Dawn Bridges

I didn't know what else I wanted to do, and I thought about going to law school like everyone else who graduated with a liberal What did you would you what was your degree of communications l A right? Okay, so you you graduated from college and this was like late seventies, early eighties, eighty three, and you had no idea what you wanted to do. Well, I knew I always liked music. I actually had an internship at A and M Records and a little bit slower, why did

you get an internship at A and M Records? Well, one of the great things about going to school at u CE, oh hey, is there are internships and almost any entertainment company. I mean, just pick it. You want to be in TV, you want to be really yeah, I mean because I grew up in the era. I'm a little bit older than you, like ten years older or close to it, and you couldn't even get a job at a record store like Tower Records. It was

so hard. So you're going to U c l A. If you say, I want an internship at a record label, is just that easy? Even better, you've got credit for it. Okay, so you're working there? Uh Gil, is there Gil Freasons running it? Yeah? Gil would have been there. Mike Gormley head Mike Gormley, was it prob? I didn't know that. And I remember the Police album, I mean not the remember the show at the Whiskey where everyone kind of

had the bright blonde hair. Go back and google it that the very very first piece was that on that album? Certainly Roxanne. So what did you do with um? Well, those were the days where you actually mailed out um records to journalists. So I stuffed a lot of envelopes. Um you know, I checked people in at shows. I did all the things that aspiring people do. Okay, and that was how long a tenure, I guess about six months? Okay. Good good experience, bad experience. Interesting. I mean it felt

very glamorous at the time. You know here you are in the old Charlie chaplain lot um. Yeah, it was great okay? And after did they give you the time of day? Yeah? No. I thought people were very nice and polite when they had extra tickets to things that would invite me to shows. So and it actually served me well later on when I had interns and departments that that I managed. You know, be nice to your interns, okay, or now the interns have to get paid otherwise, yes

they do. Okay, you're at U C l A. How do you get to A and m um, well, I don't know as you have a car. I didn't have a car my first couple of years, so I literally I was a tour gut at the l A Times my sophomore year. So I literally got on the Wilshire bus and went from Westwood downtown to the l A Times. You were a tour guard? Yeah, they used to give tours at the l A Times. What would you see, um? Well, to show you when it was the big finale was

ending in the printing presses. It's funny. When I was in grade school, we went once to the brief for post in Connecticut. I remember that was the error of what they said, you know, was it hot? Type letter came down? Yeah, no, that you did all that. And of course the l A Times had so much history you know that I wasn't aware of before I was

down there. And I can't remember a whole lot except the chandlers were a big deal and water and um, and it paid extremely I don't remember exactly what I got paid, but it paid two or three times what minimum wage was, so there was a lot of money. It was a lot of more. How did you get that gig? You know? I wish I had a better memory for it. Um, I'm not sure I do. Okay, are you? I mean? But now we hear about the internship. We hear about the job the only times. So you

sound somewhat entrepreneurial. Would that be accurate? I guess I would say I was always a self starter and and I had a good sense of perseverance. Um. And I got a much thicker skin as I got older. You know, you have to be comfortable being rejected or having people

say no and get back up again. Okay, so you you have that experience, you graduate from U C. L A. And uh, well, in the summer I grew up in Chicago in the summer, I would go back and there was a big music festival called Chicago Fest, and I worked, you know, first as a receptionist. Then they told me, if you learn how to type, you can come back and be the entertainment director's kind of assistant to deal

with all the contracts. And that was super glamorous. I mean I remember a hundred thousand people showing up for Journey. I remember the Blues Brothers playing, you know, right on Navy Pier on the water. And through there I met a lot of agents or agents assistants, and through one of them, I was introduced to someone at um Salters Roskin Friedman, which is a big PR agency. At this point, Larry Salter's son is still a PR person Um Lease Alter's son, Larry Salters. That's what I meant to say,

Larry is gonna be angry with me. Uh yeah. But that was one of the along with Rogers and Cowan, that was probably the biggest entertainment PR firm. And again I was hired as a secretary of a little bit slower. So you learned them as you found out about them as a result of Chicago Fest. Yes, how did you literally get a job there. Well again, um, PR firms are very low margin and they don't pay very much particular just for my way, it's may not be as

sophisticated as you are. Low margin in what way? Um, Well, there's a way to do scale. It's a one on one. So it's not like you, as an account executive can have a hundred clients, because you could not service a hundred clients. Um. And and they were always looking for people to do more work. They were looking for more bodies to raise the gross. Yes, and um I was hired as an assistant. You were doing you were in Chicago in the summers. Okay, so this was a gig

with solters at all after you graduated? Yes, okay. Had you in the back of your mind when you were meeting these people at Chicago FESTI say, oh, I'm going to use this to get a job. Uh. Well, I knew I wanted to stay in l A at that point. Um So to the degree that any of the relationships I built there were helpful, um, which they turned out to be. I mean I knew Bobby I met Bobby Brooks then at I c m. Um, I forget who

the William Moore's agent was. I mean, those are I guess two big ones that had at least well, I guess I'm trying to get into your personality. Were used basically saying, Okay, I know this person, let me ring them, let me work it, let me see what I can make of myself. Or we just sitting there and all of a sudden you got a phone call. Hey, you know we met you and this you'd be good at

our office. Certainly not the latter. I'm not sure. I was just organized for the former, but I was pretty good at figuring out at least target companies, and and again I figured out pretty early that a lot of them, UM needed young people who were basically willing to do anything at anyhing. Okay, so you basically called up the Solters operations that I want to work. I was introduced I think by a junior William Morris agent too, not to lead to someone else. Okay, So you did not

know Solters at all from Chicago fest not at all. Okay, so you're introduced, you go for meeting. What happens, um, Well, Lee had an office that I'm not sure he ever had filing cabinets. You know, there was the Barber Pile, the Frank Pile, who was a great character. UM. And it was basically, can you write? Do you understand what a column item is? Um? You start next Monday? And again I was hired as an assistant and about three account executives quit in the first month. And it was like,

can you be polite? Can you write? Can you figure out what makes a good story? And when you do events? Can you get people to pose for photos? And it was learned by doing. I mean there's no school. How much were you getting paid? I don't remember. Not very much enough to pay your rent and live a life well, or your parents had to help you out. No, my parents, I mean my parents paid tuition UM tuition at U c l A. At that point was not a whole lot of money. I always was responsible, No, I was

self sufficient. I did live in Santa Monica in a rent control apartment, so I had very little, you know, housing costs at that point. So what were some of the first things you did? Uh? Well, I remember following Lee around, UM too, Barbara streising events. I think that was maybe the Broadway album. I mean I didn't deal with her directly, but someone always needed helpers you know, carrying the coat or you know, holding the photographers here.

And that was also when she did her performance when she hadn't performed for a long time in her house in Malibu for um, the Democratic Party or something, I don't remember specifically what the cause was. And that, of course was so fascinating just to see this sort of legendary person and how an event like that came together. There were a lot of Um, there were a lot

of movie premiers, which need a lot of bodies. People have worked the red carpet people you know, to ask stars if they would come talk to entertainment tonight, people to pose photos. Um. They had a big theater practice which I knew nothing about theater, and most of it was centered in New York. Um. But I was given the Carol Channing account, um, which was just a hoop. She was you know, she was lovely. Um. I worked with Morris Day. Um. It was a very David Copperfield,

a bunch of Las Vegas acts. Okay, So would you basically assigned and you had to plug wires into holes or did you have to create the opportunities the latter? How did you just how to do that? Well? I've always been a voracious consumer of media. Um. I mean I always read newspapers and a bunch of magazines, So I guess I understood what kind of thing they would cover by just you know, years of reading it, um and again some of it. You know, you can pitch

ten things, you know, get nine knowes. You got to just get back up and do. But you would literally say, Okay, I want to be in the l A Times. Let me look who the names are, let me ring them, um, Or let's figure out are we best off in the calendar section? Are we best off in you know, the Sunday magazine. You also need to not just we have

a better plan. You would literally call out of the blue and what would you say, Um, we have to figure out what the pitch is, right, What what differentiates your artists from anyone else in that category that makes it interesting enough for the journalists to want to cover it. And that's kind of your job to sort of sort through that. I mean, there's a lot of singers, you know, there's a lot of actors, and why should someone care about the one that you're representing? So how do you

do it? Give me an example, Oh, you talked to the Um, you talked to the artist a lot, and you try to figure out, again, what's different from this. I don't know country artists and any other country artists. Was it where they grew up? What songs they write? Um? Uh? Their background? Um? And okay, so now you know what you're pitching. You know the artists very well. You're a newbie. No one knows who you are, so you connect in that time it was by phone. You connect with someone

who controls as a writer, the media outlet. Did they give you the time of day? Some did? Some? I mean some of the bigger ones were the nicest ones. I mean I didn't deal with Bob Hilburn a lot, but I remember he was completely charming and lovely. Um, and other ones didn't. Again, I guess I had a pretty thick skin because it didn't stick with me. If people just hunt up or not interested or whatever, Okay,

onto the next one. So you could literally say I'm gonna call twenty people and if one says yes, doesn't bother? Is that your personality at large? You rejection rolls off you. Oh I never really thought about it that way. I I guess I'm a realist, and I realized that. Um, you know, no one bats a dent um in this kind of role. So if I'm going to do this or for as long as I'm doing it, I'd better be comfortable with what the rules of the road are. So how long do you work with Falters? Four or

five years? Okay, at the end of the tenure, what does your job look like. I was a senior account executive and what does that mean as opposed to when you started out? Um, I probably had better accounts. I had junior people, even if they didn't. I mean, there was not a formal organ chart, you know, so it's not like I could say these three people reported to me, but I had, you know, people that were junior that

I could have help on accounts. Um. Having afterwards worked in corporate life, it was a pretty loose organization, kind of all out of Lee's head and and feeling. But I didn't know any different then. I mean that was just how much pressure was there. I think that there was a fair amount of pressure at least I felt on myself. Um uh, but I've felt pressure at different just asking because for me, not the top of job. For me, I can't handle that much rejection. And let's

use the example of a record promo person. You know they're gonna get the ads and they feel a lot of pressure if they don't get them, however, well hard they're working, their bloss is gonna beat them up. So it was the type of thing we say, well, you know we're working this thing. You've got to get a couple of newspapers, you gotta get the person on TV. And did you feel pressure? Well, I really have to

make this happen. Lee was a big believer in column items, and with that Carol Channing pile, he would pull out an old column item and say, just freshen this up, Dawn and see if Liz Smith will use it. So he actually gave you a certain amount of instruction. Oh yeah, and he gave a great guidance pr people should never be in the photo. Uh, you want your client posts on the left side. Why is that because when you

read the thing, you know you're that the first name. Yes, they're the first name that people read, and not everyone reads all the names. Um no, it was okay, So four or five years go by. How does it end with Lee? Well, I had a few music accounts and PolyGram was looking for someone to head their artist publicity department in New York. My father lived in New York and had since I was a teenager, and I always

knew I wanted to be in New York. At some point, you said, your father, both parents, my father, um and uh, and they offered to bring me to New York. Um. And again I knew about music. I didn't know sort of about label life and and um and I had never managed a department, even though there was so much money coming in at that point that, you know, making budgets um uh was not what it ended up being. Um later and I, UM, yeah, I mean PolyGram As you remember, there were six major is at that point,

where ninety now. Um. So this is just after what Polygrams on an acquisitions were. They bought A and M, they bought Island. They were owned by Phillips, the Dutch electronics company, and to fund those acquisitions they floated the company and the New York Stock Exchange. So they were the first pure play music group. Nothing about I P. O.

S or anything like that at that point. That got them, you know, the billion dollars that paid for A and M and Island they acquired right before I came in Subsequently, they acquired Motown a year or so later, and then another year later half of deaf Jam UM. And it was a lot of sort of integration. And UM PolyGram was traditionally on a global level, the biggest of the six companies right there overseas, but the smallest in the US. UM. But they had, you know, a handful of big stars. UM.

And yeah, okay, so you're brought in as the department head. Yes, are some of the people working there feel that they should have had your job because they've been working there for a while. Yeah, at least one did. Yeah, what happened there? Um? She stayed for a year or so. I mean, I think I didn't have the incentive to get rid of her. I felt like usually that person quits. But in any event, UM, did you feel I mean, you've been working in the trenches for four or five years,

but you hadn't worked at a label. Did you feel a little intimidated that you were going to be managing the department? Um? I think less about managing the department more than trying to figure out just the mechanics of how a label worked the various departments. UM, How something comes through the system from recording the record to how much time you need for the setup, to the other departments, the marketing, promotion, sales department. Okay, so PolyGram was an

overall umbrella and they had a lot of labels. You were working in New York. What was your responsibility in the beginning when I was hired, A and M and Island weren't integrated yet, so they were still run stand alone. Um I was the old PolyGram So Bungo, VI, Deaf Leopard, Tears Tears, Mercury. Yeah, well then they split it up after I got they split it up between Mercury and they created something called the PolyGram Label Group, which had London and I think some of the Island repertoire um

going through. And then yes, I had the Mercury artists and I think so you were literally the record company publicity I was. And then so how much did you still have to do the work that you did at least alters as opposed to farming it out to your people. Well, I remember um my boss saying you've got to deal with Bungo because he's the biggest artist on the label and you're running the department. Um Mellencamp had outside press, but I ended up having a reasonable relationship with him.

He's notoriously difficult, even myself. But at that point UM, because you know, all the corporate PR was done out of London, UM, but we were being traded in New York and Alan Levy, who came over from from Europe and was then chairman UM, said get me PR because he needed someone in New York that could deal with

some of the corporate stuff. And I tried it upstairs, and I think he made one of those decisions that I would rather have someone that knew the artists and sort of knew the mechanics of the business UM and had trade relationships, and I'll teach them, you know, the business stuff. And I mean I took accounting in college,

but I know nothing about sort of finances. I p o s. But at the time, Columbia had a month long live in Finance for Non Financial Executives course and he sent me to that, and it was famous for sending people to courses. But it was such a great gift for me because that's where I wasn'tmidated in the beginning, and all that business stuff. I didn't know the difference, you know, I knew the difference between balanced sheeting, the P and L. But you know how deals were mean

any of that stuff. And obviously a month is not like having an NBA or a finance degree, but you know what, it's enough where you can talk to the Wall Street Journal and not feel like an idiot. Okay, when was there an interim period when you were doing both or all the way to the end, All the way to the end. I literally had two titles, two sets of business cards, PolyGram Corps, com Mercury, you know,

artist publicity. I had two wardrobes because if I was in a corporate day and then I had a concert at night, you know, I wasn't gonna wear you know, you need to change into my jeans. So what was your mission a corporate level? On a corporate level, explain why people should buy PolyGram stock, Explain how um the labels are being integrated. And PolyGram did two other things that are kind of interesting that seemed obvious now. They started a film come they you know of the company,

I think what was film revenues. They bought working title films, which is still around, you know, love actually four weddings in the funeral um. They bought propaganda which mostly did music videos but also had films UM California. I don't remember all of them. Uh, and they bought Interscope Films UM. So you had this, you know, truly multi media entertainment

company UM. And then they also and now this is very obvious and commonplace, but because of PolyGram strength overseas, you know, yes, they were always trying to sell you know, Shania Twain or Brian Adams or Bunjovie records around the world. But they also put a huge emphasis on local repertoire UM. You know, the Italian artists, it's never going to travel outside of Italy. They will sell a boatload of of

records or CDs in Italy. UM. And that was I mean not just from a business standpoint, but explaining to investors that that was an important little bit slower. So you take the Columbia course. You're sophisticated enough to talk to UM financial press, do you who do you start calling? Well, there's not that many ones that you have. You know, you have to build a relationship with the New York Times and with the Wall Street Journal and the Financial

Times and UM. You know, I mean there were random things like the economists, but it's not like the economists head to beat The l A Times obviously was huge. At that point, Chuck Phillips was probably the most important music business um person. Um. You know the trades. Um. It wasn't always necessarily pitching things. It was more preparation of messaging and materials and earnings and reports in English? What is that? Well, Um, by pitching, I mean pro acts. No, no,

the other end the point with preparation. Oh well, okay, you're a public company. So every quarter you have to issue um of release about how your results were, and then you have to explain why revenues went down and what you're projecting for the next quarter. Um, and you know how the company is pitting together, what your competitive

advantages are. Okay, So there would be a meeting are there the release and they would have a meeting with the analysts would call in, Yeah, you have a quarterly okay, analysts call And then when that ended in the afternoon, you'd put out some kind of press release now product the release before? No, I guess what I guess I didn't, you're right? Would when that ended, would you call the

news outlets and try to spin them? Um? Usually they're calling you they had specific questions for whatever story they're writing about it, and you know, can you explain ABC? Um? I mean, you know, maybe I would have checked in, do you have everything you need? Can I help with

it anything? Um? But you're really the Wall Street Journal, And if you've written a good press release for your earnings and you know we had really good financial people and investor relations people, You're not going to convince the Wall Street Journal of something other than what they see and what they're looking at. You can clarify things, you can get them more information, but it's not like I'm going to go out there and all of a sudden

take you know, black and make it white. Okay. Now, I'm very familiar with UH label publicity, which I think most people can figure it out. But you say there are fewer outlets and corporate publicity, and you talked about relationships. How do you establish and keep up those relationships? Well, I suppose it's like any kind of relationship. You treat people with respect, you're polite. Um, you return calls very

quickly because they're on deadline. Um. If you don't know something, you don't try to kind of bs your way through it. It good question don't know. Let me check into it and I'll get back to you. And you never ever ever lie, okay, but let's assume it was off cycle. In between quarterly things, would you call in just make nice, to keep the relationship and now you have a lunch with you know, the key people. I don't know whether it was every quarter or every six months, but uh.

And also when there were a lot more tickets for shows, you'd invite them to shows. Okay, And you're doing two jobs. Now, when someone does one job in the music business, they have no life. How are you doing? What your life look like doing two jobs? Um? Well, I did have two departments supporting me. Um. You know, when you're in your late twenties early thirties, it's very glamorous. And you know,

I wasn't married then, I didn't have kids yet. Um, so I didn't mind if I was going out five nights a week or I enjoyed going out five nights

a week. And you know, obviously this was pre everyone having their computer at home or certainly you know, pre BlackBerry and and iPhones, so you kind of you know, when you finished with The New York Times at six o'clock, you were done till the next morning when you picked up the paper and you saw what was in there, and there was sort of a relief in that you don't have this twenty four hour cycle of of um

you know that that we do now? Um? Why were to my viewpoint, it seemed like the let me put it this way, it seemed like the entry point at the label for women was through publicity department. Yeah, okay, and probably HR, but you never paid attention to HR. Yes okay. UM. I don't know whether it felt like a more female thing that you know, you're kind of catering to people and you're the one that sets up the parties and you know, offers to poor people a drink.

I don't know. I mean obviously also you were not controlling a P and l um, so you weren't on an operational UM. I guess driving here was this actually sexism? Were they basically saying, hey, you can do the publicitist publicity ghetto, but these other jobs maybe if you prove yourself, but you were not going to let you right in. UM. I was so happy, as I think many people in my position, at least in the nineties were to have a seat at the table and be part of this.

It didn't even occur to me. I mean that that. Um, I might have been able to do something else or contribute in a different way. I just wanted to do my job in the best. Okay, how about the other end of it. Uh, you're an attractive young woman working amongst a lot of high power people. Did people abuse that relationship? Um? Did I ever have anything horrible happened to me? No? Horrible is a little strong. Uh. It was different times, and you know I felt very comfortable

and taking care of myself. Okay at this point in time, do you think you have been consistent or you have a height and awareness and you might not tolerate stuff? Oh yeah, I think everyone does. I mean I mentioned this to you. Before we started PolyGram, every year would have a very glamorous managing director's conference. I don't know, two hundred people ten years and we went to Seville in Berlin and Vancouver and um, Hong Kong, and out of two and fifty people, there were three women, which

now that seems so bizarre to me. Three women, Um, the same three women by the way, UM, and so that's a heavy ratio. What was it like being one of those women, Well, we were the junior people, and we were kind of, um, the favorite people. Everyone wanted to sit with us because there were only three women exactly. Okay, so you're rocking it, PolyGram. What's the next step? Uh,

PolyGram gets sold to Universe. So and that was kind of a shock because you know, it was the biggest record company in the world, it was still very profitable and Napster had not hit yet. Um, and it was quite a long time to close the deal. Well, actually, first I should say I was on maternity leave with my second kid, and I came back early, which I

now also think is stunning. You know, I had one second kid and one maternity leave, and all of a sudden it became so important to come back after nine weeks. And I obviously never got that back, and no one cared on the other side. It's not like anyone said, oh, look at her, she's a saint. She came in after nine weeks ahead of time. I mean, that's just not the way it worked. Um, it was about a year

to close the deal. And then I mean I kept a lot of the label people, you know, le are obviously stayed and actually got more you know, when they combined Island def JAM UM, but anyone kind of in a corporate staff level, UM what was out UM. But by them Roger Aames had been run. You know. Levy was on top of everything, including the film division, and Roger Ames was running of the company UM that that was music, recorded music and publishing. And he and I,

you know, were very close. UM. And he UM was talking to Jerry Levin and Dick Parsons about UM because as you remember, after the whole sort of thing in the mid nineties, UM, with the changes in management at UM, what was it It was Morgatto to Fuchs and and then they gave it to the film guys Daily and Semmel Um Chris Daily and semi brilliant people. But they were on the West Coast and Warner Music was an

East Coast based company. UM, and I think Jerry Um and Dick Parsons decided UM they wanted to get a music I based in New York and Roger was available. UM. It took a while to sort of get the deal done, and then when he came in, he brought me in and I started. The day that the A O. L Time Warner merger was announced Okay, a couple of things. You see the end of polygrin. Are you uptight about what you're gonna do for a living? You just had another kid. I was very sad because it was it

was a very important part of my life. It was a family to me. I mean, you know, the artists, the people I worked with, and it just sort of felt like I was being torn away from kind of everything I knew, you know, in the bulk of my adulthood. Um. Now, at that point, because the economy was good, the music induction. You're the type of person, You're a survivor. You're gonna land. You believe you're gonna land on your feet, no matter what I believe. You have to figure out a way

to land on your feet. Okay. So ultimately Aims closes with Warner and he brings you over. Now this is solely as corporate publicity, right Yeah. Well I ended up, yes, no artist stuff, but I ended up adding things like third party marketing and you know what is Oh, how

would you explain it? NASCAR wants to do music based programming. UM, so you partner with them so that you can expose you know, some of your artists and um and then they also had all these committees because all of a sudden, you know, Time Warner, which was famously siloed after the A O L deal happened, they wanted to have synergy.

So because there was a very small corporate staff, all of a sudden, I was the Synergy marketing person, the Synergy philanthropy person, the Synergy advertising person, which served me very well because I think there were eight or nine divisions then, so I got to know people all across all of the Time Warner divisions. Okay, so you started on the merger day. What was it like in the office. Well, people were in shock, as you can imagine, UM, And I don't think anyone from the end I was clearly

on the Time Warner side. I don't think anyone really knew what to think. Um. And not too long afterwards, I remember there was an investor day where what it would have been Steve Case, Bob Pittman, Jerry live In, Dick Parsons and whoever. The Time Warner CFO was UM and each of the division heads. It was a whole day thing we had to prepare. So this case Roger had to give a half an hour of presentation about why people should love Warner Music. But of course that

was when Napster was starting to show. And of the eight or nine Time Warner divisions, the music division from a business standpoint, was arguably the most troubled. Um. So there's like a big spotlight, and you had all these people jostling for position, for power, and even from the media standpoint, it was so interesting because as opposed to saying from the Wall Street Journal, this is our point person, you now had a point person who covered a O

well and a point person who covered Time Warner. And you multiply that out against any sort of business outlet um, and it was a very leaky organization. Um yeah, every everyone was getting their agenda out there. So I mean you could kind of look whether it was the New York Post or whether it was in New York Times and figure out who was trying to say what. Um yeah it was. So what were some of your experiences there? You talked about nine eleven and what happened there? Okay,

so I was nine eleven. Um, almost all of us in the senior level, Um, we're out in l A. We came out like the last flight out um on the tent um and it was pouring in la or pouring in New York. So we were delayed, you know, didn't get to the hotel until two in the morning. Um. Roger was out, Sylvia Rome was out, Valazzoli was out. It was a Latin Grammy Awards and it was um uh, Madonna's last show of this tour. So Liz Rosenberg was out, and there was a Mary Lynch conference, so Helen Murphy,

the CFO was out. So all of us were around, and you know, we'd all watched this on TV. We were all New Yorkers going trying to find our family. You know, no cell phone, no New York cell phones worked. UM. A very good friend of mine, actually, the woman who is my son's godmother, lost her husband in canter you know, and she called me and left me a message. So I and I mean she knew because obviously all you had to do was look at the footage, and she knew he worked on the top floor. Um. And so

it all came crumbling down. And I think he had actually left her message saying you know, um, I think he said a bomb went off. UM. So I'm worried about one of my best friends in the world. But I can't even talk to her because the phones aren't working. And also, as you remember, they closed um uh, you know any commercial flights. So what day? It was a Tuesday, And so every day we keep on thinking because time

Warner than had a big fleet of jets. Okay, well we'll head up to Burbank and as soon as they open up, fly home. And when they came, first they came and went. And you remember Johnny Barbs, So Johnny was good friends with Whoopi Goldberg. Evidently Whoopi Goldberg doesn't fly or doesn't fly a lot, and she had a tricked out luxury bus. So when she used to go to New York, she had these two drivers I think

they were Vietnam vets. One would go for ten hours then sleep, next one would go, you know, only stopping for gas. And they could do it, I don't know, fifty hours coast to coast. And so we actually sat in the lobby at the Four Seasons, going, are we gonna wait for the planes, you know, to be able to fly or do we get on a bus now with the idea that in two days will be home by in l Roger and Sylvie I remember stayed and waited for the planes, and they did end up getting

home before we did. The rest of us. Um. Val Um. Liz Rosenberg, who didn't have kids, Um, Helen Murphy and I decided we'd rather just be moving, you know, because otherwise we could be sitting there for another. To top it all off, the night before, I got food poisoning. So I've been up all night long and I'm completely green. Um. And what we had a nice bed because I was so sick. They gave me the bed and no, no, no, no, no, no, she just gave she and this is out of the

goodness of her heart. UM. So Liz Rosenberg would come in and kind of you know, pat my head down, and at night she and I I would say, I slept with Liz Rosenberg, you know, going across country. Um. Yeah. And they had satellite TV so we could watch CNN, but there was still no real communication in time time with New York. Um. Yeah, so did the bus drop you off your front door? You know? The bus dropped val off in New Jersey and then the rest of

us were all Manhattan, Westchester, Connecticut. Um. So they picked place um in Tarrytone, actually a mall, and you know, we and they told us beforehand, So we all told you know, whoever was going to pick us up meet us here around this time. And what was it like being on the bus with these people for fifty hours? Well, I mean, like everyone else in America, we were all just shell shocked and people were trying to figure it out. Uh yeah, I mean I had been I'd driven cross

country before, so that wasn't particularly a novel. But you were going that fast without stops. Okay, what were some of the experiences there at time at Warner Music? Um, what were some of the experiences. Well, what I know is it ultimately that Roger was trying to do mergers. Yes, okay, so that's right. So so when the A O LL deal was announced, Roger was trying to merge Warner with am I part one. Um. So I spent the better

part of a year, as did many lawyers. That's how I got to Dick Parsons quite well, because the bigger issue was Brussels, not Washington, d C. European commissioners. So I learned a lot about European anti trust and you know, all the things that go into it. And in the end, um, the European Commission decided that in order to approve the A O. L. Time Warner deal, that Time Warner would

have to give up the E M I deal. UM. And Dick Parsons will say to this day we got the wrong deal through through Brussels um, and that that was like a ten month process. But it was also lovely for me because I got to know Dick quite well because by then, you know, Jerry's the CEO and Cases the chairman, and Bob was running kind of all the divisions with the exception of music and film, and so you know, Dick was a lawyer, he was you know,

had political background, and he was responsible for music. UM. Got on very well with Roger, you know, so he spent a lot of time trying to shepherd this thing through. Um. Yeah, didn't happen. Um. And then at one point I think Roger explored something with BMG, but were Sony Um, but there were. And then when the Sony BMG thing happened, obviously it went from five majors to four, which made

it that much more difficult to do another deal. And when Jeff Bucas decided both because what do they call it negative growth um uh, to get rid of them the music Company two thousand three two four or printed up for sale because you know, given how much it was declining, no real light on the horizon, all the napster stuff and UM as well as trying to pay down some of the A O Well debt UM and that was kind of floating around for a while. Ultimately, as you know, it came down to UM, E, M,

I and UH and Edgar Bronfman. And in the end, I think Jeff made the decision to go with Bronfman because he didn't want to spend ten months in Brussels trying to get any more. Gave it away a fewer than three billion dollars two point eight billion. And now if you figure Universal and I actually talked to a banker last night whom validated this, if Universal with the ten cent deal is now valued at thirty three billion

and Warner giver take is about half the size. I mean, you can argue about the assets and publishing and everything probably worth at least fifteen billion now, so in sixteen years, just by continuing to be an operation it was worth that much. Where does that leave you when uh it ultimately happens. Well, Roger, you know, had made a boatload of money and decided he wanted to move back to London, and there wasn't probably a seat at the table for him,

at least immediately. UM and Dick Parson said I really want you to stay with Time Warner, and about a week later said you should meet Anne Moore. She's our new chairman of Time Ink. I think you get along with her. She wants her own communications person. And so I literally walked half a block from seventy five Rock to the Time Life Building met Anne was hired. I got my payoff from Warner Music, and I think a week later started at Time Inc. Um. But it was

a culture shock. I mean, no one in the music business ever asked me if I went to college where I went to college where I studied. And I'm not saying it's a good or bad thing, but all of a sudden I'm on the executive floor of the Time Life Building, down the hall from where Henry Luce used

to sit, not the only person without an Ivy League degree. UM. Again fascinating, and I walked in by the way at the time of the whole Scooter Libby UM Judy Miller trial UM, which ended up the Supreme Court didn't hear it, but it went up to the court after that, which just you know, took over everything. Um because unlike the New York Times, because the New York Times never published it. Judy Miller, you know, was on the hook for it.

But Time Magazine and the Washington um or the White House Reporter published something about the league, and therefore Time Magazine was also being sued. UM. And Norm Pearlstein, who was editor in chief at the time now editor of the l A Times, you know, absolutely brilliant, also a lawyer by training. Um. You know, it was really running a lot of the strategy. But it was super tricky. You know, if the highest legal entity says you need to do something in this case turn over your notes, um,

it's hard to say, no, I don't agree with you. UM. But yet turning over notes are supposed to be confidential for journalistic organization is just about the worst you know, sin you can um, you can have. And again this this went on for a long time while the White House Reporter that was part of this whole thing, you know, at a young kid was terrified about getting thrown in jail in the case of duty Miller and I didn't know Judy at all. I mean I sat in some meetings.

The thinking was because she was behind some of the weapons of mass destruction, you know, a rocky coverage for The Times that she sort of wanted to you know, make up for that, and if she was gonna you know, bite the bullet, you know, she would. Um. Ultimately, I guess right before they were going to be sentence sentenced. And I have no idea why they did this, um, but Carl Rose, attorney said, you know you're free to do you know, if you need to turn it over,

turn it over. Uh, and that let us off the hook. Judy, I think did go to jail for a couple of months. UM. Very interesting stuff. So what was it like, what was your role of what was your experience in the belly of the beast? Well, um, I mean it got so much coverage, I mean every day from so many different outlets. I mean it was TV coverage. It was if there was a court hearing, you know, camera is all over,

you know. And it wasn't just the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, you know, it was Newsweek and UM and things like the New York Observer. UM, you know, international papers were looking at this so it was a big deal and you had to figure you know, you had to figure out, based on the events of that time that that particular day or event, what you were going to say, and you would figure it out or you're you're right it and then ask uh. Well, I

worked closely with Norman and the other lawyers involved. I mean I certainly was not in a position to do anything laterally in a case that big. I would never do anything, you know, without a lawyer anyway. Okay, Now it's ironic that that was run by Ivy League people and that created when the music business went up. What was that experience for you? Well, in the beginning, remember Time magazine was one of the premier and one of

the largest and most prestigious media companies of the century. Um. And even when I got there, we would still do talks with with you know, Justice Scalia, Senator Obama when he was still senator um. Uh. You know, I can remember Steve Jobs coming in, you know, the show people the iPhone. Um. I mean people still cared about those titles. And I'm not just talking about Time and Fortune. I mean from the entertainment side, obviously, people Entertainment Weekly. Um.

From a sports side Sports Illustrated. I mean you could sort of get to anyone in any area, and publishing was still relatively healthy until maybe two thousand seven or eight, when you know, both consumer behavior changed, meaning getting their news from the internet, and advertisers change, meaning you know,

advertising either on social platforms or the internet. Um. And I felt I felt so much deja vu because I was like, I've been there before, I've seen this movie, and people sometimes would look at me like you see around corners. It's it's like, no, I just have kind of seen this movie. Because I would say music business

was the canary in the coal mine for digital disruption. Well, I remember at some time Warner offsite, Um, some of the film guys were basically you music people, and Roger was so fired up and he's just like, you know, you just wait until those pipes are bigger and it's going to be your turn to How did the people at the top when, when and how did they wake up? What did that look like? Well, they were very smart people. Um. I mean they may not have grown up in internet world.

Um uh, But I remember, um Going Out was then the All Things deconference, now the Recode conference with Anne Moore and it was almost like she got real. I mean, now all the big media people do it, but at the time it was a very techy thing and she was one of the first traditional media accompany people to go. And we you know, at the time time had a magazine Business two point oh, and the Business two point

oh editor worked with her quick study. I mean, you know, did some Q and A like this and the things. You know. Either she didn't get right the first time, she got right the second time, UM and UM. And I think the fact, you know, she kind of raised her hand and said, we want to be in business with you. And whether it's doing deals or you know, sharing content. Um. You know, she got real credit for that.

I mean, I still remember their special edition was George Lucas and more and Steve Jobs, and I thought, okay,

that's not bad. Okay, did you interact with Steve Jobs when Rod Raames was Yeah, because actually, UM, for the development of the iTunes store, Warner was the first company in and I'm not sure what the historical precedents for that was, but I went out two or three times and um to Coopertino just with Roger with the way or a digital guy to talk through, and Roger's pitch two jobs was, it's like the mafia families do not try to get all five companies to agree on things.

You know, you decide what you want, we'll make the introduction to Universal. You have number one and two companies. Um, And that's what happened. I mean, everyone else was just goofing around or well, I just Roger told me. He told Universal, Uh, either you're in or from resigning from the r I double A. Well he did tell the r I double A I am not going to be part of suing consumers for illegal downloading until we give them a legal option. Okay, but did you actually hang

around jobs? Do you have any insights there? Uh? I won't say. Well, actually, after Warner Music was sold, he asked me to come out and meet the Pixar people about working for Pixar. And I only realized afterwards. You sort of start with HR and then if you anyone continue I didn't realize that. And it's kind of I think a Silicon Valley thing. And if you pass with UM HR, you got I don't know, legal and then you go to finance and you know, then you end

up with you know, uh, John Lasseter and UM. And then at the end of you know, a long day, they said, you know, you should go over to Cupertino and UM and meet with Steve again. UM. Now, I'm not sure that I would have been offered the job, but I also knew that I didn't want to move to northern California. I mean, my family was quite young, you know, my extended family, most of them were in

New York. UM. And after while the tunnel in my work life, UM, I became very focused on you can't make work the center and you know if it doesn't fit in the rest of your life, because that can go away and your rest of your life is not going to go away. Well, I guess you worked with an or of experience, a lot of big personalities. What did you learn about these titans of the industry. Well, some of them had um amazing manners. UM. I mean,

Dick was is just the most polite person. I mean I could send Dick a book and I would get a personalized thank you note. I mean from from from the chairman. UM. Rogers, you know, is very blunt but also polite in his UM, in his own way. I'm certainly not a screamer. You know, I worked a lot with Chris Blackwell, both in my consulting business and when

he was at Ireland. Um I was so I was probably more intimidated by Chris and anyone else in the beginning at PolyGram because to me he was such a legend. He signed my two favorite artists of all time, which are two and who by um. And he was so cool that before one of these conferences that I told you about where there were only three women, Golden Eye hadn't opened yet. He was still his personal home even though he was building out the um the Hudson Villas.

He invited the three of us down for the weekend before the conference started. I was like, how cool is that? Right? Um? No, And he's someone who I guess like Steve Jobs, very different personally, but he had a vision. Even if everyone else didn't agree with the vision, he was going to go with that vision. You know, it is to think different things. Okay, so you were one on one with Steve Jobs. Uh yeah, but the Pixar thing, Yeah, I mean I was how long did that last? Was he blunt?

Was he nice? He was blunt? And he wasn't not nice? I mean, I wouldn't say he was warm and fuzzy. I also at that time this would have been I guess two thousand three or four ish. Because I didn't come from a tech world. I didn't realize that Steve Jobs was like this. I mean, I know, a big deale. Apple was a big deal, but Apple was not not at the time, you know, the most valuable company in the world. Steve Jobs wasn't mus around the world that way outside of you know, kind of a business and

tech community. Um. So I didn't know enough to be intimidated. I guess, Okay, So how does it end with time? Uh? The chairman retired after thirty seven years. And she was an interesting story. I mean, she spent her Harvard Business School. Right out of Harvard Business School, first class of women. There weren't even female bathrooms when she was there. Um gets offered thirteen jobs, lowest paying, most time, inc And

again she liked magazine. She didn't want to be a banker, and she went there and made more money than she would have anywhere else. And she was kind of known as the launch queen. You know, she developed in style with the idea that um, you know, women don't just want the aspirational Vogue. Look, they want the practical work, and I buy it. How much does a cost? Which became incredibly successful, not just in the US but around the world. Um, she launched and more. She launched Real Simple.

You know, the idea that the average American woman spends twenty minutes a day looking for something. If you can help them organize their life, you give them time back, which is more valuable than anything. Um. She changed people from black and white to color because who wants to look at black and white oscar dresses? Um? Uh? And

she had um this is before my time. But when she was general manager of Sports Illustrated and I guess this would have been late eighties early nineties, they told her because she was a woman, she was never going to be president publisher of Sports Illustrated. UM. And Timing also like to move people around, so it wasn't the end of the world. But at that point ESPNO just launched. She's like, we should take a piece of this because this is s I on TV. And they didn't listen

to her, so she resigns. Oh, she retires, I mean um. And then Jeff brought in a guy, Jeff Bukus, who was so CEO Dick had retired a few years before as as Time Warners CEO, Jeff Road and a guy. Um. And you know, Jeff's focus was never publishing, and publishing was starting to decline. So I think he just wanted was an m B A. You know, he went to Yale.

Jeff went to Yale. They were not like stylistically at all. Um. And as people do, this guy came in and kind of took everyone out on that senior level, um, particularly women and the only black man I will say at the senior level. Um. But it was done in such a ham fisted way that after five months he was fired. And it wasn't a euphemism about pursuing other opportunities. It was like, now this didn't work out, bad culture fit me.

I'm sure he got a very big check, um. But I do give a lot of credit for Jeff that he didn't double down, you know, with more people leaving in more damage. Um. Yeah, tid is it in with you with that new Yeah. So I got I got a you know, like a bunch of people um that he wanted to replace us. I got another substantial check. Um. And because I had always gone from corporate job to corporate job. And I had about a month or two of like cleaning up at Time Inc. And I started

getting phone calls. The Harvard Business Review is run by some x Time guys, and they're like, you know, we'd love it if you work with us for six months and we have some junior people and just kind of give us a template and organize things. And then UM, the general counsel of Sony, Julie Swidler, is a good friend of mine and UM. At the time, Rob Stringer was at Columbia and he had to stand, I'm sure

you got it right. The hundred and fiftieth anniversary of Columbia, that big beautiful book, and you know it was a Pulitzer Prize winning author Sean Lens that wrote it, and and Rob really had a vision. They didn't want this to be a promotional thing. That he wanted it to really speak to the legacy and artistry of Columbia and its artists and you know those event at the Grammy Museum.

And so I worked with him on that. UM and then the best one was I got a call just from someone I knew, UM that knew Ken Parks Um saying you should go in and meet Ken Parks because Spotify is going to launch here. And the PR the woman that ran PR in London who since left, but um Angela Watt, brilliant, but she was sitting in London and it was launching in the US UM and she

came back and forth a lot. At the time. I think they didn't have headcount or couldn't afford a full time person in the US, so they wanted someone essentially for the equivalent of three days a week to help them with the launch, and someone who had good US media contacts, and someone who understood the traditional music industry, the players, the business. And so before I even walk

out the door, I've got these three great clients. And I never thought of myself as a consultant, and I always liked the idea of having a structure in the office camaraderie. But this was also so interesting to me because there was nothing that I was hearing about that was more interesting than the combination of these things. And other things came in and out. When the Harvard business went away, I got pulled into Martha Stewart, which was interesting.

No after that, Lisa Gersh was running it at the time. Uh yeah, I like I decided I liked having the variety and and and and the combination and two thousandleven and it also and I don't think I articulated it to myself for anyone at the time, but in retrospect, it's like, sometimes when these things happen, you have to

figure out how to reinvent yourself. And I tried to reinvent myself from a traditional you know, big company, traditional media person to someone kind of on this nexus of whether you want to say media or entertainment and tech um, which was where a lot of the future was going at this point in time. Do you troll for work or the clients find you? No, I don't really troll

for work. UM. Uh, you know people. Okay. When Ken Parts left Spotify after um, you know, four years later, and he went to um another digital startup, Pluto TV, which is a free ad supported service, you know, he brought me in as a consultant. Um. You know. So it's all sort of the relationships stuff. UM. The SA Sack people hired me for a while because they wanted some help. They were doing some rebranding and UM okay, but let's stop with okay, Uh, what did you actually do?

They were rebuilding their website. So some of it too was I was no longer just a publicist or even just a corporate communications person. It became broader in terms of you know, branding, communication shans and whether that meant materials, you know, websites, one sheet, whether that meant events. UM, you know, figure out what was right for the client and what they needed and what they wanted. What do you do for Spotify? Um? Well, for Spotify in the beginning,

as I said, they didn't have anyone in the US. UM. And right off the bat we had UM big, big feature in in Business Week and Daniel was supposed to be on the cover. He did a photo shoot with Christina Aguilara. I went to Irving and said, this is great for her, and she's been all these magazine covers. I think it was just when the Voice was launching. UM, you know, she'll look cool. This will be good for everyone.

UM an eight page feature. Unfortunately, it was the week that the Murdoch um uh scandal broke about um uh the news of the world stuff and UM. Josh Terangel, who was then the top editor at Business Week, called me. He said, I love the story. You're gonna love this story. I'm sorry to tell you it's not going to be the cover anymore because we're Business Week and the business story of the week is Rupert Murdoch. Um. Okay, So at this late date in corporate publicity, is it the

same usual suspect outlets? Well, I think some of kind of following by the wayside, and I think social obviously means a lot more. You have to have a social strategy and someone who understands that, um much more cycle. No, I think there's a lot more blogs. I'm actually first talking about your role, okay, because you're more in corporate publicity. Okay, so certainly with regular publicity the whole game has changed.

But I think corporate I mean I would count you as someone, whether you want to say influencer or um, if I was trying to, you know, work on this story that had some kind of connection to the music industry, if not the wider entertainment industry. I mean, you're the kind of person that that I would go to because a lot of people, um, I don't know, you know how many people read you, but a lot of important people read you. Um, and a lot of people who care a lot maybe who care more than the people

who read the New York Times. Well, let's go droll a little bit deeper. What do we know it used to be? If it was in the New York Times, everybody knew. Okay, as a result of the right denigrating the New York Times and as a result of so many media outlets, it's in the New York Times a smaller percentage of people, because don't forget that's an influencer. New York Times is not only an influence. So it's when the evening news is built off of right exactly.

But there's no longer one outlet that can reach the country at large. Yes, New York Times will be reach everybody in Washington and people there. So how do you approach the game now? Well, I think let's stick with your New York Times. Um idea. You get a story in the New York Times. And even if this person, whether they're in Detroit or whether they're down the street here in Hollywood, um, you know, doesn't read the New York Times. We didn't see it. That's why you place

it on your social channels or you blasts out an email. Okay, let's be very specific. If it's a business story. Do you say, well, you know, if I get in New York Times, I get a business week, it covers my target market. Or do you actually go to socials on a business story? Oh? No, you definitely go to socials. Um, what is what is the thinking? Um? Because a lot of people get their information from socials? Are those people you need to reach on a corporate level? I'm not

sure that we know? It was interesting? Is you know? The Billboard Power Issue came out this week and just scrolling through Instagram, I was surprised at how many people that were named in the Power Issue printed up on their feeds. If you were named in the Power Issue, would you put it on your feed? I'm I'm pretty sure I've never thought about that, and I don't think I will be named to the Power Issue. Um, I guess what I'm saying. Do we live in an era

in the old area? You worked at Time inc? Self publicity? Self promotion was pooh pooh? Is that completely flipped? Well? Self promotion was pooh pood? But you had maybe at the fifteen thousand employees three thousand journalists. Journalists all have friends to their journalists, all of whom are very good

at telling stories. So I mean, when I was at Warner Music, if the Wall Street Journal called, I don't think anyone would want to pick up the call because they would just feel like all I can do is just muck this up. You're at time ink and whatever the official line is, you had three thousand people with varying opinions, all getting out there on background find you,

but all getting out there. Okay, So let's say a corporate when you worked with Spotify and not granted that started two thousand eleven, maybe that's not a good example. When you work with Pluto TV, did you uh use socials? I didn't personally because they had someone in house. I don't know whether it was part of the marketing department that was assigned that uh. And I don't feel like I have a particular expertise and social I just believe that you have to have UM for a business or

an entity, consistent messaging. You should use best practice with how often you post on various UM on various platforms UM. You should have some kind of goal, whether it's you want to increase you know, viewers or users on x y Z platform. You should focus probably on no more than two platforms. UM Uh, you know, I don't believe in trying to do Facebook and Instagram and Twitter and YouTube and because question, Um, I think you kind of delude things. And I think in most most companies there's

a more natural fit. Um. You know, I don't know, I'm making this up. Maybe more mainstream you would use Facebook, maybe more insider. Okay, I use the example got Time Flies By. It's probably two thousand and eight, maybe even a couple of years later. Tom Petty had a new album. Now, someone who's paying a lot of attention to media, it was in every media outlet, I mean every are you

writing about that? I'm offended, okay, by the same token people. Well, the average person is not paying as much attention as I am. So is carpet bombing publicity a good thing or a bad thing? Um? Well, I I don't think there's one answer to that. I think it depends on what the person or the project is. And I would say being authentic has always been important, but being authentic is more important now than ever. And people can really smell of fake. Um. And where's the audience that you're

trying to reach yourself to? Um? And if they're not on this platform or in this outlet, I would put more energy into places where you're going to find people, whether you're existing people or your new people, would be my philosophy. Okay, let's start from the very beginning of today. What we know is we live in a cacophonoust tower of Babel society. Okay, and it's as I believe, people know more than they've ever known before because they have the device in their hand, but a great percentage of

them don't know single things. I use an example of the music business Spotify top top fifty. They believe everybody knows Drake Salt if everybody knows Taylor's wist songs. But never in the history of modern pop music have fewer people been familiar with the so called hits. So how do you get a message across ro just say I'm gonna jump in the water like everybody else. I can't give you to me. It's out of one size fits all answer. It's what's your product, service, person, artist, um

and what do you want to try to do? You want to maintain existing, you want to grow you're existing? You want to get new audiences. Who are those new audiences? Where are they? Are they demographic? Are they geographic. Um. I think you need to ask yourself that, um. Kind of every time is you're looking at where you want to put your effort. I mean, going back to your Tom Petty example, I mean Tom Petty only has so many hours to devote to doing media, So let's figure

out what the priorities are. Well, let's use an example. I mean, I've been using this for a while, but everybody says, if we if I kill somebody out in the street and it's in the afternoon. Now, but let's assume it's nine in the morning, that will be news told about one o'clock and something else will happen thereafter. Okay, how do you keep something top of mind? Well, I think that's a problem that people have shorter attention spans, um.

And we've seen that even with Trump, right, I mean, you know, he tweets something outrageous when he wants to take attention away from something else. Um. Uh. People go to the media or the outlets that reflect what they think, um, and therefore reinforce what they're already thinking. I mean, it's it's a problem issue. I I don't have an answer for that one. Okay. Now, they're also things that everybody

will know for a day and forget about. So are you better off with a slow burn campaign or you know, all hands on deck campaign? Well, okay, from an artist publicity standpoint, um, Certainly in the nineties the rule of thumb was, you know, ever put anyone on David Letterman until the CDs in the store, because if someone decides they loved that song they heard last night and they go the next day to Tower Records and it isn't there,

that it is out of mind. Um. I think that's probably changed in a streaming world where everything is so available at your fingertips. But I think it's a good thing to think about, for um as you approach those things. I mean, yes, I guess a slow burning being there longer, or maybe figuring out how you phase things. You know, what's phase one, what's phase two, what's phase three? Well,

that's one thing, you know. I think they're revolving. But that's what the music business doesn't understand, certainly with streaming paying forever assing you're being listened to. If you could weave a magic wand over the media industry, what would you want to change? Oh my gosh, Bob, I may have to write you back on this because I want to be very thoughtful and I'm not I've ever thought of waving a magic wand even though it is a lovely thought, UM, I'm not going to whip out and pass.

I will write you on that. Well. I guess let me look at it this way. What are some of the flaws in the system that could be fixed? Fixed? This isn't necessarily a flaw, but I've been thinking about this.

I had lunch with a friend who's at Netflix yesterday, um and and just kind of reading some of the people like you, um who you know cover the film industry, and all the studios are so mad because you know, Netflix is spending all this money and they're kind of trying to have their cake and eat it too, and you know, should marriage story be up for an oscar? And you know, and Netflix is sitting there just laughing because they have how many millions of people, you know

as subscribers. They're still growing at whatever rate and you know what times change. I mean, that's like the music industry in in two thousands saying this napster thing is really unfair. And I think again, even as the consumer going to the going to the movies as a hassle. Um, gotta drive, you gotta park a lot of times the movies I want to see aren't playing anywhere near me. Um, the food is terrible. You watch twenty minutes of commercials, people talk or text through it. I'm going, how few

movies do I want to see? And I think I said once a time in Hollywood in the theater and I saw Little Women because I wanted to go with my daughter, and I figured that was about holiday movie and it got good reviews. Everything else it's like why not wait? Or why not watch what's on Netflix tonight? Or I mean, I think this is going to be very fascinating for people watching the next year. And it's slightly off topic. But you have Netflix that's so entrenched.

You have Disney which anyone with a kid under chan as we spent seven bucks a month. You have Apple that can bundle this, you know, whether it's with music or um yeah or free. But in any case, you know, if they can use this as a lost leader or marketing thing. Um, you know for a long time, and so I'm fascinating. You know, the compast is taking a different approach obviously, you know, free, free, free, free and

back to the Pluto TV. There's enough people that want free, and we've got you know, the office, and we'll have sports and late night TV. Um, so free. I sort of set aside because it's a different I never subscribed to Hulu, and I'm sure it's great for people who like those shows, but I think most people agree there's a window of how many of these services you're going

to do. Again. I look at my former company and I never worked for HBO, but I mean I was a huge Richard Pleppler fan, and I think that was one of the great brands companies, you know, of the last twenty years and what they've created. And I don't know about you. I'm really confused. Okay, Hbo HBO now HBO Go, HBO Max. I couldn't agree more. And you know, I still get tradition cable TV, so I get HBO.

Does that mean I can get HBO Max? You know, as I say, I remember, I don't use my iPad that much, but I was out a ton of the iPad and you know, is it HBO Go or HBO Max? And they're exactly they were all the icons where you know, all the apps were there and I'm wasting time to figure out which one works, and then you have to go through jump through hoops under the best of circumstances just to get it to play. But okay, I'm not sure the point you're making. Well, just that the things change.

And you know what we talked about the music was the canary in the coal mine. But you look at all these other forms of media and you have to adapt to change, whether it's a person like me or whether it's an industry, and you can't sort of look back and say the good old days. And I want Okay, let's let's drill down a little bit with this person from the film business yesterday. Could you wake them up? Or they just too far intoxix? So she's at the

winning side. Okay, So if you were with the on the movie people, what would you tell them to do? Um Embrace change and mitigate your losses. There will be losses, whether it's losses forever or losses short term, but you're not going to turn back time. So, so you're a corporate publicity person, consultant, has that world grown or shrunk? Well, I'm not that deep in Silicon Valley, but my you know, sort of touching it. My feeling is that a lot of them when they start out use PR as a

marketing tool as opposed to spending. It's not like they have big advertising campaigns or anything. Um. So I I think in that segment there also, I think a lot of people are concerned about overhead. You know, if you hire me, you're not paying for my health insurance, you're not paying for my office space, you know, or any of the other things. And so you get my brains, my ideas, you know, my contacts. UM. Obviously not full time as a consultant unless it's agreed upon, you know,

on a project basis, um. And maybe that's all you need. I mean, in a number of cases I've come in where they say, we love the person we have, but she's twenty five years old and we need someone to give him or her some guidance. Okay. So it's like the rest of the world, we're moving to an outsourcing gig economy. Yeah, I'm I mean, personally, I think I'm not sure that we're moving completely. And I think there will always be a place for in the house people,

certainly at least in big companies. UM. But I think this feels more Um, this feels easier, especially for startups and smaller companies. It's okay, you're rutting your own business. You're not. You make a deal with someone to be a consultant. It's not full time. How do you manage the compensation in time? You dedicate well. I before I take on a project or an account, I try to understand what are your goals in the best case scenario.

If we're sitting here three months from now or six months from now, and if they tell me I want to be on the cover of Fortune, I want a ten minute segment on the Today's Show. And it's something that I think that's completely unrealistic. I think, you know, you're not going to be happy at the end of this period. I'm not going to be happy because I'll

feel like I'm not delivering for you. Um. But if you can sort of start by saying what are the goals, and even if the person can articulate the goals, working with them to say, okay, so do we need to change your website, get your messaging in shape? Do we need to do any media training? Are there are conferences we should be at, you know, speaking opportunities, what media outlets are you're most interested in, where do you want

to build your relationships? Come to an agreement there, and then the next part is both for me to figure out this. This look like a two day a week project. I mean the equivalent of two days. Uh. You know if I wake up at six in the morning, which is you saw this morning, you know that that counts to it too, and you can you can kind of work from any word any time. Um, but I try to figure out it is it a two day project,

three day project? You know? And agree. I don't like to do stuff really under six months because it just takes a while to get into the rhythm of understanding the people in the business and kind of coming up with ideas and a lot of it's sitting around and bouncing things off of each other. Okay, let's assume it's two days a week. But the person calls your five days a week and you've already put in fifteen hours. Okay, well, okay,

then I should have added. The other thing I said is when we come to an agreement about a price and two days a week, I said, let's re examine this after a month or two months, and if I feel like I'm pretty more into it. I'd like to come back and talk to you about renegotiating. In turn, if I feel like either you're in a slow period or there isn't a whole lot I can do until the summer, you know, you can come back. That should not be at etchton Stone. I mean, I'm pretty okay.

So let's assume the company is realistic and they come to you and they say, well, in the next three months, even though a six month deal, I want to be on the cover of Fortune and I want to be on some news program. Can you deliver that? It depends on who the person is. Do you have those relationships? Yeah? Oh yeah, yeah, so you have those. So basically, any media outlet you have somebody there that you can pitch.

I can't tell you any media outlet, and some of the TV stuff, UM, I probably don't, but I know someone that can introduce me. Okay, what is the number one for a business story? The number one TV outlet? Well, CNBC, you know means a lot to people. Um, I'll tell you. And this is a little bit of people miss this.

You know. One of the only successful parts of Yahoo is Yahoo Finance, and they get eighteen million uniques a month, and they, sir were the guy who runs it used to Runfortune and he's built this great, great business within Yahoo. And they now do like six hours of video a day. And I've had people on there, and because so many people still go to Yahoo, you know, for stock information or whatever, there's a lot of good feedback. I'm not saying that's necessarily number one, but it's, um, you know,

it's also finding things like that. So if they have that much video a day, how hard is it to get something on? You know? Sometimes I've told yes, sometimes I've told no. Okay, Well if you're told no, when you go back, ah, if I can make the story better, okay? And then print what is the best place? Well, a lot of people still care a lot if they have

any international footprint. The ft is sort of the gold standard financial times and then um, you know, the New York Times and Wall Street journals still count a lot. I mean I always tell everyone I think the New York Post is super important because a lot of people at least in New York read it absolutely. Howard Stern is talking about I mean Dick Parsons. When he would get picked up, he'd always tell me at the Times, the journal in the post, because the post is where

you get your finger on what people are talking about. Um. And they have a good business section, again held to a different standard and following somewhat different stories. But they're smart people and good reporters. So what is the future of print? I think the New York Time was sick with our favorite, The New York Times. I think they've

shown that they've figured out a reasonable digital model. UM. I mean, I don't know all the numbers, but they're growing, both in terms of members and in terms of revenue. I think the big will get bigger and the small, sadly will probably fade it with Well, let's put it this way. I'm voracious news consumer. I get the physical

newspapers too, so and I pour over them. But I'm checking the apps innumerable times a day, and you cannot get into the depth on the app, and you miss things on the app that you will see exactly what I tell people, You know, if they look at me like I'm, you know, a ludic for still getting the print issues, I say, there's a sense of serendipity of things that I don't even know that I'm if I'm turning every page and I do. I read those three

papers every day and the Financial Times on the weekend. Um, And I think that, you know, I mean sometimes I look at different magazines. Obviously, sometimes I dive in if I see something online that interests me. Um. But I think you can kind of cover a lot of important stuff if you deal with those Well, I guess I'm going the other way when print goes away. If you get a story on the app and it's buried, will anybody see? I mean, they're big stories, like I don't think.

I guess what I'm saying is in Well, the New York Times have a print, should know, but maybe they will figure out a different way presenting it so that for people like us, you get more of the you know, serendipitous discovery. Um, I don't. I think the New York Times has even said it's print is not going away for us, you know, in the near term. What about

Apple News Plus? Um? Apple News Plus. I love as a consumer because I'm not sure I want to pay a hundred dollars for the Hollywood Reporter or for Business Week. But I like being and when I was, you know, I would find they were just stacking up and then I go. There's too much work to go through this, um, but I love having the access to it. Either if there's a certain story I'm following, or you can enter something you know you want to go back and read

what they said about you know, Rupert Murdoch. Here, Um, just type it in. You know, You've got the last seven years of archives, which I think is a great gift. The question I think for Apple News is how did the providers feel and are they getting um compensated to the degree that they feel. The one thing for sure is h subscriptions are amazingly low and they were all frontloaded. Uh, but I'm interested. Do you check Apple News Plus on

any specific device? Usually my iPad? Yeah, because I say, I'm on my phone a lot and News Plus doesn't work that much. Now. I don't like anything I have to read. I don't I don't like on my phone. UM, I like the bigger screen. So what's the future for you personally, the future of my media consumption or media career career? Uh, I'm not sure I ever plotted out my future, and I'm not sure that I am now.

I I feel very lucky that I had the experiences and met the people that I have and UM, you know, I told you I've got a twenty four year old and twenty two year old, So I feel you know, not only do I love them, but I got two great kids out of two great colleges, both working. Um. I like the flexibility too, of traveling. I mean, this summer, my daughter and I wanted to go to Croatia. We went to Croatia. You know, my son turned Next year he wants to go to Japan. We'll go to Japan.

I mean that to me is a gift because I didn't have that flexibility for a long time. I did a lot of traveling, both for work and for fun, but it wasn't just like Okay, let's go now and I can. Okay, you have a client, you go to Croatia, what do you tell him, Um, I'm going to be gone. I'll tell okay, email once a day, once a day, maybe more. Okay, So you feel fulfilled very much? So okay, don this has been great, Thanks so much for talking about Okay, until next time. This is Bob left Sex