9 Comments
founding

I suspect a large part of the confusion comes from differing constituencies, i.e. deal folks, as folks, and analytics folks, all sharing the same vocab for different purposes. As a deal lawyer I would love to see the language of your chart be used because it’s more precise, but lots of deal people tend to paint with a broader brush, sometimes purposefully and sometimes because they are new to the Tower of Babel

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Oct 28Liked by Evan Shapiro

Our choice of verbiage may not be the BIGGEST problem we have right now, but you're onto something for sure...

I guess the challenge is trying to put singular, all-encapsulating labels on things that are, by their nature, multi-dimensional. The underlying revenue model is one thing, the user experience is another (with several sub-parts to this), and the merchandising approach (i.e., the whole "bundling" thing) is a third. They may all appear in different combinations, so they can't all be lumped under one acronym.

It reminds me of a (now) very dated blog post I wrote a decade ago in trying to categorize the (then) modern content business.

https://medium.com/c-o-n-t-e-n-t-i-o-u-s/eight-layers-c07672c3a79e

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author

I love the frozen TV dinner imagery. I think the acronym mania is a symptom of the larger problem Matt - the embodiment of us constantly getting in our own way.

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Ha, thanks! I remember sifting through many images to find the one with the fried chicken AND the apple compote!

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Oct 28Liked by Evan Shapiro

Have always used the old international/universal terms of free tv and pay tv...still try to, but hard when the acronyms are flying wild. It's exhausting.

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Oct 28Liked by Evan Shapiro

Evan: Wise words about using words wisely and reducing the industry’s reliance on confusing acronyms. Say what you mean, people!

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Oct 28Liked by Evan Shapiro

Evan: Wise words about using words wisely and reducing the industry’s reliance on confusing acronyms.

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Many moons ago, before the era of streaming - it's almost de facto leader. DVB that is. All the standards and acronyms are universal primarily for Digital transmission and Pay TV industry. Perhaps we are missing that one regulatory/standardization body. This self regulation allowed us to cook an impressive alphabet soup on daily basis.

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Building on last week's theme. If you can't simply explain the concept to the audience / the customer then you're probably on your way to oblivion.

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