The Morning Walk #10
2024 seems to be off to a very fast-paced start for the world of media and entertainment. For me, it’s been a bit different.
Over Christmas, we had my parents here, to celebrate the holidays. It was AMAZING. Great bonding with Zoe and Zelda, lots of cuddles, and good food, and great conversation. A much needed emotional energy refill. For over 2 weeks I did not go on my #morningwalks, or better said, I did, but I took advantage of his presence here to go walking with my dad. He and I love walking. It’s something we have always liked doing together. The purpose and type of walk I do with him is very different: slower, more relaxed, and with long and deep conversations about everything: world, life, parenting, entertainment (my dad loves movies), sports, and just family, which is so healing and a powerful ingredient for my mental health. So, great walks, but nothing that I thought was worth writing here for.
Then, after Christmas, we all got sick. It started with my older daughter getting the flu at school. She snapped out of it in 48hrs, but the rest of us? BAD. A nasty flu. Took me over 10 days to feel myself again. It naturally evolved into worst stuff for Zelda (totally expected) and she’s now been home from school for 3 weeks. So, my morning routine had been made of medications, cleaning messes, helping my wife. Again, I think that’s also a big part of work-life balance, but probably not worth dwelling into here.
Last week, I celebrated my birthday. Thank you all for your wishes. I had a great day, and a burger.
I finally rationalized an approach to mentorship. I launched my page on Intro and look forward to use it more and more.
Then there has been work: lots of news for Kinetic Energy Entertainment, some of which we have posted on our social feed. We’re attacking our fundraise, and we have spent time meeting the advisors, the partners and a number of prospects. It will not be easy, but we’re going for it with determination. The feedback so far have been really good, we keep hearing “you are onto something” and we’re tackling some important organizational, legal and operational needs that are critical for our future growth and scalability.
And then, business environment wise, it’s been a crazy start of 2024, with very high highs and very low lows, in no particular order (and some of this will be tackled in separate posts):
– Video games studio and publishers laying people off in the MANY THOUSANDS. Wait, I thought gaming was growing? The space is in constant evolution and there are opportunities to rethink and redeploy user acquisition and monetization strategies. I am working on a couple of projects that I am excited to see coming to market later this year.
– Apple launching Apple Vision Pro. I have not tried the final product yet. I believe it will fundamentally transform many industries….in a few years. For now, I am in awe for the courage, the commitment and the proportion of this single step forward towards a future where “immersion” is what defines human-to-machine interactions.
– The Sports bundle: in what is a replay of what they did with Hulu, we all read yesterday about Disney/ESPN, WBD and Fox come together to build a streaming package for sports. Brilliant idea – but once again a proof that legacy media is really interested in splitting the risk, more than owning their future. Oh well. (PS edited few hours later: oh, and look at Disney investing $1.5B in Epic Games. Not really transformative at Enterprise level, but a step in the right direction – ie the consumer).
– Every day we read about a new creator realizing they are more than “influencers”. That is the foundational thesis for Kinetic – creative is a business and it needs creators who are and want to be entrepreneurs. The world of “ideas” without a product or a business strategy is (way) over.
– Web3 as an experiment is OVER – it’s not, but we can’t talk about it. FUD and WANGMI are real. I don’t believe this is true at all, but we’re seeing a growing exodus. This is the time where we should refocus on what worked and what will keep working: co-creation, user-generation, and player incentives need to be aligned with business incentives. We don’t need blockchain, or NFT, or crypto to keep moving towards Web3: we need experiences that are fun, rewarding and expressive, and we need to think about consumers as participants of the build, BEFORE the product is out. Eventually, blockchain technology will gain general consumer adoption, and standards will emerge and be available. We look forward to that moment, but for now we’re back to fundamentals.
– If you’re not using AI in your workflows, ideation, marketing, production, well….good luck. This isn’t about building AI products, or models, or new companies only. This is about building knowledge and muscle memory now that the tools are still somewhat novel. Missing the train now may prove itself to be the final nail in the coffin of legacy models.
As of this morning, I am back to walking.
2024 is looking bright, even if not easy, and already exhilarating.
Are you ready?
