Film producer Adam Faze: Netflix-Warner Bros. is good for Hollywood because the real war is for attention against Meta, Google, and TikTok

and launched Prism Aentic reporting that can explain your finances.

Yeah, we got Adam Faze in the New York Stock Exchange.

Wow. In the suit in the Can we get Can we get a suit check real quick? You look fantastic. [music]

Stock. Yes, you look great. Thank you so much.

Are you Are you like a tailoring guy? You get it?

I No, I am like you buy a suit then you get it tailored.

Okay. That's great. I'm not at the level yet you can get like a custom suit one. We're getting there.

Getting there. Well, uh you had some rattling timeline. I do

uh about about the news breakdown. What happened today? How did you find out about it?

I found out from someone tell I've been in favor of this merger from the day it was announced. So I think like when there was conversations around who might be the new owner of Warner Brothers, Netflix for me was always the best option. Um, and so I was having dinner with a friend two nights ago and I was saying this and the next day, last night, he texted me and he's like, "It happened." I was like, "Wait, what?" And I was shocked. I really did not actually think this was possible. But I think I'm one of the few people in Hollywood that actually think this is good for Hollywood.

Okay. Why? Why?

You say you say in Hollywood, but you're here in New York. You know, look, Hollywood is kind of every state of mind. It's a state of mind.

Hollywood. Okay. So, uh, yeah. Why is it good? Why is it good?

I think everyone is still stuck in 2015 and thinks that we are in a battle with Netflix. The reality is like we're in a battle for attention with Neta, Google, Tik Tok, the AI companies. And I think whatever's best for this IP is what's best for Hollywood.

And we as content creators, IP,

I think as people that love our industry, I think the IP that Warner Brothers own is so rich. At the end of the day, Netflix has the most powerful distribution arm in entertainment. And so when you look at the force of like a K-pop Demon Hunters, for instance, which like arguably the biggest movie of the year, you think that Warner Brothers is the second most important animated IP library, second to Disney, right? This is Looney Tunes. We're talking Hannah Barbara. We're talking

these are titles that are gathering dust on platforms and it would gather dust on Paramount Plus as well. And Netflix now has the IP to match the distribution that they already have.

Why do you why do you don't think Paramount would be able to put it to use?

Not to the power of Netflix. And I think at the end of the day, Netflix has wanted a licensing business for a very long time, but I think what they figured out is that IP is really hard to make. I think after 10 years, there's like three titles you can actually say are IP. Stranger Thingsid Squid Game. Uh, and I think you can say K-pop team, but like they spent 15 billion dollars using it really is remarkable because I feel like I feel a very positive association with Netflix. I've always had a good time with it. I've always enjoyed it. And then but when I actually look through I can name 10 HBO shows that I love and revere as like fine art relative to like had some good times on Netflix, but it's not like oh you're not watching you've never seen the Sopranos. Exactly.

You're not watching Game of Thrones. Like, it's not the FOMO TV.

And I think at the end of the day, we're matching now the most powerful audience in streaming with the greatest library on earth. So, I think like in revenue alone,

the greatest library on earth,

hey, I really do think Warner Brothers has the greatest library when you include HBO as well.

Okay. Sure. Sure. I mean, there's some good stuff. Yeah.

And I do think when you think about the licensing revenue they're going to start making for merchandising, I mean, we're talking Netflix now owning Harry Potter.

The merchandising on that alone is the reason why this is the best deal possible.

Yeah. You're not worried about You're not worried about the debt. You're not worried that everybody that that subscribes to HBO Max is already probably paying Netflix and there's there's just

Well, I don't mean it'll be cheaper for all of us, right? I mean, I think you're going to get too far a little bit more expensive.

A little bit more expensive, but then you can just keep

bringing it up, bringing it up, bringing it up. I mean, I I've I've I've always uh

Yeah, I've always always been uh like Netflix has felt like such a good value proposition for so long. I've always been interested to see how people will churn if there's not like a hot showt on Netflix at that exact moment that they're engaged with because there's just so much content.

Help me wrestle with this. There was someone on the on the timeline who was saying like uh I cannot imagine another place where Warner Brothers would land that would be more of a would create more of a monopoly and and they're saying they're going to face antitrust. Yeah. So Jason Jason Kar who was a founding CEO of Hulu. That's right.

Warner Media CEO. He says, "If I was tasked with doing so, I could not think of a more effective way to reduce competition in Hollywood." Reduce WB to Netflix.

Particularly an antitrust phrase,

but I was saying like, what about selling it to Disney? Like if it was

What about to Paramount? At the end of the day, there'd be a lot worse consolidation with a Paramount and Warner Brothers combined merger and a lot more lost jobs.

Okay. So, so explain explain that angle cuz I was talking about Disney and it just seems crazy to put uh Superman next to Spider-Man like you.

I think at the end of the day, as much as people usually like to say that they'd like to keep the teams at both studios, at the end of the day, if Paramount and Warner Brothers were to emerge, they'd have the same film studio.

Oh, sure. Sure.

And so, I think what we're really talking about here is the consolidation for the survival of a 100-year-old industry. That's going to continue to happen. But again, we are in a war for attention with the digital platforms that are free to watch, which is YouTube, which is Instagram, which is Tik Tok. So, I think that at the end of the day, we are trying to keep alive an industry that is not thriving, but still is a very powerful industry. I think that this puts it in a much better direction going forward.

Yeah. What about uh actual physical theaters? It seemed like Netflix was trying to get ahead of some narrative that uh you know movies that you love with the the next Harry Potter maybe whatever that is or the next super

well the next it is about to be an HBO TV show that's been in development which is really funny but but but you you understand

well you say that but like it it feels still feels like it this deal has a long way to go

has a long way to go

and and it still feels like there's a number of different scenarios

but I think most likely this is just held up for a few years so I think that's probably more likely the option similar time.

Hey, yep. Obviously, the next great movie we have, we could just put on Netflix, maybe get a couple more subs. We are going to consciously make an effort to put it into theaters. Uh, do you think that's lip service? Do you like that plan? Do you think like how are you feeling about the theater business and what it where it goes from here? Do you see Netflix putting a popup that's like, "Hey, this is in movies now, but if you pay $100, you can watch it [laughter] today."

That no, but I will say I think this year we've seen Netflix going to go back on things they've said. I mean, they put K-pop Demon Hunters in theaters and made $19 million in the span of one weekend. So, I do think they understand the force is you can make a difference.

There's something about a musical in a theater, too, cuz especially with kids.

Yeah. and seeing with a shared audience. But I do think that at the end of the day, Warner Brothers, you know, has to continue having their releases come out in theaters if they're going to want to still make movies with people like Paul Thomas Anderson. And so I think what you will more likely see is the window being shortened.

But I do think that they will have to keep and maintain this sort of theatrical exhibition release.

Yeah. Yeah. That's fascinating. I wonder I wonder where it goes. There's a been a trend that I've been a fan of where uh the movie theaters, at least in my town, have been uh reducing the number of seats, but then increasing the amenities and upsells and they'll try and sell you a whole dinner and drinks and you get out of there and you spend 200 bucks, but I don't get to go to the movies that much so it's like a fantastic experience. So, you like the eating in the theater. I love that.

I like the iPick. I don't like the eating in it. I like the like luxury seat for sure.

No, you bring a bottle of wine over. You bring a

How's the wine? Is it good wine?

I can't tell, but it depends. enjoy it. [laughter] No, no, sometimes inspired. I don't know. But I I I think they should go all the way. French laundry, put a movie theater in.

Yeah. I mean, look, at the end of the day, I think you look at something like the Lincoln Center IMAX, which is usually sold out for weeks on end. It's almost impossible to get a seat when you have a one battle after another or DC or something premiering there. So I think the trend is going to go to the theater during the day or just in

sold. I mean I actually tried to go see I finally saw one after another like weeks after it had come out and I had the shittiest seats on earth because I couldn't find seats at any other given show time. But I do think the trend's going to be the only reason you will go to a theater is to have an experience you cannot have at home. So if that's the ultra luxury sort of beautiful screening room that you have a steak dinner at, great. If that's the biggest screen in North America, then that's also amazing, too. And I think a lot of this is sort of repeating what the movie experience was 100 years ago. We used to build like palaces to watch movies and it went to the multiplex in the mall, which really does mirror probably a worse version of what you could watch on Netflix at home. And so, I'm in support of kind of going back to that original experience and making it something that's just like spectacular as a way of getting people back in those seats.

Yeah.

Um,

what other media stories are you tracking? I mean, this is the biggest one of the week. This is history. This is like actual history. And I and I I do I am sensitive to that fact. I think there's a lot of people in Hollywood that are scared about sort of what is next for our industry. You know, we had a very long strike that then came to an industry that was sort of smaller than it was at the beginning of. But um at the end of the day, I do think that this is an exciting story. And I also think that it's going to be as someone who's a fan of like Looney Tunes for instance, I would rather a newer version of Looney Tunes be on these platforms than having kids watch like YouTube kids AI stuff.

Favorite Looney Tunes character.

It's a great question. Wy Coyote. The the the influx of just pure AI content now to YouTube is actually crazy. specifically in the video essay kind of documentary space where they're just like, "Hey, like I'm going to just generate a deep research report,

use 11 Labs to like basically create an audio track and then just put pictures and some videos over it is actually crazy. I've only been uh I like some of the history content on there and I'll just like search for a topic and then if I don't know the channels yet, I I I don't know until I'm 3 minutes in the video and the and the and the video says this this move wasn't just uh this it was that and I'm like I'm like they got you.

I will say YouTube Kids is like one of the scarier things I think we have in culture cuz like you might think your kid is safe because they're watching a Rachel video. It's very cute and innocent but like the recommended feed I don't know if you ever spent time with YouTube Kids. It's terrifying. I mean, it's like AI slop coming from like Russian.

They're not going to swear and there won't be nudity or content, but it's weird.

It's weird and it is like weirdly sensual at times as well. And I think that like I don't know when we decided that these tech companies could be the babysitter for your child. But I imagine that we're going to sort of reverse those trends.

I completely agree. And I think the meme is already taking hold. Like the whole iPad kids meme is definitely something where parents are now proud to be like, "Oh yeah, my kid doesn't have an iPad." And it's like if it becomes a status symbol, then all of a sudden everyone does it and hopefully the matter.

What about social media being banned? There's something in Australia.

I'm in favor of this.

I think under under 16 they're banning social media in Australia, which I think is a great thing. I really do think we're nearing peak

sort of consumption.

So here's here's the issue with that. Like kids are still going to have devices. They're going to use various services. They'll use new networks that have less control. I think kids are still going to be social on the internet. And if you ban the platforms that actually invest billions of dollars a year, you're going to get them on these like places like dark corners of the internet that don't have any scrutiny, that don't have any uh whatever you want to call it, safety teams, whether you're in favor of them or or not. I just think this is you cannot ban humans being social, they will always find a way.

They will always find a way. But I mean, we had a very similar conversation around cigarettes, right? And like we know that the sort of laws we put around cigarettes has saved lives, a countless amount of lives. And so I do think that like regardless, but but the comp would be like it's you ban cigarettes, which is a physical item that you need that needs a supply chain. You need to it's hard to like make a cigarette. Uh we're not banning kids cell phones. They're still going to have a device

roll with one hand. [laughter]

Yeah, John was John was probably rolling his own pipe actually back.

Whiddling whiddling a pipe. Whiddling a pipe. So I just so I just think like you're going to end up in a situation where kids are probably going to make they're going to just vibe code a crazy social network and it's going to invite in a lot of

Sure. I mean I think look regardless I think we're we're nearing that point where we need to have a national conversation about this. I don't think anyone out there can say that like kids are better off today as a result of the amount of brain rotten consumption they're doing on these platforms than they were before. And I think like on top of that these platforms are in the business of getting you more addicted to their slop. There's a reason why Instagram moved the reels tab to where messages used to be cuz they know that once you're on the reels tab, you're probably going to watch a few more reels. That's a $50 billion.

I was not I was not on the reals tab at all. I would just check my messages.

You swipe and now it's real.

I swipe it down there. I'm like cursed.

Okay. Well, it is cursed.

It's cursed.

So, I just think that like this is a conversation that needs to be parentled and [clears throat] we don't really have the data yet to show just how harmful it is.

I always just go back to like my experience with video games like you know Halo I think was like M for mature. I was not supposed to be able to play it until I was 17. I was probably able to get out my hands on it at 14. I think I turned out okay. I'm not obsessed with like killing aliens and I not doing like No, I'm actually completely fine. Same thing with Call of Duty.

I mean, I remember going to GameStop with my mom and uh trying to buy GTA V and they have to give you that whole warning like do you know this game includes like every horrible thing you've ever heard in your entire life? And it's like yeah,

yeah. Yeah. So, so having some sort of warning system. I'm a big fan of MPA ratings coming to tech products. I've been kind of beating that drum for for a couple months. But uh I I like I I think the MPA ratings I hope that the MPAA figures out a way to work with the tech companies in a way that's like accreative to them, like they get paid or whatever. Um because I think that there's just something about if I say, "Hey, uh like like Instagram is R-rated," you'll be like, "Okay, I know what that means." Or like Instagram is PG-13 rated or it's G-rated. I know intuitively and I'm ready as a parent to to decide when and maybe I want to say, "Hey, uh, you know, PG-13 rated movies like a little bit earlier because parental guidance is recommended." It's okay. It's like we can even with video games, I I'm I'm I'm a big fan of like cooperative games being a wildly different dynamic than like solo online in like the toxic chat room. Whereas if it's like me and my son playing a co-op game together, like troubleshooting and stuff, even if like the the the screen images are a little bit like like adult, it's like we're collaborating and so it's a wildly different dynamic than being like lonely and then seeing [clears throat] imagery.

I mean, I do think these are just sort of unfortunately some of the problems we had to deal with with userenerated content. Like we're talking about games that were made by hundreds if not thousands of people that had to go through an approval system to get that rating. There are dangers when it is totally left up to the person of just making whatever type of content you want. Of course, platforms like YouTube are going to police that content and you're not allowed to have, you know, can murder somebody and have that video exist on on YouTube. You can on X, though. So, I think it's just a matter of figuring out like where do we want this conversation to go and like what approvals do we want to give the parents?

Yeah.

Uh want your take on uh the Marty Supreme marketing campaign.

Oh, yeah. Cuz this feels like to me I don't I don't I don't pay much attention to movies, but I'm seeing a lot of Marty Supreme content.

That's good. And

Jord's film of the year already.

Oh, you haven't seen it. Have you seen it?

No. No. I saw it a few weeks ago. You saw it on Christmas. I saw it. I went to the premiere.

I understood it came on Christmas from that. But it's [ __ ] I mean it's amazing. It's the best movie of the year. I will say the best movie of the year. Not to put a a brotherly race between the two, but Josh Safy is is the GOAT and he's he's the one. It's the best score. It's the best acting. It's the greatest cast. It's such a phenomenal movie.

The best score.

Best score.

Really?

Yeah.

Interesting.

Like the game in the ping pong.

No, no, no. Like the best like the music of the movie. The music of the movie.

21 to zero.

I will [laughter] say I don't know. I I think

you know part of they're dealing with Tim. Timmy has a Timothy, not that I'm friends with him, has a very short amount of times. I think he's filming Doom right now. So, I don't think he's that available for press. I think what they're doing is super creative.

I worry that it's a little inside baseball. And I think like you could be going more mass culture with this like he did with the Bob Dylan movie by going on Pat McCaffy and all these other programs.

Um,

I will just say the blimp. The blimp. I've been trying to get somebody to use do a blimp marketing campaign for so long.

You want to do a blimp? Uh, no. I was just pushing like ramp to do a blimp. I told the Gemini team, do a blimp. Right. Like blimps are an amazing asset cuz you can physically put them over the air. Like you're putting something naturally inspiring. You look up and it's a blimp and it's like amazing.

They are. And I think it was fun that it was connected to the instrument. It is. It is. It is the movie of the year. It is best.

Okay. Wow.

Best picture. Wo wo wo.

It's the show of the year.

The show of the year. Um, honestly, I feel like I actually didn't catch up that much with television shows. I'm re-watching Homeland though, which I

Oh, Homeland. Wow. That's a throwback.

It is a throwback at this point. sort of like Obama era scene.

I remember season 1 having a great like cliffhanger. I was really into it. You're deeper in the seasons. You

No, no. I'm I'm like episode seven, season one right now. This is like a new kind of like in passing when I was a kid, but I don't really think I like went through.

No, I remember being really into it when I watched it. Uh anyway, thank you so much for coming on. This is fantastic. Thank you for having me. Congratulations on your booth. Look at this.

This is crazy. This is crazy.

We're here. We're doing it. Thank you so much. Have a great rest of your day. Uh I'm going to tell you about adquick.com. Out of home advertising, easy and measurable. Plan by buy and measure out of home with precision.

Uh did you know the owner of AI.com is uh DeepS?

What?

Apparently it could be fake news. It's according to Google AI overview.

Uh but uh

wait, no, no, no. This is this is completely wrong. Completely wrong because it says it was owned by techuber YouTuber MKBHD who acquired it from Elon Musk. That doesn't make any sense. That's complete nonsense. Um, no, no, no. That fake news. That's That's like completely unreliable. I I'm not buying it. I'm not buying it.

Um, anyway, is there any other news that is worth running through? There was a review in the Wall Street Journal of a book called Mainten Maintenance of Everything Part One review, Making of the Future, uh, by Stuart Brand. This is a Stripe Press book. We should try and have him on the show. Um, so, uh, it begins with this drama. This is a This is interesting. It's talking about like the the the process of maintenance and says, "The author recounts the stories of three contestants in the 1968 Golden Globe around the world solo sailboat race. One was a former merchant marine whose wooden 32 ft catch was barely adequate for a journey through the punishing southern ocean. Make do and mend was his was his uh motto." Another competitor was a tech whiz who packed his plywood triaran electronic electronic gizmos. A dreamy optimist, he set sail in a rush uh hoping for the best. The third and the most experienced racer sailed in a purpose-built steelhold boat which he maintained with zen-like discipline. He said he spent his days working calmly at the odd jobs that make up my universe. And so while this story will be familiar to sailors and others who have read the many books written about the race, Mr. Brand minds the competitor's harrowing experiences for deep lessons, maintaining the technology that keeps us alive is more than a necessary job.

Josh Wolf, remember he was talking about his thesis for maintenance.

Like I think he was on the show if I remember correctly. Uh, I mean the idea is like everybody wants to build things. Nobody wants to maintain them. But we have a lot of things in the world that maybe aren't functioning the way that you want them to. You can throw them out or you can like like maintain them and improve them, bring them uh revitalize them. So uh I'm excited to read the do they did they give a proper review? Um I mean the New Yorker isn't or the the the Wall Street Journal is not doing exactly like two thumbs up here but uh they they they are they are reviewing it and they say uh maintenance will engage students of technology, challenge business readers and inspire home tinkerers who will be happy to learn that fixing gadgets is also a path to enlightenment. Fittingly, the book was initially published in installments online visible at books.work andworksandprogress.co. Co. Uh, as a kind of editorial DIY project, Mr. Brand tends to jump from topic to topic as he follows his passions. Some might find his digressions meandering. I certainly wouldn't have a problem with that. Um, and the author of this uh post on the Wall Street Journal says, "I found them delightful." Uh, reflecting that quirky organization, the book ends on a tangent rather than a big wrap-up. [laughter] Uh, but that only raises expectations for part two. And so, uh, I think this is a positive review, uh, by, uh, Mr. Meeks, the former editor of Popular Mechanics and senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Um, and I think that concludes our our show from

I found out, uh, AI.com. The owner is trying to sell it and they're redirecting it to a bunch of different sites to try to generate income.

Exactly. And so people are people so so they'll show they'll send it to MKBHD for a couple days

to hope that he post and then and then if you're in the analytics and you're Elon at XAI or something and you're like, "Oh, wow. I'm getting all this traffic from where? Oh, someone someone redirected aai.com to me. I'd be curious how much valuable. Maybe I should buy it. It is a lot of traffic.

I I wonder how much traffic it actually gets.

I have no idea. Um I can't imagine that there's that many people that are just going to ai.com. Are those the best customers really? Like people haven't made a decision. I mean, openai botch chat.com. So maybe these short short domains uh make a lot of sense. Um I mean uh doesn't uh does Google own.ai AI or something because they have AI.studio. So I guess they own they own the the TLD studio. Google Google doesn't just buy domain.

See AI.com only got 93,000 visits in October

according to similar web which is not seem super valuable. Um but you could do something fun with it. You could do something interesting with it. I'm sure that there's a there's a way to make some

but it's not worth $100 million in any situation.

Yeah. Well, uh, in other funding news, uh, there, uh, there's 350 million new funding for Castellian, who's been on the show, uh, is, uh, and and the Wall Street Journal is putting in context, there's alarm over the hypersonic missile gap, and it's fueling a startup boom. The Pentagon is getting serious about hypersonic weapons, a technology that have eluded uh, the US military for decades. It's looking two startups with no experience but billions of dollars backing them to fill an increasingly glaring hole in the national arsenal. China and Russia both have stockpiles of these long-range super fast maneuverable weapons. The US doesn't. Even though officials consider them essential to winning future conflicts as the defense department belatedly looks to close that gap. private investment is pouring in and startups, many of which haven't has haven't built hypersonic systems at scale and haven't flown at hypersonic speeds, are seeing their valuation sore. The latest is Torrance-based uh Torrance-based Castellian, which on Friday said it raised $350 million at a $2.8 billion valuation. Wow. Congrats to the team over at Castillian. That is crazy.

They were

they were around a I remember they were around like 100 or 200 earlier this year. So big jump.

Um we are in the back of our show. So I will pull up this post from Jason Freed. He's talking about the best back quarter in the last [snorts] 50 years. What car is this?

Uh this is the Aston Martin Zagato.

Oh the which is probably an underrated car in general and just a fantastic color. Hopefully the team uh can pull it up. Um but uh Jason has incredible taste in all things in life and certainly in cars. Uh but uh that's our show for today. We'll be back home on the West Coast on Monday. I can't wait. And uh thank you for tuning in with us today and yesterday from the NY. Thank you uh to Lynn, Chloe, and the whole team. They're all fantastic. And uh we will be back here soon. We'll see you on Monday.

Cheers.

Thank you. Goodbye.