44. Music listening is also incredibly personal –roughly a third of people listen to playlists they curate themselves when exercising, hanging out with friends, working or studying, or just when they are out and about.

5 min read

Goodbye Google Podcasts: What’s next for YouTube Music?

Cover image for Goodbye Google Podcasts: What’s next for YouTube Music?

Annie Langston

5 Oct 2023

YouTube’s podcast bet just got bigger. Last week, Google announced that its standalone podcast app, Google Podcasts, will shut down in 2024. Since YouTube’s official podcast launch , this strategy was expected , as Google Podcasts began rolling back some of its podcast features while YouTube Music started offering more.

4 min read

Epic blames layoffs on low creator margins — what does that mean for the rest of entertainment?

Cover image for Epic blames layoffs on low creator margins — what does that mean for the rest of entertainment?

Tatiana Cirisano

4 Oct 2023

Content Creators

Increasingly, engaging with entertainment involves some form of creation — be it turning your life into a Wes Anderson film , making songs with Grimes’ vocals , or learning the choreography to your new favourite music video .

5 min read

Spotify’s audiobooks move is another brick in the audio wall

Cover image for Spotify’s audiobooks move is another brick in the audio wall

Mark Mulligan

4 Oct 2023

Streaming has come a long way since its days as a pure music service for super fans. Spotify’s announcement that it is making 15 monthly audiobook hours available to premium subscribers is simply the latest step in a journey that has seen streaming become the 21stcentury’s take on radio.

4 min read

Goodbye DVDs, hello streaming economics rationalisation

Cover image for Goodbye DVDs, hello streaming economics rationalisation

Tim Mulligan

4 Oct 2023

streeaming economics

Last Friday saw the end of 25 years of Netflix’s DVDs subscription business, drawing to a close the pre-streaming model of home entertainment for the largest international subscription video on demand (SVOD) service.

3 min read

Why YouTube should disrupt streaming TV’s love affair with TikTok

Cover image for Why YouTube should disrupt streaming TV’s love affair with TikTok

Ben Woods

28 Sep 2023

It has become a tried and tested tactic for streaming TV services: Take the exclusive show you want to promote, drop the first episode on social media for free, and hope it motivates audiences enough to buy a subscription to your service.

4 min read

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