State of Streaming Podcast

State of Streaming
  • 5.0 (1)
  • Tech News
  • Updated Weekly

Covering the topics, trends, people, and acquisitions shaping Streaming TV.

  1. 3d ago ·  Video

    Why Sports Streaming Is Fragmented and How Roku Is Solving Discoverability | Joe Franzetta, Head of Sports at Roku

    Have a question? Send us a text! Tim sits down with Joe Franzetta, Head of Sports at Roku, to map out how Roku is solving sports discoverability, unifying fragmented streaming rights, and turning smart TV home screens into interactive fan hubs. They explore a 21-year-old prediction about interactive TV, how Roku City brings live stadium energy home, and why centralized sports zones are driving real engagement for major leagues.  From 21-year-old soap opera predictions to the front door of modern streaming. Over two decades ago, Joe envisioned a world where television viewers could use their remote control to click on a couch or dress inside a soap opera and purchase it in real time. While technology was ahead of execution back then, streaming television has finally caught up. Today, sports serve as the ideal home for interactive viewer engagement because they command the largest, most captive audiences. To power this experience, Roku operates on two levels: as a platform OS acting as the front door to over 100 million households, and as a service via The Roku Channel offering free, ad-supported content.  0:00 – Looking back at a 21-year-old prediction about soap operas and interactive TV 1:25 – Why live sports are the ultimate home for interactive viewer engagement 2:10 – Roku as a platform OS vs. Roku as a first-party service Bringing Grayson Stadium to Roku City: How the Savannah Bananas built a fan-first destination. To recreate the energy of a live game for fans at home, Roku teamed up with the Savannah Bananas for a unique platform-level integration. They placed a clickable Grayson Stadium right inside the iconic Roku City screensaver. Hitting the remote's "up" button enters viewers into a virtual stadium greeted by founder Jesse Cole, which leads directly into the Banana Ball Zone—a dedicated hub aggregating live games across all distribution partners alongside VOD clips and exclusive content.  4:15 – The Savannah Bananas partnership: taking Broadway-style baseball on the road 5:40 – Placing Grayson Stadium inside Roku City as an interactive, clickable feature 7:10 – Solving fragmentation: How the Banana Ball Zone aggregates live games across all distribution partners Solving rights fragmentation with Roku Sports Zones and fan personalization. As sports rights split across four, five, or six different streaming platforms, viewer friction has reached an all-time high. Roku’s North Star solution is the Sports Zone—a centralized hub on the platform that aggregates live broadcasts by sport, provider, and league (including the NFL, NBA, MLB, WNBA, and NWSL). By combining explicit signals (fans picking their favorite teams) with implicit viewing signals, Roku serves personalized content feeds while leveraging the tribal nature of sports fandom.  8:45 – The North Star thesis: centralizing sports content across fragmented rights holders 10:30 – Building dedicated branded hubs for the NFL, NBA, MLB, WNBA, and NWSL 12:15 – How explicit fan choices and implicit viewing signals power personalization Reimagining RSNs with FAST channels and expanding the playbook globally. Regional sports networks were built for traditional cable, but digital streaming opens up new hybrid models. By offering free game unlocks on FAST outlets like the Roku Sports Channel paired with interactive click-to-subscribe remote prompts, leagues can convert local viewers into paid subscribers. Beyond North America, Roku is taking this sports hub playbook international across Latin America, Europe, and the UK, driving record streaming engagement during global tentpole events like the World Cup.  14:10 – The future of RSNs: hybrid distribution, FAST unlocks, and click-to-subscribe remotes 16:05 – T-commerce, ticket sales, and building digital fan communities around team rivalries 17:35 – International expansion: driving record World Cup streaming engagement across seven global territories Connect with Joe Franzetta on LinkedIn · Roku  Thanks to Looper Insights for sponsoring today’s show! Ready to unlock your streaming strategy edge? Head over to mystreamingvalue.com to compare CTV home screens and find out which spaces are worth the most. You’ll even learn exactly why Fox was willing to pay $22 billion for Roku. Stop guessing and start scaling—visit mystreamingvalue.com to get your free insights today!

    Why Sports Streaming Is Fragmented and How Roku Is Solving Discoverability | Joe Franzetta, Head of Sports at Roku

  2. 5d ago ·  Video

    Why Platform-Reported Measurement Is Wrong and How to Solve It | Moe Chughtai, Global Vice President at MiQ

    Have a question? Send us a text! Tim Rowe sits down with Moe Chughtai, Global Vice President at MiQ, to untangle the fragmented state of modern television and how advertisers can responsibly measure multi-channel media allocation. The episode dives into the evolution of "Total TV," bridging the gap between walled gardens and the open web, and why true measurement requires looking beyond platform-provided metrics.  The definition of TV is now entirely generational. What constitutes "TV" completely changes depending on who holds the remote. For older generations, it remains the traditional cable box, but for Millennials, it is streaming-first, and for Gen Z, TV means YouTube and social video before anything else. Advertising must follow the consumer, meaning buyers have to operate across multiple ecosystems—often needing at least three different platforms to achieve true CTV scale.  01:27 – How MiQ’s AI tech enables traders to run 45 campaigns a month compared to the agency average of five 02:50 – Why getting CTV scale requires buying across at least three platforms, including walled gardens like Amazon and Google 07:21 – The "Total TV" framework and how younger demographics view short-form social video as primary entertainment Platform-graded measurement is creating massive blind spots. If an advertiser relies solely on a buying platform to measure its own success, the numbers will inevitably overstate performance and claim overlapping conversions. True measurement cannot be graded by the platform selling the media. Advertisers need to elevate their data strategy above individual platforms to identify overlap, measure cross-channel frequency, and spot wasted ad spend across both the open web and streaming investments.  10:30 – How overlaying location data with CTV and social investments helps national brands eliminate local media wastage 13:17 – Why relying on platform-reported performance leads to overcounted conversions and critical business blind spots 13:50 – The shift toward independent measurement partners and digital MMM solutions to track true cross-channel performance Walled gardens are finally lowering their defenses. After years of locking down data in response to privacy regulations and competitive fears, the major walled gardens are starting to open up. Platforms are realizing that to secure ad dollars, they must allow marketers to bring their own data in and take actionable signals out. With clean rooms and integrated measurement providers gaining traction, the binary battle between the open web and walled gardens is turning into a collaborative spectrum.  15:23 – How Google’s Ads Data Hub and Meta’s clean rooms are signaling a shift toward more open data sharing 16:06 – Why YouTube remains the dominant global video player, with 60% of MiQ's YouTube ads running on the big screen 18:23 – Moe's two-year prediction on walled gardens allowing more data in and out to satisfy marketer demand Connect with Moe Chughtai on LinkedIn · MiQ Thanks to Looper Insights for sponsoring today’s show! Ready to unlock your streaming strategy edge? Head over to mystreamingvalue.com to compare CTV home screens and find out which spaces are worth the most. You’ll even learn exactly why Fox was willing to pay $22 billion for Roku. Stop guessing and start scaling—visit mystreamingvalue.com to get your free insights today!

    Why Platform-Reported Measurement Is Wrong and How to Solve It | Moe Chughtai, Global Vice President at MiQ

  3. Sep 24 ·  Video

    Why Live Sports FAST Monetization Is Broken and How to Fix It | Keith Bedford, GM EMEA at Wurl

    Have a question? Send us a text! Tim sits down with Keith Bedford, GM of EMEA at Wurl, to map the infrastructure gaps standing between live sports and FAST monetization — and what Wurl is building to close them. Recorded ahead of Sportel and Mipcom, with a Part Two already locked in. Live sports on FAST went from less than 3% of viewing to an entire content category in 12 months. A year ago, live sports made up less than 3% of all FAST viewing compared to nearly 20% on traditional television. That gap is closing fast — Man City launched a channel going live on match days, UEFA landed on Tubi with highlights and women's Champions League content, the Bundesliga kept a Friday night game for Samsung TV Plus while selling Saturday rights to Sky. The rights model is diversifying. The platforms are filling up. The ad infrastructure hasn't caught up yet. 1:37 – Man City's live match day channel and why it's unprecedented in the UK market2:10 – UEFA on Tubi: highlights, women's Champions League, and what rights they kept4:48 – The Bundesliga case study: Saturday rights to Sky, Friday nights to Samsung TV PlusThe programmatic problem? If nobody knows it's live, nobody bids like it's live. In a programmatic bid stream, a live Champions League match and a three-year-old highlights reel look identical without metadata. The CPM is the same. The opportunity isn't captured. Wurl has spent most of the year building a live event API that pre-sends event IDs, metadata, and timing into the bid stream — essentially a sports TV guide for media buyers and planners that tells the market what's live, when, and what content surrounds it. It's not live yet. But it's close. 7:57 – Why FAST ad monetization is still a mixture of pre-sold sponsorships and programmatic9:30 – Why walled garden OEM data creates fragmentation for advertisers trying to reach across platforms16:23 – Wurl's live event API: pre-sending event IDs and metadata so planners can actually plan against itSomeone still has to press the ad button - what about AI? All this technology and AI, and the best way to insert an ad break into a live sports stream is still a human being pressing a button in real time. Wurl uses AI to model when game breaks should happen, but the final call is manual — because if it's live and the game overruns, an automated system gets it wrong. The investment they've made is in making that human intervention smarter, faster, and more frequent so more ad slots get filled at better rates. 12:50 – What Wurl does: playout, channel distribution, and AdPool across every major platform14:22 – Why live ad insertion still requires a human in the loop15:10 – How Wurl's ad break model creates more inventory and better metadata in the same workflowThe three reasons FAST live sports channels fail: the TV, the home screen, and the cross-marketing. Keith's honest diagnosis of why good content still doesn't find its audience. First: consumers don't know the free channels exist when they buy the TV. Second: if the content isn't on the home screen, it might as well not exist — and getting home screen placement requires an active marketing strategy with the platform. Third: almost nobody is cross-marketing their FAST channel across social, YouTube, and Instagram, which is the only place to find the audiences who aren't already looking. Two tiers exist: brands that understand marketing, and brands that ignore it entirely. There's no middle. 19:39 – Why consumers don't know they have 300 free channels when they buy a new TV20:30 – Why home screen placement requires an active strategy, not just distribution22:01 – Why cross-platform marketing is the missing piece for almost every FAST sports channelConnect with Keith Bedford on LinkedIn · Wurl Thanks to Looper Insights for sponsoring today’s show! Ready to unlock your streaming strategy edge? Head over to mystreamingvalue.com to compare CTV home screens and find out which spaces are worth the most. You’ll even learn exactly why Fox was willing to pay $22 billion for Roku. Stop guessing and start scaling—visit mystreamingvalue.com to get your free insights today!

    Why Live Sports FAST Monetization Is Broken and How to Fix It | Keith Bedford, GM EMEA at Wurl

  4. Sep 22 ·  Video

    Why Direct CTV Buys Used to Be "Dumb" and How They Became Programmatic Winners | David Nyurenberg, SVP Digital at InterMedia Advertising

    Have a question? Send us a text! Tim Rowe sits down with David Nyurenberg, SVP of Digital at InterMedia Advertising, days before the Ad Exchanger Awards Gala at Programmatic I/O — where three of InterMedia's projects landed five finalist nominations. The episode unpacks all three: closing the conversion loop on direct publisher buys, privacy-safe show-level targeting at scale, and what happens to performance when you separate good news from bad news using AI. Direct publisher buys in CTV have been dumb buys. That just changed.  More advertisers buy direct-to-publisher in CTV than the industry realizes — better rates, no middleman fees, upfront commitments, JBP spend requirements. But the tradeoff has always been measurement. Publishers had no visibility into which slices of their inventory were driving conversions, which meant they couldn't optimize. The buy either worked or it didn't — a roll of the dice on CPMs that aren't cheap. InterMedia closed that loop with Tubi, NBCU, and Paramount by placing publisher pixels and feeding conversion data back in real time. All three publisher tactics became the top-performing placements across an entire major buy. 3:09 – Why direct CTV buys have historically been "dumb buys" — and why that matters at scale6:53 – Why DTC and mid-market brands are existential for legacy CTV publishers competing with Meta and Google9:04 – The result: Tubi, NBCU, and Paramount tactics outperformed every other tactic across the entire buyShow-level targeting without knowing the show name. Privacy-safe and scalable.  David has been banging the drum on show-level transparency for years — because you can't optimize toward content that drives performance if you can't identify the content. The first solution used metadata matching: zip code, time of day, channel, and network cross-referenced against an airings table to deduce what show was on and bid accordingly. It worked. It didn't scale. Pier 39's content ID solution hit scale — assigning a unique ID to every show without revealing the title, then tying that ID to conversion data so the algorithm knows what to buy more of. You give up the show name. You get the performance signal. 12:20 – Why show-level transparency is the gap holding CTV back as a true performance channel13:14 – The first approach: metadata matching via zip code, time, channel, and Grayston airings tables15:07 – The Pier 39 solution: random content IDs tied to conversions, scaled through Pontiac IntelligenceGood news outperforms bad news. The data is now in. News is efficient and it converts — older audiences, disposable income, high engagement. But many advertisers still won't buy news on CTV because brand safety enforcement is harder than in display: no keywords, just moving sound and image. Anokey AI's contextual technology solved it by segmenting news into positive and negative sentiment in real time. InterMedia ran a scientific split — positive news versus negative news versus all news bundled together, with deduplicated audiences and a control line. Positive news outperformed both the negative-only line and the everything line on a cost-per-lead basis. Good news is good for your bottom line. 16:52 – Why news performs in CTV — and why most advertisers still won't buy it17:21 – How Anokey AI segments local news by sentiment in real time on CTV19:00 – The result: positive news sentiment outperformed negative news and the control lineConnect with David Nyurenberg on LinkedIn · InterMedia Advertising Thanks to Looper Insights for sponsoring today’s show! Ready to unlock your streaming strategy edge? Head over to mystreamingvalue.com to compare CTV home screens and find out which spaces are worth the most. You’ll even learn exactly why Fox was willing to pay $22 billion for Roku. Stop guessing and start scaling—visit mystreamingvalue.com to get your free insights today!

    Why Direct CTV Buys Used to Be "Dumb" and How They Became Programmatic Winners | David Nyurenberg, SVP Digital at InterMedia Advertising

  5. Sep 17 ·  Video

    Why Traditional TV Keeps Fading and How Video Podcasts Replaced It | Emily Williams, Consumer Expert at MRI-Simmons

    Have a question? Send us a text! 📊 Read the MRI-Simmons Video Podcast Report: mrisimmons.com Tim sits down with Emily Williams, Consumer Expert at MRI-Simmons, for a return visit built around fresh data from their annual podcast study — 10,000 US podcast consumers surveyed, weighted and projected to the total US audience. The topic: why the definition of a podcast is breaking down, why that's actually good news, and what the numbers say about where streaming, podcasting, and creator content are all converging. Only 36% of podcast consumers still define a podcast as audio-only. In 2021, that number was over 60%. The format-first definition of podcasting is collapsing — and Emily's data shows it happening faster than anyone expected. Today 13% of podcast consumers define a podcast as a video program on an app. Another 8% — roughly 7 million active podcast consumers — say they're not even sure how to define a podcast anymore. Emily's read: podcasting isn't losing its identity. It's becoming bigger than the format that originally created it. 1:26 – How MRI-Simmons surveys 10,000 US podcast consumers annually and what the study measures3:00 – How the definition of a podcast has shifted: from audio-first to format-agnostic4:47 – The 8% who actively consume podcasts but can't define what they're consuming96% of podcast consumers still listen to audio. 89% watch video. Video isn't replacing audio — it's adding to it. The winner-versus-loser framing the industry keeps reaching for doesn't match the data. Nearly three-quarters of podcast consumers — 74% — say video is an enhancement to audio, not a replacement. Two-thirds say they prefer to watch video when it's offered. And 53% say that when they're watching a video podcast, they ignore the video and just listen anyway. The availability of video matters more to consumers than the constant visual attention. They want the option. They don't always use it. 9:00 – Why video and audio are complementary formats, not competing ones10:20 – Why 53% of video podcast viewers ignore the video while listening11:30 – The multi-platform consumer: TV at home, audio in the car, clip on Instagram at nightSocial media clips have officially replaced word of mouth as the #1 way people discover podcasts. Up until 2024, the number one podcast discovery mechanism was a friend or colleague recommending a show. Starting in 2024, social media surpassed verbal recommendations. Today 44% of podcast consumers discover shows through social media — ahead of recommendations, app directories, online searches, and advertising. A two-hour episode generates dozens of short clips. Those clips circulate on TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram. The show finds the consumer before the consumer finds the show. 18:07 – How social media surpassed word of mouth as the #1 podcast discovery channel in 202418:30 – Why video creates the short-clip discovery engine that audio alone never could19:45 – Why consumers discover the clip before they discover the podcast — and why that's lower friction23 million consumers say podcast time is replacing streaming time. Netflix is paying attention. Podcasts are not just another content category for streaming platforms — they are increasingly a competitor for the same hours. 23 million consumers say their podcast time is replacing video streaming. Another 32 million say it's replacing traditional live TV. Nearly 60% of podcast consumers say they find podcasts more engaging than TV. And 70% say they actively seek out other content from publishers once they find a program they like — TV shows, movies, live events, merchandise. That's not passive media consumption. That's fandom. That's why Netflix and YouTube are in a bidding war for creator franchises. 12:54 – Why streaming platforms see podcasts as a competitor for attention, not just a content category13:30 – Why 55% of podcast consumers — about 50 million people — go to YouTube for podcasts16:21 – Why streaming services acquiring podcasts are buying loyal audiences, trusted creators, and communitiesBy 2031, we'll stop asking whether something is a podcast or a TV show. We'll just ask whether it has an audience. Emily's five-year prediction: the podcast-versus-TV distinction disappears. The relevant distinction becomes scripted versus unscripted. The future media landscape will be organized around creators, communities, and interests — not formats. Brands that create belonging and give audiences reasons to return will win. The format will be irrelevant. 21:19 – Emily's 2031 prediction: the end of the podcast-versus-TV conversation21:45 – Why scripted vs. unscripted is the distinction that actually matters to consumers22:10 – Why the future asks "does it have an audience?" not "is it a podcast or a TV show?"📊 Read the MRI-Simmons Podcast Study highlights deck — free: mrisimmons.com Connect with Emily Williams on LinkedIn · MRI-Simmons Thanks to Looper Insights for sponsoring today’s show! Ready to unlock your streaming strategy edge? Head over to mystreamingvalue.com to compare CTV home screens and find out which spaces are worth the most. You’ll even learn exactly why Fox was willing to pay $22 billion for Roku. Stop guessing and start scaling—visit mystreamingvalue.com to get your free insights today!

    Why Traditional TV Keeps Fading and How Video Podcasts Replaced It | Emily Williams, Consumer Expert at MRI-Simmons

  6. Sep 16 ·  Video

    Why Niche Sports Docs Work and How 'Wing Bowl' Was Made for Streaming | Pat Taggart, Documentary Director

    Have a question? Send us a text! Tim sits down with Pat Taggart, filmmaker and founder of Sky Blue Creative, to discuss his new documentary No One Died: The Wing Bowl Story — the 26-year history of Philadelphia's most chaotic winter tradition, and what self-distributing an independent film in today's streaming market actually looks like when the major players come calling with contracts designed to take everything. A radio joke in 1993. 30,000 people in an arena by the end.  Al Morganti threw out a throwaway comment on the air — the Eagles are never going to the Super Bowl, let's have a chicken wing-eating contest instead. Two guys at a folding table in the lobby of a Ritz-Carlton-caliber hotel. Two hundred drunk Philadelphians showed up. The hotel told them never to come back. The next year, 700 people showed up in an ice storm to watch year two at Mike Schmidt's bar on Market Street. It grew from there. 3:01 – How a passing comment on Philadelphia sports talk radio became a 26-year tradition4:15 – Year one: a folding table at a hotel, 200 hooligans, and a horrified management team5:39 – What the Florida Film Festival reviewer called "strangely heartfelt" — and why they were rightFor 364 days a year, the participants were anonymous.  For one day, 30,000 people knew their name.  Landscapers, security guards, plumbers, mailmen. Wing Bowl gave regular people a moment that almost nobody gets — walking into a packed arena with 30,000 people on their feet screaming for them. The community that formed around it was a brotherhood and sisterhood that reunited every year. The chaos on the surface was real. So was everything underneath it. 5:54 – Why Wing Bowl was as much about community as it was about spectacle6:46 – How Pat approached the tonal shift from harmless joke to massive cultural event17:41 – The universal story: the little guy getting their shine, freedom of expression, a runaway trainA truck exploded in the parking lot. A man was attacked by dogs carrying grilled cheese. Someone ate three candles.  The behind-the-scenes stories that didn't make the final cut are as good as the ones that did. Mitch Williams — the relief pitcher famous for giving up the World Series-winning home run to Joe Carter — parked his truck over smoldering tailgate embers and it blew up. A Wing Bowl qualifier was attacked by stray dogs on his walk to the studio because they smelled the grilled cheese in his backpack. One contestant's qualifying stunt was eating actual wax candles. Pat had 40 characters in the film and says he could have made another film with 100 more. 14:59 – The Mitch Williams truck explosion story that didn't make the cut15:30 – The grilled cheese dog attack that almost got a guy disqualified16:10 – The candle eater and the philosophy of finding the best collection of characters possibleTwo of the largest production companies on the planet made offers. Pat walked away from both. During COVID, major streamers were buying documentaries at massive multiples — seven figures for content that wasn't even exceptional, just available. The pendulum has swung hard in the other direction: $300,000 documentaries now selling for $30,000 because filmmakers have no leverage. Two major production companies approached Pat about Wing Bowl. Their contracts would have removed Pat as director, removed the producer, severed all financial and name attachment, and given them full narrative control. Pat said take it out of the contract. They said that's not our intention. He walked. 19:23 – Why the major streamers are now buying $300K documentaries for $30K19:48 – What the production company contracts actually said — and why Pat walked20:30 – The self-distribution decision: aggregator over distributor, creative control over upfront moneySelf-distribution is more expensive upfront. It's also the only way to keep the film you made.  Pat went through an aggregator instead of a traditional distributor to get the film on Prime Video, Apple TV, and YouTube. It cost more out of pocket. But the film that's on those platforms is the film he intended to make, and he's still attached to it by name and financially. His wife's cousin asked if it was on Fandango. It isn't. Discoverability in a world of infinite shelves is the next problem — and it's the same problem every content creator faces. 18:53 – Why Pat passed on Fandango and chose to stay on three major platforms19:11 – The discoverability problem: you have to be in all the stores, on all the shelves20:30 – What self-distribution via aggregator actually costs and what it protectsConnect with Pat Taggart on LinkedIn · pat@skybluecreative.com · wingbowlmovie.com Thanks to Looper Insights for sponsoring today’s show! Ready to unlock your streaming strategy edge? Head over to mystreamingvalue.com to compare CTV home screens and find out which spaces are worth the most. You’ll even learn exactly why Fox was willing to pay $22 billion for Roku. Stop guessing and start scaling—visit mystreamingvalue.com to get your free insights today!

    Why Niche Sports Docs Work and How 'Wing Bowl' Was Made for Streaming | Pat Taggart, Documentary Director

  7. Sep 10 ·  Video

    Why Sports Streaming Needs Disruption and How an NFL Legend Is Doing It | Shawne Merriman, Founder of Lights Out Sports TV

    Have a question? Send us a text! Tim sits down with Shawne Merriman, three-time Pro Bowler and CEO of Lights Out Sports TV, to trace the journey from defensive end to streaming architect — and unpack the 5G broadcast technology he's been quietly building for a year that could fundamentally change the economics of live sports delivery. From the field to the production truck to the boardroom — how Shawne was taking notes the whole time.  Shawne Merriman started asking camera operators questions during pregame warmups in San Diego. He went from NFL AM at 3 a.m. — the broadcast boot camp that became Good Morning Football — to Fox Sports, ESPN, the WWE Network, and MMA promotion. By the time he launched Lights Out Extreme Fighting on Fox Sports Regionals in the same timeslot UFC vacated, he had already spent years picking up intel at Fubo's offices, sitting in Pluto's LA suite when they had 12 employees, and watching the streaming industry build itself from the inside. 2:39 – Why Shawne was asking camera operators questions during pregame warmups4:15 – NFL AM: the 3 a.m. broadcast boot camp that became Good Morning Football6:14 – Pitching Lights Out Extreme Fighting to Fox Sports the day UFC left — and landing itProgrammatic alone doesn't work unless you're Pluto. Direct ad sales is how you build a real business.  FAST looked promising — until Shawne ran the numbers. Programmatic revenue doesn't scale for a sports property unless you're already at Pluto-level monthly actives. The model that actually works: direct-sold ads anchored by live sports, with enough complementary content on the platform to create a trickle-down viewing effect when the game ends. It's the same math Paramount+ is running with the NFL and Landman. Shawne's running a version of it with LXF, Glory Kickboxing, World Poker Tour, and high school football. 9:17 – How Shawne learned the FAST business from the inside — including what programmatic actually pays18:32 – Why direct ad sales is the only way to meaningfully grow revenue for a live sports property20:47 – The trickle-down effect: why live sports is the top of the funnel, not the whole funnelOne signal to a million people. The 5G broadcast technology that could change live sports economics.  The fundamental cost problem in live sports streaming: one million concurrent viewers means one million simultaneous CDN signals. Costs scale linearly with audience. Shawne has spent the last year and a half embedded with a company building 5G broadcast technology that flips that model — one signal delivered to millions via low-power tower infrastructure, with no congestion, no dropout, and built-in compatibility with the new chipsets coming to mobile devices. The announcement hasn't been made yet. But the math is already solved. 13:51 – Why CDN costs are the live sports streaming industry's biggest unspoken problem14:54 – The 5G broadcast technology: one signal to millions, no congestion, no dropout15:26 – How new mobile chipsets unlock billions of addressable devices as 6G comes onlineDTC wins. The platforms that figure it out first take the long game. Shawne called it three to four years ago: the streaming services that win long term are the ones that solve direct-to-consumer. Not because of price — most consumers will absorb a couple extra dollars. Because of experience. The navigational friction of jumping between Netflix, Paramount+, ESPN, and Hulu is the real complaint. Whoever solves the bridge — seamless access, unified data, direct fan engagement — owns the next decade. 11:00 – Why DTC is the only long-term winning strategy in streaming distribution15:52 – How the closed network model lets platforms push products and rewards directly to viewers17:06 – The math problem streaming is now in: responsible scaling, not growth at all costsHow high school football is paving the way for high school sports streaming. St. Francis vs. IMG Academy. Shawne has exclusive broadcast rights, drone production planned, fan engagement built in, and conversations underway with multiple networks and platforms. He produced the East-West Shrine Bowl practices live for the first time in the event's 100-year history. High school sports is the next frontier — and he's building the production infrastructure for it. 21:37 – The St. Francis vs. IMG Academy game: why Shawne expects it to be the most watched high school football game in the country22:00 – Fan engagement as the core production principle: if fans feel connected, viewers follow22:30 – The East-West Shrine Bowl: 100-year-old event, first-ever live stream practicesConnect with Shawne Merriman on LinkedIn · @ShawneMerriman on all platforms · Lights Out Sports TV Thanks to Looper Insights for sponsoring today’s show! Ready to unlock your streaming strategy edge? Head over to mystreamingvalue.com to compare CTV home screens and find out which spaces are worth the most. You’ll even learn exactly why Fox was willing to pay $22 billion for Roku. Stop guessing and start scaling—visit mystreamingvalue.com to get your free insights today!

    Why Sports Streaming Needs Disruption and How an NFL Legend Is Doing It | Shawne Merriman, Founder of Lights Out Sports TV

  8. Sep 8 ·  Video

    Why Meta Faced an $18.1B Settlement and How YouTube Got Dragged In | Mark Stenberg, Senior Media Reporter at Adweek

    Have a question? Send us a text! Tim sits down with Mark Stenberg, Senior Media Reporter at Adweek, to unpack the real ripple effects of Meta's $17 billion teen settlement — what it actually means for media buyers, whether YouTube gets dragged into the same restrictions, where youth advertising budgets go if mobile supply shrinks, and why the microdrama format might be the most interesting disruption nobody is talking about yet. $18 billion sounds like a reckoning but it's only $1.2 billion a year for a company that made $60 billion last quarter.  The coalition of state attorneys general asked for $200 billion. They settled for $12 billion cash plus a conditional $5 billion — spread over ten years. Meta's stock went up. The more interesting part isn't the number. It's the conditions: reduced notifications during school hours, dark mode after midnight, a two-hour daily usage cap for teens. And the conditional $5 billion only triggers if YouTube, TikTok, and Snap agree to implement the same restrictions — Meta's lawyers took hostages on the way out. 1:47 – The settlement breakdown: $12B certain, $5B conditional, $1B to the Texas AG2:44 – The teen restrictions: notifications, dark mode, usage caps7:09 – Why Meta's legal strategy was "if we're going down, we're all going down"The media buy remains unchanged. By and large, the answer from agencies is: we're establishing benchmarks and watching the next 6-12 months. The demographic affected is less than 1% of Meta's revenue. Teens don't have the disposable income of any other demographic. But if YouTube, TikTok, and Snap all get pulled into the same restrictions — and the entire social ecosystem adopts teen safeguards simultaneously — that's a different conversation entirely. The brands paying attention are the ones in fast food, gaming, and fashion. 3:35 – What media buyers actually said: benchmarks, not budget shifts5:00 – Why less than 1% of Meta's revenue comes from this demographic6:05 – Australia's under-16 social media ban and the broader legislative trajectoryYouTube is different but those differences are disappearing. YouTube has never really been a social media company — it lacks the social graph, it's consumed more like television, and it's been more proactive on parental controls. But Instagram is launching Instagram TV. Microdramas are making streaming look like social. The distinctions that protect YouTube today are eroding. Mark's read: YouTube voluntarily adopts some teen-friendly policies to avoid bad press, but doesn't end up looking exactly like Meta. 9:16 – The CPM gap between YouTube mobile and YouTube on the living room screen10:26 – Why YouTube's distinctions from social media are continuing to disappear12:00 – Why YouTube lacking a social graph is one of its biggest internal challengesThe biggest creators are acting like media companies. YouTube is paying creators to not talk to Netflix. Jay Shetty. Tom Segura. The talent wars are accelerating — and Mark wrote the cover story on it. The biggest YouTube channels are functioning as standalone IP. Spotify is a dark horse. Fast platforms and institutional capital are getting involved. In 12 months, Spotify will have video, YouTube will have podcasts, Netflix will have music. The platform distinctions we have today won't exist. 13:01 – Why YouTube is paying creators to stay off Netflix13:36 – Mark's Adweek cover story: creators hitting an inflection point15:00 – The talent wars: signing creators like unseen NBA prospectsMicrodramas: the addictiveness of social scrolling plus the IP of Hollywood. A company out of Tel Aviv is using AI to cut licensed Hollywood IP into five-minute, ten-clip highlight reels. A company out of Ukraine is building original IP for the format. The microdrama genre has been massive in China for years. Mark's thesis: if you combine mobile scrolling addiction with genuinely compelling short-form IP, that's a potential sea change — and the dominant player in that space hasn't emerged in the US yet. 16:17 – Why microdramas are the format Mark is most interested in right now17:00 – The Tel Aviv company cutting Hollywood IP into bite-sized streaming19:14 – Quibi was six years early. The format is now arriving on time.📰 Read Mark's piece: What Meta's Teen Settlement Means for Media Buyers More from Mark at Adweek: adweek.com/contributor/m Thanks to Looper Insights for sponsoring today’s show! Ready to unlock your streaming strategy edge? Head over to mystreamingvalue.com to compare CTV home screens and find out which spaces are worth the most. You’ll even learn exactly why Fox was willing to pay $22 billion for Roku. Stop guessing and start scaling—visit mystreamingvalue.com to get your free insights today!

    Why Meta Faced an $18.1B Settlement and How YouTube Got Dragged In | Mark Stenberg, Senior Media Reporter at Adweek
See All (49)

Ratings & Reviews

About

Covering the topics, trends, people, and acquisitions shaping Streaming TV.

Information

  • Creator
    State of Streaming
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    49
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 State of Streaming Podcast
  • Show Website
    State of Streaming Podcast

You Might Also Like