Sony Pixel Power calrec Sony

Content Creation is a Semi-Glamourous Business

01/08/2024

Content Creation is a Semi-Glamourous Business

Andy Marken August 1, 2024

0 Comments

They worship everything, and they value nothing. - Sebastian, LaLa Land, Lionsgate, 2016

One of the toughest jobs in the world is to be a boss/CEO of a company.

Worse? Being a CEO in the Americas.

Worse yet? Being a CEO of a tech/entertainment company in the Americas.

How did we arrive at this epiphany?

Logic! because you have to pay some idiot an exorbitant amount of money along with a huge backend payment to take the job.

According to the Booth School of Business, the average salary of a CEO at a Fortune 500 company is about $15M and entertainment CEOs get a lot more.

The job is so tough that when Sheri Redstone (family fortune so it sorta' doesn't count) and the board blew out Bob Bakish, she had to convince three guys to share the blame job - Chris McCarthy, George Cheeks and Brian Robbins. Then she could focus full attention - along with the board - to decide if they're going to keep the old girl together, sell her as a single diamond or cut her up into smaller gemstones.

Safe Landing - A for hire CEO always needs a well-crafted exit package or golden parachute because well, paying boss gigs are tough to come by.

In addition to having some small consolation knowing it took three folks to replace him, Basich was given time to clean out his desk and got his monthly stipend ($258K/mo.) until the end of October.

Oh yeah, he had a soft landing like most CEOs who get fired with a $48.5M ++ severance package.

Hollywood may be a tough business, but it pales in comparison to tech firms. Elon Musk is so broke he asked (demanded) that his $56B compensation package be reaffirmed. Wonder how much he gets paid every time he goes to the bathroom?

It's Tougher - While we have a world economy, it's obvious that being a boss in the US is tougher than anywhere else so you have to pay the guy (most of the time it's a guy) because, ah well because.

Sorry, got sidetracked, but being CEO for an American company really has to be tougher than anywhere else in the world.

After all, they have to get paid so much more than their counterparts in other parts of the world to be convinced to take the thankless job.

According to Bloomberg analysis, US CEOs average $14.3M annually more than double their counterparts north of the border and 10X more than those in India.

There are a lot of different reasons for the discrepancies - many of the world's largest companies are located here, there's a higher cost of living (you know about that, right?) and well stuff.

Of course, their jobs - making their numbers - were made even tougher by all of the strikers (actors, auto workers, etc.) who wanted a living wage, healthcare, holidays (EU folks get a month) and simply drug the strikes out, quibbling over little things.

According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median US worker made about $31.43/hr. last year but actors were paid $17.94/hr.

While the negotiating bosses still got paid, folks on the picket lines lived off savings (?), the kindness of others and union health plans.

Most actors aren't stars, most creators aren't Tarantino or Nolan; stunt folks have it a little tougher than Fall Guy's Gosling; production folks only get in front of the camera to clean the lens and most postproduction folks grind away hours on end in dark rooms staring at screens.

Sorry to crush the kids' dreams of heading to Hollywood, getting discovered serving coffee, becoming instantly famous, living in a Beverly Hills mansion and wallowing in money.

That s*** doesn't even happen in the movies!

But ever since the golden era of Hollywood, media industry executives have always been highly paid. And over the past bunch of years, these tormented executives have been through the grinder.

There was the MeToo period, the pandemic, those troublesome worker strikes and the total upheaval of the show/movie food chain. But through it all, top executives at Disney, Warner Bros and others got paid an average of $34.8M last year (more than double their counterparts in other US industries).

Salary Plus - Executives - or their agents - may have to negotiate how much they get paid but there's an entire industry built around executive compensation that helps them ensure they get theirs first.

True, stock awards make up most of their compensation packages and they're granted at the beginning of the year.

So, it probably doesn't count that all of those shelved video projects (regardless of how far along they are) that create tax savings and folks being layed off rather than adjusting their salary, are important management decisions.

After all, the pandemic was behind us and obviously, people were going to flock back to theaters even though they had been cutting back on high ticket prices and expensive popcorn for years.

Not Going - Certain segments of the entertainment industry don't like to admit that the cost (time/money) of a movie makes it less attractive for a lot of people to go to movie houses today especially since they have options.

In fact, according to most research, only eight percent of folks consider themselves frequent movie attendees while 59 percent say they rarely or never see movies in the theater.

And we hate to break the industry, but that just ain't gonna change!

The other change, which has been equally as slow and insidious, has been the petering out of the pay TV gold mine.

Folks have options lots of options.

Past Prime - Prime TV viewing is past its prime as the cost of the payTV bundle continued to grow along with the number of ads networks/services packed into each hour. Consumers have begun switching to economic and quality options.

Actually, FX CEO John Landgraf coined the term Peak TV a few years af
LINK: https://creativecow.net/content-creation-is-a-semi-glamourous-business...
See more stories from creativecow

Most recent headlines

05/01/2027

Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be demoed at CES 2026

Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...

06/09/2026

Dolby and MagentaTV Bring Fans Closer to the FIFA World Cup 2026 in Germany with Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos

June 9 2026, 23:00 (PDT) Dolby and MagentaTV Bring Fans Closer to the FIFA Worl...

04/08/2026

Dalet Announces Commercial Availability of Dalia, Bringing Media-Aware Agentic AI to Enterprise Productions

Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...

04/07/2026

Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in Dolby Cinemas Across Japan, Presented in Dolby Atmos and Dolby ...

April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...

23/06/2026

IAB Tech Lab Releases SupplyChain v1.1

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

Besco to Represent PlayBox Neo in South Korea

PlayBox Neo appoints Besco as Channel Reseller to establish a firm foothold in Asia Pacific's thriving high-tech export-driven economic boom PlayBox Neo, t...

23/06/2026

PBS Selects LTN to Power Nationwide IP Video Network

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

PBS selects LTN for nationwide IP video network

LTN, a global leader in IP-based video transport and network services, today announced that PBS has selected LTN as its IP video partner to modernize and future...

23/06/2026

The LiveU Q Era Arrives in ANZ with the LU900Q at ABE2026

LiveU will introduce its Q Era to Australia and New Zealand for the first time at ABE2026 on Stand No. 25, (July 30 31). Leading the showcase is the LU900Q, a n...

23/06/2026

Miri Technologies Ships V410 Live 4K Video Encoder-Decode...

Miri Technologies Inc. has begun shipping its highly anticipated V410 live 4K video encoder/decoder for streaming, IP-based production workflows and AV-over-IP ...

23/06/2026

DHD SX2 and TX2 Consoles Go On-Air at Radio Tzafon

DHD audio reports the completion of an upgrade to the audio production facilities at the Galilee headquarters of Radio Tzafon. The station broadcasts two progra...

23/06/2026

Nagravision Launches Nagra Venturi Security Offering

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

ITN Expands Programmatic Local TV Platform

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

Warner Bros. Discovery Taps AWS for New AI-Powered Ad Tech

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

Study: Younger Viewers More Distracted But More Receptive to Ads

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

Chilevisin, ClaroVTR Tap Pixop for 4K FIFA World Cup Feed

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

Imagine Communications Names Greg Garmon as Senior Vice P...

Multifaceted Growth Executive Brings 20+ Years of Experience Leading Organizations Across Tech and M&E Imagine Communications today announced the appointment ...

23/06/2026

Australians in Film and Screen Australia's talent development initiative UNTAPPED returns for 2026

Australians in Film and Screen Australia's talent development initiative UNT...

23/06/2026

Visual Productions Unveils RdmRelay2 Four-channel Relay Control at InfoComm 2026

Visual Productions Unveils RdmRelay2 Four-channel Relay Control at InfoComm 2026 Brie Clayton June 22, 2026 0 Comments New Relay Solution Combines DMX, ...

23/06/2026

SMPTE Makes Its Standards Freely Accessible, Opening Standards Library to the Global Media Technology Community

SMPTE Makes Its Standards Freely Accessible, Opening Standards Library to the Gl...

23/06/2026

Arqiva response to DCMS Green Paper

The priority now is a clear and credible plan June 23, 2026, Winchester, UK - Arqiva, the UK's leading communications infrastructure provider, welcomes tod...

23/06/2026

RT AND COMMUNITY FOUNDATION IRELAND ANNOUNCE RT TOY SHOW APPEAL GRANT AWARDS 2026

The RT Toy Show Appeal has raised over 31 million since its inception in 2020 ...

23/06/2026

NVIDIA Powers Over 400 of the World's 500 Fastest Supercomputers

News Highlights: NVIDIA technology runs 81% of the TOP500 and 90% of the systems new to the list. 26 systems on the TOP500 adopted the NVIDIA Grace CPU, up ei...

23/06/2026

How Businesses Are Building Specialized AI They Can Trust

Companies are asking how to build specialized AI that fits with the way their workflows actually run. The first wave of enterprise AI was about access. Compan...

23/06/2026

June 22, 2026

Newly identified molecule strengthens the eye's response to damage in retinal disease Scripps Research discovery finds that restoring the naturally occurrin...

22/06/2026

Behind the Mic: SportsCenters Lisa Cohn to Retire This June From ESPN as Longest-Tenured Anchor

Behind The Mic provides a roundup of recent news regarding on-air talent, includ...

22/06/2026

Cosm Appoints David Ho as Chief Legal Officer

Cosm has announced the appointment of David Ho as Chief Legal Officer, a newly created executive role reporting to President and CEO Jeb Terry. Ho will oversee ...

22/06/2026

Warner Bros. Discovery and AWS Announce AI-Powered Advertising Technology Platform

Warner Bros. Discovery and Amazon Web Services (AWS) have announced the developm...

22/06/2026

Daktronics Completes Audio Control System Upgrade at Petco Park for San Diego Padres

Daktronics has completed an audio control system upgrade at Petco Park in San Di...

22/06/2026

Accelerate Media Names John Willi President, Launches Accelerate Sports Network

Accelerate Media has named John Willi as President and announced the launch of the Accelerate Sports Network (ASN), a prep sports media and streaming platform c...

22/06/2026

AWSN to Air 3XBA Womens Basketball Tournament Live June 26-27

All Women's Sports Network (AWSN) and 3XBA (3 3 Basketball Association) have announced live television coverage of the annual 3XBA tournament on Friday, Jun...

22/06/2026

OWL AI Appoints Jay Prasad as Chief Executive Officer

OWL AI has announced the appointment of Jay Prasad as Chief Executive Officer and member of the Board of Directors. Prasad succeeds Josh Gwyther, who has served...

22/06/2026

CP Communications Provides RF Support for Inside the NBA at 2026 NBA Finals

CP Communications delivered RF video and audio support for TNT's Inside the NBA at the 2026 NBA Finals, providing main show coverage in San Antonio and ea...

22/06/2026

Polymarket and GRID Partner to Integrate Esports Data and Streaming into Trading Platform

Polymarket has announced a partnership with GRID, an official esports data platf...

22/06/2026

SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: Metinteractive's Rachel Mele, Ken Cyr on Building Technology Backbones for Sports Venues

As sports venues continue to evolve into more video-centric, fan-engagement-driv...

22/06/2026

SVG All-Stars: Corbin Perkins, Chief Engineer, Victory+

As the regional sports production scene shifts toward streaming, this Texan helps lead the engineering behind Victory+'s growing live platform...

22/06/2026

Meet the 2026 Sundance Institute Documentary Edit Intensive Fellows

By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs the memories of your elders [are] a scaffolding for you to build your identity on - and t...

22/06/2026

Blade joins CEDAR Audio Icons line-up

New hyper-resolution analyser EQ revealed CEDAR Audio's all-new Icons plug-in series has just gained its newest member, Blade. Described by the compan...

22/06/2026

Sampleson release Aeronaut

Turn any live input into a cinematic soundscape Designed for use in the studio and on stage, Sampleson's latest creation is capable of taking any audio ...

22/06/2026

ADDAC System's new Four Strings Series

Adds guitar strings to Eurorack rigs ADDAC System are renowned for their weird and wonderful synth designs, and their line-up includes plenty of gear that&#...

22/06/2026

FIFA World Cup 2026 fever grows, as more than one third of Australians tune in to SBS coverage

FIFA World Cup 2026 fever grows, as more than one third of Australians tune in ...

22/06/2026

NAGRA Venturi - Turning Piracy Intelligence into Measurable Business Impact

In our latest blog, Tim Pearson explores NAGRA Venturi, the new streaming security solution for the AI era from NAGRAVISION. Designed to aggregate and analyze ...

22/06/2026

Xumo Expands Contextual Targeting Capabilities Through Gracenote and IRIS.TV Integrations

Expanded integrations give advertisers access to distinct contextual signals acr...

22/06/2026

Greg Garmon Joins Imagine as Senior VP, Americas Video Sales

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

22/06/2026

Kaleidescape Breaks the 8K and 4:4:4 Barriers

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

22/06/2026

Xilica introduces Dynamic Voice Lift in new Designer

Xilica today announced the release of Dynamic Voice Lift, a new feature in Xilica Designer v4.12 that brings adaptive speech reinforcement to large meeting spac...

22/06/2026

NVIDIA Brings Trusted, 24/7 AI Agents to Telecom Operations

Telecom operators have seen remarkable returns from using generative AI to automate network management, customer care and back-office operations. Most of that i...

22/06/2026

Official trailer released for Katie Price: Nothing to Hide, coming to Sky and NOW on 8 July

Monday 22 June 2026 Official trailer released for Katie Price: Nothing to Hide,...

22/06/2026

Eco Wave Power Turns Waves Into Watts With NVIDIA AI Infrastructure and Digital Twins

The next era of AI will not be defined by compute alone. Its growth will be dete...

22/06/2026

NVIDIA Vera CPU Opens the Way for Agentic Scientific AI at Los Alamos National Laboratory

Mission, Vision and Veritas - new Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) supercom...