Product Strategy | MIDiA Research

What the music industry can learn from play-to-earn gaming

16 Mar 2022

Should entertainment fans be compensated for their fandom? Play-to-earn (P2E), a newly popular school of thought in the gaming space, says yes. People usually play video games for pure enjoyment, but in...

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Why TikTok is primed to become the next-generation music company

Tatiana Cirisano

10 Mar 2022

TikTok

social media

creators

By now, TikTok’s impact on popular music is well-established. The platform routinely catapults songs to hit status, and it has become a regular part of digital marketing campaigns. But behind the scenes,...

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Kanye’s Stem Player release is a real-time experiment in superfan targeting

Tatiana Cirisano

23 Feb 2022

monetising fandom

Music Streaming

Superfans

Never one to follow tradition, Kanye West has announced that his next album, Donda 2 , will not be available on streaming services. Instead, he will release it exclusively on the Stem Player (a handheld...

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Unpacking music royalty investment NFTs

Tatiana Cirisano

26 Jan 2022

Streaming Music

cryptocurrency

NFTs

Last Thursday, a Royal NFT drop allowing fans to purchase a share in the streaming royalties of two Nas songs sold out within minutes. The drop was delayed by a week after high demand crashed Royal’s...

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How relevant are awards in the age of Spotify Wrapped?

Keith Jopling

12 Jan 2022

Streaming

Netflix

Spotify

Are awards ceremonies relevant in today's entertainment landscape? The widespread boycott by major movie stars of this year’s Golden Globes is more than a temporary protest and will lead to a major period...

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The next evolution of direct-to-fan will be fan-to-fan

Tatiana Cirisano

10 Jan 2022

d2c

Fandom

creator tools

Last month, we wrote about creator burnout and the need for more sustainable paths toward financial stability for artists. The abundance of creator platforms has opened the door for anyone to share their...

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Fandom drivers
From fan psychology to NFT demand

Mark Mulligan, Karol Severin, Srishti Das and Tatiana Cirisano

January 2022

superfan

Spotify

merchandise

Fandom is entertainment’s growth currency, yet it remains both under-valued and poorly understood. While other entertainment currencies can be accurately measured (number of streams, number of sales,...

2022 will be a reckoning point for cultural value in digital entertainment

Hanna Kahlert

5 Jan 2022

NFT

niche

publishing

The turn of the year has kicked off with a bang for digital entertainment – well in keeping with the 20’s so far. $2.2 million worth of ape jpegs have been stolen . Vinyl sales were reported to have...

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Formula One’s rise of the creators shines a ray of hope on the future of the sport

Srishti Das

22 Dec 2021

Formula One

Super Max

Creator Economy

Last week marked the end of an eventful year for Formula One with the tight championship fight between Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton. The hue and cry over the International Automobile Federation (FIA)...

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How SZA is building a model for fan base advisory boards

Tatiana Cirisano

20 Dec 2021

social media

engagement

fandom insight

Earlier this month, SZA scored her highest-charting solo single with the breakup track ‘I Hate U’. Perhaps the more interesting milestone for us is that ‘I Hate U’ marks the second time she has...

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A red-hot cultural movement (Taylor’s Version)

Ashleigh Millar

23 Nov 2021

Fandom

music fans

Streaming

Here at MIDiA Research, we like to take a deep dive into fandom culture and the effect it has on industry progress and strategy. As of late, we have focused on the success behind tribal fandom (a skill...

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Tribes are the future of fandom (and that may or may not be a good thing)

Mark Mulligan

12 Nov 2021

Fandom

Tribes

Media and Marketing

At MIDiA, we spend a lot of time exploring the fan economy and how new forms of fandom are redefining media businesses. The most significant underlying dynamic is the fragmentation of fandom: the dynamic...

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Adele’s success will be best measured in cultural impact – not sales

Mark Mulligan

15 Oct 2021

adele

30

Streaming

Adele is something of an anomaly in the modern music business, a throwback to how things used to be. These days even the biggest artists struggle to get mainstream attention for their new releases in a...

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The impact of culture on content: Why Squid Game is a bigger hit than Bond

Hanna Kahlert

14 Oct 2021

Fandom

James Bond

Squid Game

Earlier this week MIDiA highlighted how the format of content is gradually eroding , so much so that a TV series, like Squid Game , can reach bigger audiences and generate more conversation than the decades-old...

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Content proliferation is remaking entertainment categories and giving rise to experiential consumption

Hanna Kahlert

23 Sep 2021

Media and Marketing

Fandom

Digital

The attention economy reaching saturation was a disruptive force in entertainment long before the coronavirus pandemic. Too much competition for too little time meant that audience engagement was increasingly...

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The oncoming fandom crisis

Mark Mulligan

10 Sep 2021

music fans

music fandom

Fandom

The Chinese authorities’ crackdown on fandom represents the first major growing pain for the global fandom economy. Tencent Music Entertainment (TME) will likely be the bellwether of this shift, with...

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The games universe is driving the rise of global football fandom

Srishti Das

3 Sep 2021

FIFA

football

English Premier League

Sport is built on the pillar of fandom, with a global network of passionate fanbases who are driven by different sporting cultures across the world. Football is a prime global example of this, with multiple...

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The four key cultural trends transforming digital entertainment in 2021 and beyond

Hanna Kahlert

August 2021

Marketing

live

Amazon

The effect of streaming on entertainment is not new, but as we move into the era of mainstream vaccinations, the shifts in streaming-driven consumer behaviour over the last year and a half will drive fundamental...

Sports fan consumer snapshot, Q2 2021
US, Canada, Australia, UK, Germany, France, Sweden, South Korea, Brazil

Cover image for Sports fan consumer snapshot, Q2 2021

Tim Mulligan

August 2021

Streaming

Video

Fandom

This slide deck presents sports fan consumer demand, covering video services, live TV sports viewing, sports highlight viewing, free live digital sports viewing, device viewing, sports betting, fantasy...

Hip hop fandom is driving the music business' future in gaming, live streaming and beyond

Kriss Thakrar

17 Aug 2021

Fortnite

Fandom

gaming

The music industry is at a pivot point as new ways of interacting and monetising music arise with unprecedented speed. Kanye West’s Donda live stream generating $7 million in merch sales demonstrates...

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