Comcast has a bad reputation, but it doesn’t get enough credit for the difficulties it’s overcome in integrating those wide-ranging systems into a (relatively) coherent whole. Interestingly enough, that process is not too far off from how Comcast was built-a small cable operator that acquired dozens of other regional operators, largely over the course of a decade. Vox CEO Jim Bankoff is a master of what business people call “deal flow.” The company has been built almost entirely on a series of clever acquisitions that have been integrated into a larger tech stack. Prediction: IPO in 18 months at a $3–4 billion valuation eventually craters and sells for $250 million when Facebook changes its algorithm. For all its goofy meme-driven content, BuzzFeed is run by very smart people, and I wouldn’t bet against it pulling it off. BuzzFeed’s valuation is skyrocketing based on its huge traffic growth and innovative ad model, but much of that traffic (some reports estimate up to 75 percent) comes straight from Facebook and, as such, is subject to the whims of an algorithm outside of its control.īuzzFeed knows this and surely will use some of its ginormous new stack of cash (a rumored $250 million from Comcast/NBCU) to diversify into more bulletproof businesses like its feature film unit, news bureaus, and technology stack. And the scuttlebutt is that BuzzFeed has already turned down at least one huge acquisition offer because Peretti wants to take the company public. Jonah Peretti has already been part of one lucrative media acquisition when the Huffington Post sold to AOL. Prediction: Acquired by News Corp for $4–5 billion in the next 12–to –18 months. An acquisition offer from News Corp or another media conglomerate-and the large stripper-filled yachts that would allow the founders to afford-would be hard to turn down. But the big wolves are circling, consolidation is coming, and the founders of Vice have been in the game for enough time to be ready for a big payout. Of all the new media companies, Vice is also the one I’d bet is least dependent on Facebook and other platforms for its audience. It’s also poured more resources into its in-house agency, Virtue, which helps Vice stay incredibly responsive to the needs and language of advertisers. Instead of using venture money to scale across the entire known universe of cheap clicks, Vice has invested heavily in high-revenue content-like custom integrations and co-branded properties, and, more recently, TV and digital video. One of these things is not like the other! This graph speaks to something I think Vice has figured out that the rest of the world hasn’t: It isn’t the size of your audience that matters, it’s how you monetize it. Here’s a graph that’s kind of cool, via The Information: What follows are wholly unscientific and entirely unsourced predictions about some of the big players in digital media. In any case, with huge new rounds of funding rumored for Vox and BuzzFeed, and even more drama than usual at Gawker, this week feels like as good a time as any to vomit our largely baseless speculations out into the internet. As a tech company that plays in the media space, we get to watch these absurdly cascading valuations at a semi-distance, which does very little for our objectivity but does temper any jealousy we might have otherwise. It’s kind of a parlor game ’round Contently way to speculate about the future of the various digital media companies that populate our navel-gazing universe.
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