Media mogul Barry Diller talks about the strikes – Deadline

Noam Galai/GC Images

Veteran media mogul Barry Diller called on media companies to “get out of the room” with the tech giants and instead reach a separate resolution on writers and actors strikes.

“They should definitely get out of the room with their fiercest and almost decisive enemy, Netflix, and perhaps with Apple and Amazon,” Diller said on the podcast. With Kara Swisher. “Because Netflix is ​​in one business, and they control the business they’re in. The other two companies, Apple and Amazon Prime, are in completely different businesses and don’t have a business model around film and TV production.”

The former Fox, Paramount and Universal boss, who was more focused on InterActive Corp., said Swisher in the chat introduction. and other digital projects over the past 20 years, summoned from his yacht. “I don’t know where he was wandering off to Venice,” she added. The bulk of the interview dealt with non-entertainment topics, including Diller’s support for Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie and his efforts to rein in tech companies’ use of artificial intelligence in publishing.

Regarding the technology giants Apple and Amazon, Diller said: “I do not think they belong in the same room with the producers. I think the producers should go and say, “We’re on our own.” We will negotiate with you directly. We are your savior. Historically, we’ve been working together for literally a hundred years. “We are your natural allies, not your enemies.”

Diller’s comments are consistent with sentiments from the strike front reported by Deadline earlier this week. AMPTP members are said to face internal opposition and find it difficult to synchronize with each other in talks with the WGA and SAG-AFTRA due to their diverse business models and goals. Disconnection added another layer of complexity to finding a path to end the downtime.

Diller has long suggested that Netflix has long “won” the streaming race. In the podcast, he links the company’s meteoric rise and the disruption of Hollywood models to the strikes.

“Netflix has urged — and I would say somewhat tempted — all of these companies to get into streaming at the loss of huge amounts of money to try to build a competitive streaming service,” Diller said. “They’ve reduced their investments in cable because of Netflix’s impact on cable. They’ve reduced their investments in their streaming arms. He went on to call Netflix the ‘architects of the strike.'” He noted that the streaming giant “is in the same room with the people who were killed and who were trying to get out of This is in a way. The strike only does one thing, in the end because the strike will be settled. What do you do, or what do you do? It strengthens Netflix and weakens the others. Now, what kind of genius would you have to be to be able to achieve this in a fairly straight line “For the last 10 years? That’s pretty amazing.”

Despite his more recent digital orientation, Diller has also been an outspoken advocate for broadcast television, and has returned to the topic on his podcast. He said that media companies embroiled in the union struggle and trying to navigate the extremely difficult business climate “have to reorient themselves and say: We all own a great television network, fully distributed to every household in the United States.” “Let’s not treat it like it’s some fragments of yesterday. Let’s go compete. Let’s take some of our offerings. Look, it’s finally a successful business. Let’s take some of our offerings and creativity and build our networks back up. It’s there for the taking. Let’s take whatever we do.” We activate it again by allocating the capital that suits the suit.