Axios media correspondent Sara Fischer and Breaker founder Lachlan Cartwright are two of the best reporters who are attuned to the daily changes to the media business. They joined me for a year-end episode that covers key themes of the year, including the rise of personality-driven reporting, the pressure on legacy newsrooms, and the politicized dealmaking that’s reshaping Hollywood.

Welcome to the Rebooting Show.

This is a special.

End of the year edition.

I'm Brian Morrissey and when I was thinking about the end of the year, I

thought I need to have two people have their fingers on the pulse of this

industry, that are out there every day, figuring out what direction it is going.

And I could think of.

No two better people than Sarah Fisher who has been on this podcast a few times.

I think you're, I think you're close to Neil Vogel with having the record, Sarah.

So congrats on that.

Or I'm sorry, as the meme goes, Sarah, Is the proprietor of Axios Media, trends.

I think you're now at like the sort of f first name basis,

at least within the industry.

When people say, Sarah, I know who they're talking about.

So Sarah, thank you for

joining us.

Oh my gosh.

Thanks for having me.

and Lachlan Cartwright.

Lachlan, is the proprietor of Breaker, which shockingly has

not even been around a full year.

I feel like you have, and I'm not saying this just because we're looking at each

other on Riverside, but like you've sort of burst on the scene with this.

I, I told you I love the spirit of Breaker.

Anyone who doesn't read Breaker, you got to because it has, it has a

little bit of a tabloid sensibility and hopefully you'll, you'll hear.

Lachlan is not American.

And I, I mean that in a complimentary way 'cause American journalism

takes itself too seriously.

And we could get into that Lachlan, but Lachlan has, you know, a little

bit of, you know, that, I don't know.

You make it fun.

So I

Cheers.

Right.

Thank you for having me on.

and it's just necessary reading for, for what is going on.

So let's just get into this.

I want to start off by talking about like what it, the, the macro

story we're talking about when we think about the media industry.

And to me it like comes down to we are, we are all witnesses.

And we're also living through, and that's why it's interesting

for the three of us, a massive decentralization of this media ecosystem.

And I feel like this year it accelerated, into almost like disintegration,

it was going to be a challenging year for the institutional media,

world, considering all of the.

External forces that are compressing it, whether it's the changes, the

search AI coming online, the fact that a lot of these business models, are

not, you know, like working really well when they're dependent on advertising.

And then you add in, Trump and it's been, it's been a difficult road.

but let's talk about like our own, like places in it.

so Lachlan, you.

You are you, you've worked at a bunch of different places.

You're at Hollywood Reporter, you're at The Daily Beast.

post New York Daily News, a MI.

You touched them all right?

And you went out on your own.

You're part of, and I think this is one part of this story, is we saw an

acceleration this year of journalists.

Going out on their own and joining whatever we're gonna call this, this area.

I don't think creator economy does it, but if you have a, if you have

a, a suggestion, I'm, I'm willing

How to lose your life savings in a year, maybe.

So tell me about that.

Let's just, just start with like, what, like how has, how has it been?

I mean, as I said, like I think break's been like very, it's

obvious from the outside it's like been very successful, right?

I think you have.

You have something there for sure, and that's the most important thing, but

it's always messy behind the scenes.

Yeah, I mean, I, I kind of look at it.

I've got mates who own restaurants and they say to me, you know, I say, oh

look, looks like this place is just taking off and there's a lot of fun,

cool, sexy people here, and the food's great and you guys are killing it.

Must be just, just, it's just dreams, right?

And they're like, mate, you've got no idea what goes on back there in the kitchen.

And I look at Breaker similarly to that, but, you know, you might look

from the surface that everything's ticky boo, but mate, it's just

constant ag and constant problems.

I can't log in, I didn't get the email.

Or then, you know, I, I look at the sends and someone's open it 600 times

or 400 times, which means that there's mass forwarding around a company.

I don't see any revenue.

Off of that.

And the first four months were brutal.

Like, you know, I've told this to friends.

Like I was waking up in the middle of the night throwing my guts up with stress,

worried I was gonna lose my life savings.

'cause I didn't get money from the roofing blokes or TPG or Jerry Carow.

And so, you know, that, that was incredibly stressful.

And when, you know, when you're spending someone else's money, it's probably fun

when it's your own life savings and, and the thing is it growing, then, then,

then it's, then it's, like I said, it is very, very frightening and stressful.

And there's a period there I'll be very.

Brutally honest, I didn't think Breaker was gonna make it.

Having said that, in the last three, four months, it's just taken off.

And, you know, we're not in orbit yet, but I think, you know, there'll be a

period next year that we'll get there.

and that's exciting.

And you know, I, I see the response from people because in real time, you know,

people will, if the thing's not out by, if the break break's not out by eight 30, I'm

getting messages of people, where is it?

Where is it?

What's going on?

I'm like, hold your horses.

I'm dealing with this flack having a. Having a panic attack about some item.

and so I, I see that it's, it's, it's got this direct relationship with the

subscribers and I see the subscriber list and it's a, a list of very prominent

and influential people in the industry.

And, you know, you've just gotta keep going and you've just

gotta keep, keep growing it.

And, I'm chuffed that, you know, it's getting this response.

And I always

say, if you tell the punter something, they dunno

and make them laugh at something.

They do know that that's a compelling product.

And that's, that's the mantra

breaker.

I love that you say

You you're chuffed

and you're talking about the punters.

This is what I was talking about.

We're gonna have like a

Someone, someone said to me, we need a breaker, a breaker translator for some of

these things.

So I do apologize to the audience, which I'm assuming is mostly Americans,

but I am still a, a, a bloke, a kid from the suburbs of Melbourne, and

I'm, I still do consider myself the little Aussie butler, which is the

scrappy side of, of, of Breaker.

So tell me about like, so I think one of the things that I've liked about

Breaker is, is that spirit, like, I mean, and you've carried that through you.

You've, you've mentioned before some of the places you work,

but there, there's some tabloid, there's some tabloid in there.

And I think, you know, I remember when I started really paying attention

to, to Breaker and being like, oh, he's up to something different.

Was when you like deployed when you did like the creep shots at

the, uh, get Sulzberger barbecue.

I was

they were,

they were, they were brilliant.

this is innovation.

This, I'm seeing

from my, from my, from my snapper.

And yeah, I mean, look, I, I learned everything I know, or

pretty much everything I know from my time at the Sun in London.

Which was the remnants of, of Fleet Street, all these legendary Fleet Street

reporters who would, you know, took, who took a shine to me, who would let me come

down the pub and, and, and sit with them as they work their, their sources and

their contacts and, you know, those kind of old school tabloid techniques, whether

it's a door knock or a stakeout, are are very much in my DNA and and in my blood.

And, you know, the Sulzberger thing was a prime example, you know.

I wrote about that barbecue ahead of time, and a couple of readers reached

out, a couple of subscribers, and they're like, well, who's going, who's invited?

I thought, do you know what I'm gonna, I'm gonna find out myself.

And, and I, I, I found a snapper and, and we drove up there and it was the

best 500 bucks I'd spent for a long time because we got up there and, and that

job could have gone wrong by the way.

You know, the, the first rule of a stakeout is you don't

really show your hand to the, to the person you're staking out.

But it was really important to me that we let Ag Salzberger know that we

were there and what we were gonna do.

And so he was actually out front when we, when we arrived, you

know, on that, on that stakeout.

And I just went up, I was wearing my breakout fedora with the, the

breakout, business card in it.

And I was like, good day mate.

Lock them for break it.

Now.

His initial facial reaction.

Was, was there someone who wasn't exactly pleased to see me, but, and

I did get a call within 10 minutes from the New York Times communications

department saying what is going on?

But, um, uh, you know, we stood in the rain for, for, you know, five

hours and we got all these shots of people coming in and out and,

and you know, they, I think, saw.

The, the fun side of it.

And at about 4:00 PM his assistant brought me out two plates of food

and the snapper went to dig in.

I said, mate, what are you doing?

We've gotta get shots of those.

We've gotta do the, the, the food test.

So I did a food review of the, of the New York Times barbecue, but

that, that's the fun side of breaker.

That's the kind of delight in the shade.

the, the, the, the, the mix, which is really important, to

have, as well as the scoops.

It's important to have, you know, a bit of that cheekiness and, and, and that.

As I said, that sort of highbrow and that lowbrow.

that's kind of the, the, I think the very unique appeal of breakout.

Look, I'm in a very busy space, Brian, as you can appreciate.

You know, I'm up against, you know, everyone from puck to, to status.

and you know, it's, it's about how can I differentiate my product from the

competitive set and doing some of that, you know, fun, cheeky stuff, which again,

I'm, I'm, I'm full, I'm leaning into my.

To my experience from working from the tabloids, it's like, yeah, fuck it.

We'll, we'll we'll go up to the Redbird A GM and, and, and stake that out.

And we did the same treatment on that one.

And on that one, again, I, you know, it's a classic example of you, you know.

Because you go, I didn't know Barry Weiss was gonna roll in with fi six

beefy bodyguards, but we got great frames of the beefy bodyguards.

And, and that became a big component of the story.

And we ran that and then I, I send it over to the New York Post and I

said to someone over there, I said, this is great material for you guys.

I'll, I'll let you use the photos one use only.

I won't charge you for them.

and they did it up big.

And then I sent it to Drudge and I said to Matt, Hey, this is like perfect for you.

So then he put it up at the top of the Drudge Report for 24 hours

with Gary's beefy bodyguards.

And now I, and now I, you know, I'm licensing those photos.

So

Yeah, you got the hustle in you and you threw a great party.

It, it, it attracted a, a, a wide swath.

Um,

I think, I think I had a great mix of hacks and flax editors, execs, you know,

I, I think, I think it was just a fun old school, downtown New York Media party,

and we're gonna do more of them next year.

Yeah.

Great.

Amazing.

and so the business model right now is, is subscriptions.

Yes, it is, is I'm wholly relying on subscription revenue and that's

why it does my editing when I see someone's open at 500 fucking times.

'cause I'm like, you're gonna have me sleeping rough if you keep doing this.

But the plan for next year is to, be promiscuous with revenue streams.

So events, brand partners, and I'm already starting to have those conversations.

and then, you know, the hope is I'm working with NYU, the J School.

To feed some interns to me.

and then that hopefully will free me up to, to really sort of dig in and

concentrate on other lines of, of revenue and also solve problems like the, the,

the mass 40 situation, introduce group subscriptions, go to all these media

companies and all these PR agencies that are, that are, you know, widely sharing

it and say, Hey guys, like, you know, we now, we now do group subscriptions

and, and I think, you know, this is, this is appropriate for you guys to,

you know, compared to how many people are, are reading and sharing it.

So what to you was like the quintessential media story of the year?

Well, I mean, I, I, I broke one of them and that was Air Park.

you know, that was, you know, John Kelly's, puck acquiring

Grayden Carter's airmail.

And I think why that story was, you know, you know why that story was

fascinating is, is, is both p and air mail, were really two of the first of

these new entrant newsletter digital media companies, you know, run by.

Legacy media operators.

Grayden Carter, obviously legendary editor for Vanity Fair, John Kelly, who had been

at the New York magazine, sorry, New York Times magazine and at, and at Vanity Fair.

And they were two huge entrants.

They went, they went and both got, money from the roofing blokes, the

glamorous roofer standard industries.

They both, had investment from TPG.

and, you know, and both I think had.

You know, entered this market with a, a fair amount of sort of buzz.

and then sort of fast forward, you know, 4, 5, 6 years on, I think

six years for ml, four years for puck, both entities not profitable.

And so then you had the investors saying, Hey, we need to figure this out.

ML went up for sale with the rain group, and there was one, you know, situation

that that was, you know, that looked like likely the Jerry Cardinal and Redbird.

He himself was.

looking to buy the telegraph, but that was getting stalled

because of, you know, matters that were going on across the pond.

And so the, the, the conclusion of this was basically for John Kelly's,

apart to absolve, to absolve air mail.

But I think it told us a lot about the state of digital media.

I think it told us a lot about the state of these newsletter

businesses you know, and, and

And for far less than airmail raised.

I mean, an airmail was not a, a commercial success by any,

Correct.

And puck still isn't either.

I mean, puck still loses a, you know, per my reporting about a

million, a million, a, a year, a bit more than a million a year.

So I think the hope is by bringing these two entities together, it,

it could, it could be profitable.

Yeah.

Sarah, are you there?

All

Ah.

Sorry guys.

I was gonna say before, I was just gonna jump in, like before you lost

me, and sorry to the listeners that I think Lachlan, what you've built with

Breaker is so compelling because it's very clear that you never phone it in.

Like every single edition has some sort of break.

I mean, it's called Breaker, right?

It's some sort of breaking news or it's telling me something

I did not know before, which is why it's an essential read.

And so to me.

I'm sorry that you had so much stress starting it, but to me, like I have

no qualms, no questions that this is going to continue to be a success

because you never phone it in.

The challenge though is like the metabolism to do that.

Like what you're doing, what Oliver is doing.

Oh my god.

It's a lot.

It's

Cheers, Sarah.

I, I appreciate you saying, I mean, I, the way I look at it is every edition

has to be shit hot because it could be the first time someone interacts with

Breaker and, and you know, and also could be the last time someone interacts with

Breaker, if they think, you know, I'm phoning it in with, they have every right

to, to cancel their, their subscription.

But, you know, full credit to, to, to Darcy as well, to Oliver, because this is.

Bloody hard.

And as you know, you know, because you do a newsletter, and a brilliant one at that.

it is, it is bloody hard jitting up stuff for, for, for a newsletter every

week or twice a week for, for breakup.

Yeah.

So Sarah, Sarah, tell us about, so you've been at this for, what is it

like,

about metabolism.

You've been at this for years.

six years?

How long is.

I've, I launched the newsletter in 2017, so almost nine.

Wow.

Oh my God.

And now like, this is becoming a business.

So I wanna like talk a little bit about that as like a, you're kind of like an,

they used to call 'em like intrapreneurs, you know, that, I don't know.

I don't think anyone uses that term anymore.

but like, you know, the idea is, you know, you're, you're a

personal brand under yourself.

Let's be real here.

I know that like we, Ben Smith says that that term causes journalists to

throw up in their mouth a little bit, but, that, that's how it is right?

These days.

and you guys are building this into its own like business, right?

Yeah.

Well, it's so funny you say that on the personal brand because I'll tell you,

I'm heading out on mat leave in like five weeks, and one thing I've learned

from that experience is your personal brand does not matter when you have

to remove yourself from the product.

What matters is can you actually build a strong team that can continue

to produce when you have to be out?

And so.

I appreciate what you're saying about the my personal brand.

For me, what matters a lot is the brand of my team, Kerry Flynn, who's

an incredible reporter, Christine Wang, who's an incredible editor, Dan Primack,

who helps us with deals coverage.

Ena free to help us with AI coverage.

that team effort is actually, to me, the most critical part of being an

quote unquote intrapreneur because it, ensures one that if someone like

myself has to remove themselves from the equation for any reason that the

product can continue, which is very important with a subscription product.

And then two, I think your readers get to understand that you have subject matter

experts beyond yourself that you can tap into that make you even stronger.

Yeah, for sure.

And I think that sort of circles back to what we were talking about

with with Puck and air mail, right?

Because both of these were opportunities a little bit different, but I think

Puck is more, more pure of saying, Hey, there's something going on here with this

shift from institutions to individuals that's happening across media, right?

Locklin, you're part of that.

At the same time, there's always the tension of.

You're not building enterprise value necessarily, if it's just a person, I

mean, we all think about this, right?

Like, and so I think what you're saying, Sarah, is beyond, I mean beyond the

enterprise value, but it's also just the reality of, you know, you hear

about burnout and the rest and it's hard to ship a, shit hot newsletter, um,

consistently.

You know, when you, when you set the shit hot bar, you know,

you're, you're setting yourself up.

And especially for paid products, like, so when I authored a free newsletter only

and I needed to take, time, then it wasn't as big of a deal if we had to sunset it.

Yes, you were losing a little bit of ad revenue for any week that

you weren't on for a paid product, and ours is a hefty fee because

it's meant to be, you know, for.

B2B professionals.

You can't just, you know, take off a few additions.

It needs to be consistent.

And so that's where I think a lot more now than I ever have about the team

aspect of what I'm building and how can we service people consistently with

all of these insights and all of this.

Information.

so, you know, I, I appreciate what you're saying about the personal brand.

I just, I think my personal brand is starting to evolve if

I can, if I can elevate others, that's actually the best, uh,

metric of my brand.

So I, yes, I, I I take that and it sounds like you have like some skepticism

of this great decentralization of journalists going out on their own.

I mean, there's, there's just a consumer problem, but it has.

It has almost accelerated, I feel like, this year.

And you're in, like, you're not right now, but you're usually

in like Washington DC right?

Like, and Washington is like the heart of it.

Like it's shocking the number of journalists we were talking about,

Ryan Lizza dropping, like part 19 of,

uh, his, his, his, uh, paywall

Liz, I've been trying to get a hold.

Yeah.

Ryan, if

would say, Brian, I'm not skeptical.

I think actually in many cases.

It can be good because sometimes I, I've seen it where if

the journalist hadn't gone.

They're out on their own.

They would've been held back at the organization that they were in.

They can move faster on their own.

So I'm not skeptical of it.

I just think it depends on what it is that you wanna do.

For me, I'm very focused and passionate about serving media professionals

with market moving information.

So that means that people need to have these insights

consistently to do their jobs.

And that is a different value proposition than, you know, providing really scoopy

and entertaining information that.

You know, you still need to be consistent about it for sure, but

it's not the same as somebody who's paying a $500 a year subscription,

what the expectations are for that.

Yeah, so let's talk about the, your story.

Like what is your like macro story of the year?

Like, what's the, what's the big thing you're, you're tracking across this

business and what's moving markets?

If you had to boil down the year into, into one story, what would it be?

It would be the lack of independence of federal agencies that are

supposed to regulate this industry.

So we saw the other day that the Supreme Court seems poised to

allow President Trump to be able to fire FTC commissioners, and

that's a big deal because the FTC regulates advertising, which is the

currency that our entire industry.

Floats on.

We have seen the president trying to meddle and engage, with the FCC

in terms of how they're going to potentially lift broadcast caps or not.

And we're seeing it now with this Warner Brothers discovery, Netflix Paramount

drama that even though the president truly doesn't have that much power, I mean

he still is trying to meddle with this.

Merger.

And so for all of those, nine years I've been covering the media industry,

we felt as though we could rely on the independence of regulators to

keep this industry, fairly operating.

And I don't feel as though, that I, I think that's changing a

lot and I, I don't know what the long-term implications of that are,

but it's going to be significant.

Yeah.

I mean, Lachlan, you had on that, you, you had a, a great anecdote, and I think these

things have so many downstream effects.

Like, I mean, everyone responds to incentives in a marketplace and

like, that's why we've got FIFA giving, like Trump the, like fifa,

Nobel Prize knockoff or whatever.

And like you had a great anecdote about Politico,

Yeah, I mean,

Politico, Politico, stuck Trump on the top of the list about, you know, the

most influential, people out of Europe.

Look, this is an effective, this is an effective strategy.

I come from

and then managed to get, miraculously managed to get a sit down interview

in, in the White House, their first one-on-one with Trump for, for five years.

And that

he admitted.

he admitted.

it was because of the

he said he's already doing it because you made me, you made me, the man of

Europe, which, which wasn't exactly

You know?

You know, we said we wanted transparency and we got it.

Yeah, I mean, I noticed it.

Just, just for the record, that list is usually features people

living and working in Europe.

Not, not in, not in Washington, but hey, it worked and as I said in last night's

newsletter, they got the interview, they got some, you know, newlines out of it.

And, it's, it's a, it's a trick As old as time, I mean, time Magazine

had been doing this for years.

Yeah, exactly.

So Sarah, on that, I mean this.

I think this came at the end of the, the year.

Right.

But the, the Netflix Warner Brothers Paramount.

I think this is a, i I had written, I don't know if I took it out,

but it's basically a stimulus package for media reporters, right?

Like this, this guarantees.

a.

A year, like plus of great, and this is a fun story because to me it like

hearkens back to, you know, the highway men like Ken Aletta wrote about them

and like all the deal guys who were, who, you know, I don't mean that in a

gendered way, but they were male that, that, you know, were making the deals

that shaped the industry and the reality.

The industry is shaped now, like, totally differently.

It's usually technology companies that, that are, are doing it.

This is a little bit of a throwback story, but it, it, it shows that it, it

is, it has all of these forces in it.

So give us the lay of the land.

We're doing this on December 10th, with where this is and then where it goes.

Yeah, for sure.

And like, full disclosure, I'm I'm a CN contributor, which is a

part of Warner Brothers discovery.

okay, so here's what I would say.

I think Paramount was trying to position itself as the darling of

this deal because it made three unsolicited bids and it's what triggered

this entire bidding war to start.

Where I think Paramount fell out of favor is when it submitted

its, first deadline bid.

So its first solicited bid on December 1st.

I think there were a lot of things in there that gave the Warner Brothers

Discovery Board a a lot of pause.

one, you know, they have raised $24 billion from Sovereign Wealth

funds in the latest SEC filing.

it says that those sovereign wealth funds have.

declined voting rights and governance rights.

I wonder if that was always the case.

As well as Jerry Kushner.

two, they've promised a funding backstop.

So essentially like, you know, I know a trepidation that I've reported from

the Warner Brothers discovery Board is whether or not they, with seven.

Different entities on the cap table, would they be able to close if

someone like pulled out last minute and they've essentially said, look,

we've got access to all this Oracle stock, like we're good for the money.

Whereas with Netflix, you know, it, it's a much cleaner,

streamlined financing situation.

So I think, I think for the Water Brothers Discovery Board, which they have 10 days.

as of, Monday to respond to the hostile takeover, I think that the,

there's a lot of reasons why they are leaning towards that Netflix bid.

I also think for Warner Brothers Discovery, the regulatory concerns

about each bid are not really that.

Steep and I'll, I'll tell you, talking to people in Washington, the being

close with Trump does not really mean much because Trump can direct

his DOJ to sue to block a merger.

Sure.

At the end of the day, an independent judge is going to have to make that call.

So Trump, like for example, there were a lot of reports that Trump

directed his DOJ to sue at and t Time Warner and the judge did not back

the DOJ and that merger went through.

So, I think the Paramount folks are trying to spin this like.

Netflix has such a tough regulatory, hill to climb, and I think the

Warner Brothers Discovery Board is thinking to itself, what?

You don't think we have lobbyists that can tell us what's actually gonna happen here?

so I, I, I think, and Lucas Haw reported this the other day, that

this might, this might take a lot longer than people had anticipated.

the one thing I feel pretty certain of Brian is no matter who.

Ends up ultimately being the dance partner to Water Brothers Discovery,

I think it gets investigated.

I do think that there's likely a chance that the DOJ Sues to block either,

which means that for me, I'll end up in Petman Court in Washington DC for a

trial and sometime in late next year.

yeah, yeah.

Yes.

You're, you're gonna be bringing your baby to, To these hearings

for, without, without a doubt.

This is gonna last longer.

I, I, I'm sad to say, than the Olivia Na, is it Nazi or Nsy,

Yeah, that one's already done.

That one's done.

but is it.

Nsy?

I, think it's, is it.

I, I, I was saying Nazi and then Dylan Byers said Nsy and

when we did a podcast together.

So, I don't know.

I'm just gonna go with Nazi then.

I think it's gonna last longer than the Olivia knows.

Olivia knows you.

'cause I, unfortunately that's over.

It only lasted two full weeks, but it felt like it lasted, two full

Well, where's

the other part?

You know, he kept, he, he teased eight parts and now it's, it just fell.

It's just like we are like mid, mid this, you know, serialized se season.

It's just bizarre.

I was just gonna say on this taking a really long time, I think

that's one of the main reasons why Comcast is like mic drop.

Were out.

Like, I don't think anyone should expect Comcast to try to come back

into this because they see how messy and how long this is gonna

take and they don't need this deal.

There was no downside to them putting a bid in.

But there is downside to them getting into this, you know, big bidding, war, wasting

time, wasting resources, so I think it's definitely down to two players for good.

So I want to Lachlan, I want you to like talk about this, but from the

personality, 'cause we've, I, I've written about like media persons and like, we

need, we need media people and um, and, and we need heroes and villains and

I'm all about

that.

at Breaker and.

So who are the character?

Who are the characters?

'cause this is gonna, unfortunately this is gonna be with us from, from

everything that Sarah is saying.

This is gonna be with us all through

I mean, I might have a baby by the po.

The time that this, this whole thing is, this whole thing is uh, I

might have met a bloke and we might have found a surrogate and had the

baby by this time.

This thing keeps going.

No, I think this is why I love this, this ya mate.

It's, you've got Zaz who you know up until, recently seemed to be

the most hated man in Hollywood and now looks like he might have the,

the last laugh in in all of this.

Yeah.

Any port in a storm.

Yeah.

And then you've got the Allisons who are kind of carving out,

this turf, this territory as if they're like the new Murdochs.

And I think, you know, from my vantage point, we're acting incredibly

arrogantly, about this deal as if it was already a done deal.

And you've got Larry with the TikTok, connection, which is now

also plays into Murdoch with Lock.

The Murdoch is now a part of that.

And then you've got his son, David, and then.

His, you know, first two acquisitions were the UFC and the Free Press with

Barry Weiss and now her beefy bodyguards.

So, you know, I love this yarn because it is character rich, and then you've

also got Ted around us and Netflix, who also seems to be, you know, a

fairly disliked, bloke within the creative community in Hollywood.

so, you know, for me it's, it's a cracking character driven yarn.

Yeah.

So Sarah, I know you are a CNN contributor, right?

that, that we've already disclosed that.

there's obviously a lot of consternation that, was in CNN about their fate

under Paramount, owning them.

I mean, paramount, obviously Barry Weiss got brought in, there,

uh, to, to run CBS news and the beefy bodyguards who Lachlan

is, is close friends with.

Barry also emerged as a. A media, a media person, like, you know, I

mean, she's obviously always been a media person, but I think she is a

character and she has a lot of good, she's got a lot of good traits that

make, her a compelling character.

Right.

where do you see that?

I think that was one of the stories of this year, Barry Weiss coming in, the

acquisition of the Free Press and how.

That is going to play out.

Now, CBS news to me is a distressed as asset from Yes yesteryear.

I'm not sure if anyone can necessarily make it, as culturally

relevant as it used to be.

what, how do you evaluate that story, sir?

I think David has a personal affinity to.

The state of Israel.

And so I think he and Ellison.

And so I think he was very partial to the news slash opinion content

that comes from the free press.

And I also think that Barry reaches an audience of like these sort of

libertarian rich people that his peers also were tuned into her.

And so he personally liked her and liked the coverage, I think in bringing her on.

Obviously there's a, there's a sense that this is from a regulatory

perspective going to help me cur favor with conservatives, and I also think

that he, believes that CBS news as she believes needs to be, you know,

brought more towards the center.

The, the kind of pushback I've always given to that.

State of mind and that kind of thinking.

60 news has been, the 60 Minutes has been the number one news

program in America for 50 seasons.

CBS has affiliates mostly in the southeast, region of the United States.

That's why a lot of its programming is, is kind of honestly leans

a little bit more, right?

If you think about paramount with Yellowstone and all of that, and then

some of its, primetime programming.

It's not super progressive.

It's a lot of like big brother and survivor.

So to me this, this assertion that CBS needed to be moved into

the center is, is interesting.

I think within CBS what I'm hearing is there's a lot of trepidation

around to what extent this sort of hybrid opinion news content gets

integrated into what's pure play news and to what extent are people who

are currently at CBS comfortable.

I think people don't wanna push back because they don't

want to lose their jobs,

but I do think there's discomfort.

Well, Lachlan, you've reported on this and, and discontent

throughout the industry.

The workers are discontent, like, and they have been discontent for a long time.

This, this industry is compressing and that, and, and, and grumpy to begin with,

and that compression is, is painful.

In a lot of places.

I mean, we have seen this from everywhere, from the Wall Street Journal to CBS News.

There's walkouts, the Washington Post, I don't know if anywhere

is, you know, full of like, you know, super enthusiastic content

fun

out there.

Yeah.

Seriously.

Yeah.

Look, I think as it pertains to, to, to Barry Weiss and the beefy bodyguards

and CBS news, I, I, I think a lot of people are, you know, I think still

grappling with the fact that, you know, here's someone with, without broadcast

experience, here's someone that.

In meetings, he's suggesting things like, oh, how about we go and book, you

know, the lieu of heist has happened.

Why don't we book Dan Brown who wrote a fictional book, about a murder at the

Louv of 20 years ago, the Da Vinci Code.

Why don't we go book him?

you know, even the, even the hirings that we've seen, Matt Guttman.

From a, b, c being brought across as chief correspondent, you know, I

don't think mam, many people could pick Matt Guttman out of a lineup.

and, and then Tony Depel is now gonna lead the CBS evening news,

which has always been third place.

So, you know, good luck with that.

I, I, I think there's still this kind of suspicion or skepticism

about Barry Weiss's chops in leading, uh, a broadcast news division.

So Sarah, are we, are we gonna see more sort of unrest in the ranks in 2026?

It seems like a safe bet.

Oh yeah, there's gonna be unrest in the ranks for a ton of reasons.

I mean, for one, you have this whole free press thing, but for two, I think

President Trump is gonna continue to rail after CBS, despite the

fact that they settled $16 million.

With him for a lawsuit that legal experts say they could have won.

And so there's the frustration there of like, why did we settle?

Why did we drive out top executives at 60 minutes only to still get railed on?

Like that's a huge problem for them.

And then I also think the Paramount merger causes a lot of frustration

and stress because these are people who just went through the whole

Skydance rigmarole and had to, and felt like their company had to make.

Concessions, right.

From a reg to regulators to get it done.

Do they wanna have to go through that all over again?

No.

So it's gonna be, it's gonna be a very challenging year for the folks at CBS

News, and I have a lot of empathy for

them.

Yeah.

And I wonder about in 2026 is whether we start to see the correction.

'cause I think you were talking about it a little bit like we're, we've

seen this shift from institutions to individuals and the question is always

like, how the rebundling is going

to

I think, I think that's what we're on the, the edge of here.

I, I think we we're, we're living through this great, unbundling and I think

what comes next is the great bundling.

And I could see a scenario where.

Some of these independents, drift back into legacy, media

organizations because those legacy places want some of these creations.

I can also see a scenario where someone comes in and bundles,

a bunch of us up, together.

I mean, I do miss being in a newsroom and that's why I now have a, have a,

a contributing editor, gig with Vanity Fair because I do wanna do some of these

bigger pieces that, that I need the rigor.

Of a legacy institution with the, with the lawyers and the checkers

and the, the, the levels of editors and designers and photography.

You know, I still wanna do those, those bigger pieces and only a certain handful

of places can give me those resources.

Yeah.

I mean they, they, they were looking for a little juice.

They went out, they got Olivia Nazi, they got you.

Like, so they, they, they kept you.

They didn't, they didn't

Yeah, I, I, I, I, I said to them, I can't bring you a sex scandal.

So, not, not yet.

Not yet.

Sarah, what about you?

What do you do?

Do you think we'll see more of the rebundling, next year?

Because like a lot of the energy has moved, it, it seems to me from like

institutional media to the individuals, there's just more energy in the sort

of, I don't know what to call it.

It's not creator exactly, but it's, it's like the new kinds of independence, right?

Like I look at like some, somewhere like TBPN,

right?

an energy about that.

About that brand.

I don't think you can necessarily say that about, say, I don't know, CBS news

or like a lot of legacy publications that, particularly with, with page view

models, that, you know, frankly they feel like, you know, they're constantly

just trying to figure out like there's just this existential angst about

them and that Yeah.

And that comes at a cost of just like feeling like they, they,

they're like low energy, I dunno.

A hundred percent.

I, I, I couldn't agree more.

I think actually where you're gonna see some rebundling is

just on the business side.

I have a friend who launched a business where he's essentially selling.

Brand partnerships on behalf of a bunch of different creators.

You see the Vox Media podcast network picking up steam because

they're selling advertising and doing distribution and marketing

on behalf of a bunch of podcasters.

You're seeing beehive creating collectives where they can help these creators get.

Advertising dollars.

Even Substack is announcing that it's sort of testing native brand sponsorship.

So to me, the bundling is happening on the business side because they

know that these creators need shared resources to be able to make money.

Do I think that the bundling is going to happen within newsrooms?

What's interesting is some newsrooms are kind of trying it, like the Washington

Post is, you know, trying to do this third newsroom type of business side thing

where they roll up a bunch of creators.

The challenge they're gonna face is you have to convince creators that.

You Legacy media company are a better place for them to be than

a creator collective like beehive.

And I think very few creators buy it.

It's gonna be incredibly difficult for them to land those kinds of

Yeah, I mean, Lala, we've talked about this like casually, right?

I mean, you always have, you have legacy institutions that go out to people like

you or, or others who are independent and they wanna sort of rebundle you

and you're like, wait a second, mate.

Like I'm, you're like the pirate.

You're like, I'm in, I'm the captain now.

Yeah, I'm, I'm having too much fun to be, to be bundled up or, or tickled up

or whatever the, the terminology is.

you know, I'm, I'm having way too much fun, you know, building breaker

in my own, in, in my own speed.

Having said that, you know, dealing with, like, I can't log in.

I didn't get the email last night.

I need a refund, like.

There are some days where I'm like, ah, I really could do with, with some

of the, the infrastructure that, you know, only a legacy place can can offer.

So there is that kind of, you know, trade off.

Okay, so last thing, I want each of you to give me a. A Publica,

some kind of, of a media brand.

Okay.

It doesn't have to be like an institutional media company.

It can be a person, it could be a Substack, or it could be a YouTuber.

It can be anyone who makes media.

It could be a company.

I don't care.

that you find compelling.

Sarah, do you wanna start?

Some sort of media company person that I find compelling.

Yeah.

I mean, I'm in DC so I listen to the Punchable podcast every single morning.

It's like I, I can't not have that in my life.

And once you get somebody hooked on a daily habit of something you

cannot not have in your life, then that is extraordinarily compelling.

And then in terms of like the media business side, because I care a

lot about covering the industry.

Um, with all of this stuff going on with all of these, you know, mergers and

things like that, the equity analysts and researchers have become even more

powerful and important to me, like the Moffitt Nathanson of the world and

all the reports that I get from UBS.

There's no way you can manage coverage.

Responsibly in my opinion, without really understanding all of the, like

nooks and crannies, around some of these deals that the analysts are just

so, they're some of the best equipped people to provide that information.

Yes, a hundred percent.

Lachlan.

E Emily Berg and, and feed me.

I mean, it's incredibly impressive in the space of.

Three years what, what Emily has, has built.

And I was at a third year anniversary, shindig the o the other night.

I, it, it's very rare that I'm, in a, in a situation, with someone,

and they don't bring up Emily Berg and, and feed me and ask me, you

know, my thoughts on it are asking.

How she's done this.

She's a hustler.

She, she, she is a hustler and what she's built is a club.

It, it is a club that people wanna be a part of.

The newsletter is one part of it.

The events are another.

The merch, her chat, is, is, is, is another.

And, and it's phenomenal in just the space of three years that she's built this club

in, in Feed Me the, the other one is.

and you were kind of scoop me here, the TBPN blokes who, who

again, have sort of captured the conversation in such a unique way.

And I, you know, I think they would also say they're not reporters, but what

they have done is they have created, you know, something that, that is, highly

appealing, to people in the tech world to to, to go on and to be interviewed.

And again, in, in sort of a warp speed time, become a thing.

Yeah, I think, I think what they've gotten right is they've taken what's

basically a trade publishing model.

And modernized it, you know, I mean, they, they create for a universe and

they've said this of like 200,000 and that's being very generous.

It's probably actually like 20,000 and it's just happens to be the

most powerful and influential set of people in the world right now.

And, and then you get a bunch of people who come along.

The key is to stay focused on that, like say 20,000 and it's, it's different for

everyone, but I think if there's like a thread of the models that are working

the best right now, it seems to be that they are focused on a relatively, you

know, confined small group of, of people.

It might, you attract a lot of others around that, you know,

in media, but it seems like that is the model that is, is most

They're, they're also authentic.

And, and, and it's clear to me those two blokes actually like each other,

unlike most morning, you know, breakfast, tv, personalities here

who fucking hate each other's guts.

It's clear those two blokes get along.

It's clear that they, you know, have a, a, a great working relationship and,

and you just get a sense that they're really enjoying it and having fun.

And I think that's appealing.

Yeah, totally.

and one thing they've got that Emily Sunburg also has, which Lachlan I

totally agree with you about, Emily.

These are extroverted people.

It used to be that journalists were expected to be weird and not social,

and not good at creating community and developing relationships.

The new age of the journalists, to somebody who can cultivate audiences

and make them feel like they're part of communities like you can't be.

A weirdo anymore, honestly, you have to be really social,

Sad.

of those

have that.

I'm sorry, weirdos out there.

You gotta be Lachlan standing on the bar at, at a burrito joint downtown.

and that's just how it goes.

You know, like it starts with, you gotta be able to moderate a panel

and next thing you know, you're on top of the bar shouting out.

Thank yous.

I'm usually on top of the bar twerking, but, uh, that night I.

Locklin, you are always.

You are always though.

I will say like the life of the party.

Oh, thanks Sarah.

Appreciate

no, I think that's a great point because that, to me, like the la, like the

mo, a lot of times when people talk about like personality, and that's

the part that, and personal brand that journalists sort of hate, but the, I I,

I think it's something other than that.

Like it's accessibility, right?

And just like being like an authentic.

Person.

Right, and like journalists, the reason that people like to talk with journalists,

journalists are generally interesting.

They might be a little

And we, and we know stuff.

I've been at events where I've seen, you know, people just come up to Sarah

and, and ask her her, you know, take on what's going on in the industry because

she's so incredibly well plugged in.

And, and I think, you know, people do wanna have that, that interface

with, with the, the, the bylines.

Yes.

And so while Sarah, we'll we'll bring this full circle.

While I don't think that you are like a personal brand like that,

that gives you a lot of leverage and you've recognized that over the years,

because you are front and center, you are like all over the place, you

know?

You do, have to be all over the place.

I will say like the, the one thing that you have to do when you're a

reporter is be on the front lines.

It's the same thing as when I was in sales.

You have to be where the story is.

We have to be where the, the sources are.

You can't hide behind a keyboard anymore, and.

that excites me and gives me energy, but if it doesn't excite you and

give you energy, you're gonna have a tough time in this new era of

journalism.

Time to.

perfect note to end it on time to find another gig.

All right.

Thank you both.

I'm glad we got this done.

Brian.

Bye.

you all.