Bloomberg Tech Screentime Special

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1:19Bloomberg Tech is live from coast to coast with Caroline Hyde in New York and Ed Ludlow in San Francisco.

1:33Welcome to a special edition of Bloomberg Tech, live from Bloomberg Screen Time in Los Angeles. Coming up this hour, we're going to bring you conversations with some of the biggest names in the entertainment industry. We'll be speaking with top celebrities, Ed, with entrepreneurs, with leaders across this very much changing media landscape. And we first go to the talk of the town. Here at Screen Time, of course, it was Jimmy Kimmel. The late night show host sat down with Bloomberg's Lucas Shaw and explained how he thinks his comments about the conservative activist Charlie Kirk were mischaracterized by the political right.

2:06Take a listen. I didn't think there was a big problem. I, you know, I just saw it as distortion on the part of some of the right wing media networks. And I was I aimed to correct it. I have problems like all the time. And it's kind of funny because sometimes you think, oh, this is not a problem. And then it turns into a big problem. And then sometimes it goes the other way where you think like, oh, this is going to be a problem. And nobody really notices. And so at what point did you realize this was a problem? I think when when they pulled the show off the air. Well, that's unusual. Yeah. And what were the conversations that Dana and Bob that led to that?

2:53um i i hate to disappoint you but they were really good conversations i'm not asking for anyone i mean really like really good conversations they are these are people that i i've known for a long time and who i like very much and who were you know who wanted we all wanted this to work out best and i will tell you like i mean first of all i ruined dana's weekend it was just nonstop phone calls all weekend. But I don't think what I don't think the result, which I think turned out to be very positive, would have been as positive if I hadn't talked to Dana as much as I did, because it helped me think everything through and it helped me just kind of understand where everyone was coming from.

3:39I can sometimes be reactionary. I can sometimes be aggressive and And I can sometimes be unpleasant. And I think that it helped me really having those days to think about it was helpful. I have a dumb question about this. As someone who was kind of reporting on it in real time trying to figure out what's happening. So the show goes off the air. You have all these conversations. And when you all made a decision to put the show back on the air. My understanding at the time was it still wasn't exactly clear what you were going to say. They still hadn't resolved the issues with the affiliates. So what do you resolve in those conversations to know you're going back if you haven't figured out a lot of the things that come out of it?

4:24I think just the spirit of what I'm going to say rather than specifically what I was going to say. And I think that's something that we all agreed on. And I think that ultimately I wanted to kind of cover every base if I could. and sometimes he can do that and sometimes he can't do that and it was something really that had to come from inside me it had to be truthful and i had to lay it all out there and just be honest about what i was feeling and what i'd experienced and i think i did and i think that um it probably went about as well as it could go i knew that it wasn't going to be perfect and there There were always going to be people that didn't like it and didn't accept it.

5:12But the important thing to me was that I was able to explain what I was saying, what I was trying to say. Because you felt like your initial comments had been mischaracterized. I didn't feel like it was. They were. It was intentionally and I think maliciously mischaracterized. Yeah. that was jimmy kimmel there with bloomberg screen time host lucas shaw who joins us now this morning the story around jimmy kimmel is one of the most read on the bloomberg terminal and the website and it's being shared across the industry i think that's not that surprising right lucas um the headline is really straightforward he thought that the show was done and in the course of what we just heard he explained everything that happened in the days that followed being taken off air, confirming quite a lot of your reporting.

6:05I just invite you to take it from there and the main takeaways from you from the conversation. Well, I guess I was a little surprised on retrospect, not shocked by how effusive his praise was for Disney, just because in the moment, my sense from people around him was that he was pretty pissed off at them, right? They'd taken him off the air. You heard him say, I didn't think I did anything that wrong. my comments got sort of weaponized by right-wing media and yet he's had nothing but positive things to say about CEO Bob Iger about entertainment co-chair Dana Walden he sort of somewhat endorsed Dana Walden to succeed Bob Iger which I don't know that he or Dana were expecting to happen last night but this turned from what could have been a really sad, ugly episode in his career to something that has made him something of a hero and so I you know this was I guess a little bit of a victory lap for him.

7:01A victory lap which then you get to the nitty-gritty of numbers because that's what Bloomberg does yeah and you're trying to present him that ultimately yes he had record bump in terms of numbers but the numbers haven't been great for late night television full stop. How did he navigate what he thinks is the revenue positive or negatives right now for him? Well twofold one he was like look there was a lot of reporting about how much his peer Stephen Colbert show was losing. He thinks that that's wrong. He knows how much money these shows cost to make. He knows generally how much they bring in.

7:30I think he said last night it costs about$120 million to do one of these shows. But he also said, look, if they were losing money, they'd go off the air. Stephen Colbert's show is going off the air. We don't know the future of Kimmel's show. His contract is up next year. I think most people assume that he'll be around for a little bit longer. They don't want to... At a minimum, they're not going to fire him in the same way that CBS did Colbert. But obviously the big challenge for late night is that there's just so much more consumption happening online and you can't monetize it in the same way.

8:00I found that so interesting, like his insight into how the industry works, budgets, talent costs, losses or not losses. Lucas, that's kind of the point of the rest of the day. We have many very high profile speakers across entertainment and media generally, but just for you, what is your next big focus after last night? My first interview is David Ellison, who I think is, other than Kimmel, probably the biggest interview of the conference, just because he hasn't done a big interview since taking over Paramount Skydance. He seems to be in the news every other day. He bought Barry Weiss's The Free Press.

8:35He may or may not be trying to buy Warner Brothers Discovery. We'll talk about both those things with him. And you've got Warner Brothers Discovery at the table as well. That's going to be fascinating considering the conversation you have with Greg Peters, the co-co of Netflix, about how ultimately he's not after M &A. WBD, that's going to be a fascinating conversation. Yeah, the co-chairs of their movie studio, I'm sure that they will avoid talking about any big corporate matters and kind of defer that to their leadership. But look, they will be great to talk about the movie business with. They have been on a real hot streak with Sinners, with Minecraft, many other hits over the summer, Weapons, and then the new PTA movie, which probably isn't a commercial hit, but looks like an Oscar frontrunner.

9:13All right, Bloomberg's Lucas Shaw, who's leading our coverage here at Bloomberg Screen Time in Los Angeles. Thank you very much. but actually here on Bloomberg Tech, Caro. So much more coming up. We're going to be speaking with Catherine Mayer, NPR CEO. Look, public media faces threats, particularly under the Trump administration right now. What is the future of funding? Stick with us. This is Bloomberg Tech.

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10:45See, that's what happens when people get activated. People got activated and demanded that Jimmy Kimmel come back on the air. And I think that that was a great victory. So sometimes, you know, when you're struggling and you're going through all these changes because of the madness in D.C., it's important to realize when you do win, when you have a victory. And I think Jimmy Kimmel being back on the air was a victory for all of us.

11:13Los Angeles Mayor there, Karen Bass, reacting to Jimmy Kimmel's return, of course, to the air after a brief suspension of what he described as a mischaracterization of his comments about Charlie Kirk. Meanwhile, look, public broadcasting as a whole is facing new challenges. Outlets, PBS, NPR, for example, seeing their share in federal funding cut by Congress over the summer. It raises questions about the future, the viability. At the center of the debate is NPR CEO Catherine Mayer, who we're pleased to say not only is joining us, having already been called before the Oversight Committee earlier this year.

11:46Catherine, how do you navigate this time? How are you seeing the ability for NPR to thrive and drive forward? Well, there's certainly no roadmap for this moment in time. I think this represents a step change for all public broadcasting. It's not just here in the United States. We recognize that public broadcasters around the world are under increasing scrutiny and pressure. The good news for us is that we have a viable model because we've built audiences over the 50 years we've been in existence. We have 46 million listeners a week. And so as we look to the future, we're looking at, all right, this is a change.

12:19It doesn't change our public service mandate. It doesn't change our mission and our obligation to the American public. It just probably will change how we have to do our work. When you say how you do your work, does it ultimately mean that you have to think about the resources that you put to work there? Can you be as expansive in the coverage that you have been for so many years? It's a good question and it's something we're trying to figure out. NPR received traditionally about 1 % of our budget directly from the federal government. Just 1%. Just 1%. But we have a network of around 250 member stations, which received as much as 70 % in rural parts of the country.

12:52And so we're waiting to see what some of the fallout will be for those stations. We have projections. We're concerned about this. And we're looking at how we can buttress some of their work by cutting fees to them and thinking about how to make a dollar stretch a little bit further to continue to serve local communities. Catherine, I think there would be a lot of value in you explaining the business model. It is confusing. Well, the reason I ask actually is in preparation for today, I suddenly stopped and looked at NPR's following on social platforms, for example. It's very, very big. Yes. you know, how do I consume some NPR content like on YouTube, for example?

13:27But that isn't necessarily a big income generator for you. Is that right? Right. So I think that people think of us as radio because that's our origin. But in fact, 50 % of our listening comes from digital platforms. It comes through podcasts. It comes through YouTube. It actually comes through reading online. And you can see in our numbers that our demographics are actually very well distributed. We've been accused of being too liberal. But what I can tell you is that when we look at the audience data as to who comes to us, it's actually a very representative distribution of the American public.

13:58So 50 % of what we're doing is for digital audiences and 50 % of what we're doing is for radio audiences. On the radio side, we have these roughly 250 members across the country. They serve 99.7 % of the American public. So in some ways, we are one of the largest national networks and we have 3 ,000 local journalists around the country who then serve back into the network with stories that they're filing for their local communities and for their states. How does it make them feel when they're deemed to be too liberal? And how? Not good. Yeah. Really not good. I mean, we have reporters who are covering tribal areas who are primarily focused on the issues of Native American communities.

14:37We have reporters in rural Alaska who are focusing on the issues that their communities face, some of the issues around, for example, fishing and access to the National Wildlife Preserve. And what does that mean for economic opportunity for Alaskans? They're having nuanced conversations that represent the full spectrum of the American debate on any of these issues. And so to be called liberal or to be demeaned in that way is really a misrepresentation of the work that they do. Nuance is a great word. You need more of it. Well, we try to make sure that we're hearing from all sides of the story and every story.

15:12And that means that we are representing, sure, of course, communities in California that perhaps have one point of view, but also communities in Indiana that have a different point of view. You know, we talked about this as a team and one of our producers, Zoe Thomas, brought up the idea that there is like the NPR strategy and then there's what the local stations are doing. On the politics side of things, you know, how are the local stations reacting? for example, if a lot of their listener base did vote for President Trump, you know, with what's going on, how are you factoring that in? But also, like, in the business model, do you end up sort of also competing at the NPR level with the local station level because you're trying to pursue different subscribers, things like that?

15:55Well, those are sort of two very different questions. I mean, we aim to serve the entire spectrum of American conversation, right? So we had the White House press secretary on just last week speaking directly to the American public about the administration's thinking on the current government shutdown. We invite members of both parties on all the time. We invite independent voices on all the time. This is important to us. But it's not just our politics coverage. It's also coverage of American life, all of the cultural aspects that make up our differences as well. And that is one of the flexibilities of local reporting, is it means that our station in Utah can run stories about the local reaction to the Charlie Kirk assassination as well as contributing to our national coverage so that Americans all across the country can hear from those perspectives.

16:37What is the feedback from the American listeners about everything that's happened? Well, I mean, on the news, of course, I think what you hear very consistently is that this is a concerning time. People dislike the amount of polarization. We do hear that our coverage and the way that we approach things tends to bring people closer to an understanding of their fellow Americans because we really do focus on finding the personal story. We like to say that everything that happens in America happens somewhere. And so we're always trying to find this somewhere that that is happening, whether it's the implications of tariffs or, you know, the conversation that's happening around, for example, Jimmy Kimmel, who you were just recently referencing.

17:13Listeners are so loyal. You turn to them for funding. Have you seen big billionaires, big donors wanting to step up into this moment? We have seen a outpouring of support. Absolutely. So New Hampshire Public Radio, for example, raised a million dollars in response to the defunding efforts over the course of a short period of weeks. We're really appreciative of this, but that won't fill the gap for these rural communities that are already socioeconomically strapped. There's a reason they have been federally funded. We know that 20 % of Americans live without local news. There's a reason for that.

17:48The market conditions don't allow it, and that's where public media has filled in the gap. So that still remains a challenge. We have seen a lot of support, of course, across the board for public radio. I think there were three million people who wrote into Congress to support us at the time of defunding. But it won't be enough to fill the$120 million gap relative to the defunding efforts. Your own background is so fascinating, having been for a stint with the Web Summit, making huge, big events, and for a tech community. You're the chair of the Signal Foundation. You've also been at Wikipedia.

18:22I'm interested as to how in this moment of belt tightening, your technological savvy comes into all of it. Well, I actually think that technology is an enormous advantage for the complex structure that you have. You asked me about the business model earlier. Yes. And I think it's a great lead into this, right? There is a way in which we could be in competition. All of these local stations seeking to now transform their work for a national audience. Technology actually offers us the place to bring all of that aggregate reporting together. And so if somebody is running a really great story here in LA about a local band that is about to go on tour, and I reference that because music is a big part of what we do at NPR, we now have the ability to serve that to any audience member anywhere across the country who might be interested in what that band is about to do.

19:06right we wouldn't have been able to do that in a previous era but the ability of digital platforms the affordances for us to serve audiences seamlessly they don't think of us as our local station versus our local station they think of us as one public media experience and that's really what we're leaning into so it's when what are you going to do differently you know in this environment what are you going to change to to bring in more money that you need well certainly investing pretty heavily in the fundraising piece i mean i don't think that that's dissimilar from what we've seen in nonprofit news as a whole.

19:34We've seen tremendous success in the nonprofit news sector in building subscriptions and building memberships. That's an opportunity for us. And in fact, we've been doing it for a long time. We have millions and millions of loyal donors across the country. It's time to bring in the next generation. You mentioned I come from Wikipedia. We have a little experience in this, right? So that's one piece of it. I also think that it's an opportunity for us to think about how we're doing our news gathering and news production more effectively. And so we have all these journalists across the country. What does it mean to do the national editorial planning where we're really thinking about how to elevate these conversations that are happening around the country into the national story?

20:09And then, of course, we have this great international and national reporting that we're going to now weave into the mix. Catherine Mayer, NPR CEO, thank you very much for being with us here at Bloomberg Screen Time. Meanwhile, Warner Music Group is said to be in close agreement with Netflix to create a slate of movies and documentaries based on the record labels, catalog of artists and songs. That's according to sources. Here's what Warner Music Group CEO Robert Kinkel said about a potential deal. I cannot confirm anything. But, you know, if you step back and think about this, it makes a lot. You know, our company has tremendous catalog.

20:47Prince, Madonna, Fleetwood Mac. You know, it just goes on and on and on. The stories that we have are incredible. and they haven't really been told. We're like Marvel for music. That's where we are. And it will be unlocked. And so it makes a lot of sense for us to partner with a company that can bring it to life all around the world. And it's exciting both for acts who are no longer with us, but we make their estates happy and satisfied, but also for acts who are with us, who then can actually help bring young audiences to the streaming platforms. Robert Kinsel, Warner Music Group CEO there. I think it's hard for any brand that has a deep consumer sense of what are you doing for me, right?

21:46And then you're like, well, I'm going to do this as well. And it takes a while to really build up that sense of what's happening. But it's not that dissimilar to, let's say when we launched in a new country. Like, you know, I launched in Japan, right? So when we started in Japan, 2 % of the Japanese population had ever heard of Netflix. So nobody knew our name, much less be able to tell you what we were doing. And we were doing pay TV service in a country that doesn't really have a great pay TV operation. We're doing over the internet in a way that was totally new. And so you've got to, every day, build a little bit of, like, what are we doing?

22:21Who we are? How are we here to serve you? So that 10-year journey, let's say, we just did the 10th anniversary in Japan, tremendous progress over 10 years, but it took us a long time. And I think the gaming situation is not dissimilar to that. How much is it an impediment that, for the most part now, you can only play it on your phone? Well, I would say the phone is, what's great about it is it's a well-developed gaming ecosystem, right? So, folks know to find games there. But it's also a highly competitive gaming ecosystem. So, its developedness gives you both that upside and that downside. But what's exciting is that now we are moving beyond the phone to the TV.

23:02So, I mentioned the big gaming areas we're going after. One of the big gaming areas we're going after now is social gaming experiences that will show up on your TV. So, we are now announcing, we're going to announce here, actually, that we're going to have these social party games, a pack of social party games that you can play on your TV with your phone as the controller. And it's things like, you know, recognizable games like Boggle. You got Pictionary. We've got a Lego party game. We've got Tetris. We've got like a mafia style whodunit. This is me and our CTO, Elizabeth, playing Boggle here, which is, we're two very competitive people, so it got pretty ugly.

23:41Who won? I'm not going to say. That means he lost. Oh, does it? Why don't you watch the video, my friend? You triggered my competitive spirit. But this is, again, this is, you know, so it's your phone, which is an incredible device. And there's all sorts of things you're going to be able to do on your phone that you can't do on a normal controller, like touchscreen. And this is us basically picking our words on that. And it's, you know, it's dead simple to use. It's intuitive. and then this is us on the earliest days of how we actually can use that. And if we basically are going to unleash this with a bunch of creators and they're going to go figure out stuff that we didn't even imagine that they can do with that interactivity.

24:27That was Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters. Key conversations coming up, gaming with Twitch CEO Dan Clancy, Eunice Lee of Scopely. One of the top streamers out there is Pokimane. So much more from Los Angeles and Bloomberg Screen Time. This is Bloomberg Tech.