Product Strategy | MIDiA Research

Why the MLS and Apple are rebooting subscription sports for the streaming TV era

Tim Mulligan

17 Nov 2022

Yesterday Apple announced that it is launching the MLS Season Pass in 100 plus countries. This is a de-facto call to arms for every tech major and media major serious about wanting to incorporate Sports into their streaming video propositions.

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Artists – take our survey and get a free MIDiA report

Mark Mulligan

15 Nov 2022

Artists

Independent artists

Artist survey

With 2022 coming to a close, and Spotify’s Wrapped just around the corner, artists are beginning to look back across the year at how they performed and what they have achieved, and whether it lines up with their hopes for the coming year.

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Is Mastodon the beginning of the social platform revolution?

Hanna Kahlert

9 Nov 2022

Social media

social platform

mastodon

Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter last week has raised serious questions about the future of the app, and about the future of social platforms overall . As the likes of TikTok move social into the category of content, and new, use-specific social platforms begin to take off, it seems that not only i...

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Artists and managers: Help shape the future of artist services

Kriss Thakrar

7 Nov 2022

Independent artists

Artists direct

Music

It has arguably never been harder for artists to break through on social media, streaming, and in the real world. We repeatedly hear how artists and their teams are overextended, burned out and overwhelmed by the demands of the modern music industry.

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How DAZN is set to reboot global sports fandom

Tim Mulligan

27 Oct 2022

DAZN

UWCL

EA Sports

Hidden in the stream of high-profile broadcast rights announcements from DAZN this month was an announcement that EA sports will be DAZN’s now global sponsor of its UEFA Women’s Champion’s League (UWCL) broadcast coverage.

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Podcast creators: Your chance to help shape the future of streaming services

Annie Langston

26 Oct 2022

survey

Podcasts

Streaming

Podcasts have earned new attention and investment in the entertainment market and are becoming increasingly integrated into major streaming platforms. As podcasts battle for listeners amid the attention recession and help fuel the creator economy, podcast creators are navigating uncharted territory.

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House of spoilers: Leaks are bad for services, but good for fans

Hanna Kahlert

26 Oct 2022

spoiler

latency video

tv shows

The finale of House of the Dragon aired this Sunday (or Monday, for countries to the east of the US), culminating a wildly successful first season of HBO’s first Game of Thrones spinoff. To be specific; the official version aired Sunday / Monday in 4K.

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A resurgent Netflix has reassured Wall Street despite the warning signs appearing in emerging markets

Tim Mulligan

19 Oct 2022

Netflix

Netflix Q3 2022

emerging markets

Netflix Q3 2022 results were well received by the financial markets, with NFLX shares up 14.4% in after-hours trading. This follows a challenging year for the world’s largest subscription video on demand (SVOD) service, one that saw its first-ever global membership decline in Q1 2022 and resulted ...

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Why Sky remains focused on Formula 1 as streaming TV remakes sports fandom

Tim Mulligan

4 Oct 2022

Formula One

F1

Sky

Last Friday, Comcast-owned Sky announced that it had renewed its exclusive UK and Ireland coverage of Formula 1 (F1) until the end of 2029. Included in this deal are additional rights for Sky Italia and Sky Deutschland Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

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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...

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.

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Amazon demonstrates the viewing power of proven content IP

Tim Mulligan

7 Sep 2022

Strategy

Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power

Lord of the Rings

On Saturday, Amazon released the first day viewing figures for The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power its billion dollar fantasy original streaming series adapted from the Lord of the Rings universe IP.

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Welcome to the era of attention inflation

Perry Gresham

2 Sep 2022

attention inflation

attention recession

Peak Attention

The covid pandemic and associated lockdown dynamic allowed entertainment consumption to reach new heights amongst a temporary surplus of free time. However, after restrictions eased, consumers found the constraints on their newfound time tighten, and had to make sacrifices, often preferring to retur...

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Help shape the future of streaming services — calling all artists, podcasters, and executives

Tatiana Cirisano

1 Sep 2022

Music creators

Creator economy

creator tools

Music streaming is among the most hotly-debated topics in the music industry, with artists and executives alike sharing their opinions on what is working, what is not working, and the potential solutions for change.

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Attention inflation
How multitasking is reshaping the attention economy

Karol Severin and Perry Gresham

August 2022

Apple

Spotify

YouTube

Entertainment hours are up, but consumption is becoming diluted and losing focus, and is increasingly in the background of other activities. Audiences want to consume more but have no more time to allocate; increased multitasking is the result. Consequently, attention / focus is split between more propositions.

Games genre fan overlaps across entertainment

Karol Severin and Kazia Rothwell

August 2022

Games

niche audiences

gaming culture

Entertainment genre overlaps of games genre fansQ2 2022 This report presents a snapshot of cross-entertainment (music, video, and sports) genre preferences of consumers who are fans of a particular games genre. It includes the following games genre fan segments: Action games fans First person shooter (FPS) fans Role playing game (RPG) fans Sports g...

The trials and tribulations of virtual reality

Perry Gresham

26 Aug 2022

VR

virtual reality

Playstation VR

The new world of virtual reality (VR) has felt closer over the past ten years than ever, but is still just over the horizon. VR remains niche The main sticking point is adoption: currently just under one in ten US gamers has a VR headset, dropping to around 1 in 20 in western Europe and even less in...

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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.

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Netflix versus AMC – a tale of two fandoms

Tim Mulligan

11 Aug 2022

Bridgerton

lean through

lean in

The last two weeks have witnessed two contrasting approaches toward the increasingly fragmented world of show fandom. First of all, it was revealed that Netflix has taken legal action against Abigail Barlow and Emily Bear and their company Barlow & Bear.

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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...

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Audience Insight