OTTQT Riffs Episode #1 – Industry Rhythms & The Autumn Term
OTT Question Time Online is our regular debate show, where a rotating panel of senior streaming executives tackle the biggest issues facing the industry. OTTQT Riffs, on the other hand, is me and my new co-host, Lydia Fairfax, having a chat about all things OTT. Riffing, if you ...
OTT Question Time S6, Episode 2 – A Modern Streaming Operation
Two decades ago, OTT teams were often made up of seconded broadcast staff, building the first on-demand services as bolt-ons to linear TV. As streaming grew in scale and profitability, dedicated hierarchies and specialist roles emerged. In 2025, there’s no single recipe for success: today’s VOD organisations can ...
What Would Streaming Look Like if the Pandemic Never Happened?
We’ve been doing the prep calls for this week’s OTT Question Time Online with Leah Hooper Rosa, of Warner Bros Discovery, and Julie Mitchelmore of Hearst Networks EMEA - where we’re talking about the makeup and approaches of modern streaming operations – and an interesting question came up: ...
OTTQT Riffs Episode #1 – Industry Rhythms & The Autumn Term
OTT Question Time Online is our regular debate show, where a rotating panel of senior streaming executives tackle the biggest issues facing the industry. OTTQT Riffs, on the other hand, is me and my new co-host, Lydia Fairfax, having a chat about all things OTT. Riffing, if you ...
OTT Question Time S6, Episode 1 – YouTube & The BVODs
Ofcom’s latest Media Nations report, drawing on Barb data, suggests that YouTube has now overtaken ITV in total viewing, second only to the BBC channels. But is that really the full story? Are we comparing like-for-like when broadcasters and streamers are measured side by side? And what do ...
OTTQTL26 Survey: In-Trays & Out-Trays
Our annual conference, OTT Question Time Live, returns in January 2026 and will focus on two major themes. #1. In-Trays & Out-Trays To get a sense of where the industry is at, we’ll be asking our speakers, panellists, sponsors, and, of course, audience, to share what’s top ...
Are we Creatives?
If you’re reading this you probably work in the OTT industry and on this side of the glass-to-glass process. That is, you’re likely nearer to the final screen on which the end-user watches the content rather than the first one - the camera - where the movie or ...
Broadcast TV Dies in 2045 (Apparently)
YouTube overtakes ITV, but is broadcast TV really dying? We break down the latest Ofcom and BARB data with a critical eye.
ITV, PSBs & The Bouba/Kiki Effect
Two bits of industry news this week got me thinking about perception, bias, nuance. First, Ofcom published new recommendations about the prominence of public service content in the streaming age. In essence: as the media landscape shifts decisively to IP delivery, public service media (PSM) must remain easy ...
50 VOD Professionals 2025 – Nominations Now Open!
50 VOD Professionals – our list of the 50 most influential people working in the UK’s video-on-demand and OTT industry – is back for 2025! Nominations are now open and we’d like to hear from you about the brilliant people that power VOD services all over the UK: ...
Trump, Overton & Foreign Movie Tariffs
For good or bad, a typical Overton Window – the process via which an idea might move from unthinkable > radical > acceptable > sensible > popular > entirely unremarkable – used to have a reliable half-life of years. Interracial marriage, for example, in the US was still ...
OTT Leaders Sentiment Survey Report 2025
One of the most striking things about our OTT Question Time Live conferences is how much appetite there is for sharing knowledge, insights, and hard-won lessons — even (perhaps especially) among senior industry figures. I guess it’s a truism that while companies compete, people collaborate. With that spirit ...
Hypothesis: AI Kills Google, Opens up a Massive AVOD Opportunity
The rise of generative AI - particularly ChatGPT and other large language models - poses fundamental questions about Google and Meta’s ad-driven business models. If users bypass search engines in favour of AI assistants, and brands follow the audience, could this open the digital ad market to new ...
OTT Leaders’ Sentiment Report 2025
One of the most striking things about our OTT Question Time Live conferences is how much appetite there is for sharing knowledge, insights, and hard-won lessons — even (perhaps especially) among senior industry figures. I guess it’s a truism that while companies compete, people collaborate. With that spirit ...
The OTT Singleton Problem: Are OTT Video Services Penalising Single People?
Many streaming platforms price their subscriptions around features like video quality, downloads, and concurrent streams rather household size. But with single-person households now making up around 30% of homes in the UK, USA, Canada, and much of Western Europe, is this model still fit for purpose? This report ...
Content Creation & the No Body Problem
There’s an alchemy about creating a hit TV show or movie which seems impervious to logic, money, even data. In theory, the formula is fairly straightforward - and replicable. A solid script. Actors who are willing to commit. A director and crew who share a similar vision. And ...
Growing the Pie: The State of AVOD in Europe
AVOD is now a core part of many streamers’ business models offering a way to reduce churn (“Don’t unsubscribe! Downgrade to our ad tier instead!”) while opening up new revenue streams. But is the European ad market big enough for everyone? And do streamers even have the infrastructure ...
A Flock of Black Swans: What Could Blindside the OTT Industry in 2025–26?
When COVID hit in 2020, I remember speaking to a friend at a UK broadcaster just after the first national lockdown was announced. We’d had some warning this was coming — Italy had imposed similar restrictions a couple of weeks earlier — but the moment still landed with ...
Business Resilience and Continuity in Streaming Services
What would happen if your streaming platform went down tomorrow - not from sabotage but from a sudden, unexpected failure in the cloud, your CDN, or your own architecture? This report explores the real-world resilience strategies of Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and Disney+, using them as a blueprint ...
Streaming Without Humans: The AI Takeover of OTT Services
What if Netflix or BBC iPlayer could run entirely without human input? This report explores that provocative question in depth, using today’s AI capabilities as a starting point — and projecting how every major function of a streaming service could evolve over the next 1, 2, and 5 years. From encoding and metadata to scheduling, pricing, commissioning, CRM, content delivery, UX, and advertising, we map how AI is already reshaping the glass-to-glass OTT process and how close we are to autonomous operations. Drawing on real-world examples, visionary use cases, and strategic implications, this is a must-read for streaming leaders preparing for a future where AI isn’t just an assistant but a fully-fledged operator. With practical insights and a clear framework, the report also explores what remains uniquely human and where oversight, creativity, and governance will still be required in a world of algorithmic automation.