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Notes -
I was reading this article about Amazon Prime's streaming service:
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/inside-amazon-studios-jen-salke-vision-shows-1235364913/
Mostly it's not particularly culture war related, talking about how the executives are blowing huge amounts of money on niche shows that don't bring in enough viewers to justify their costs, or paying big salaries to writers and directors that don't end up producing much.
But this part made me chuckle:
I've seen people argue that big companies aren't ideologically woke, they're just doing it for good publicity with the ultimate goal of making money. I think if that was true then Amazon would tell their producers and directors to make the type of content that people want to see: white men with guns (apparently). And if they didn't want to get on board they should take a hike. That's what a company that wants to make money would do. Instead they're trying to change their audience's preferences which is a much harder and less profitable job.
When it comes to representation in media I still do think it's mostly about the bottom line. Even if most people prefer seeing white men on tv that doesn't mean the profit maximizing strategy is to make all your shows feature only white men. I suspect adding a token x character/story line is almost always a profitable decision because most people that don't like it won't stop watching because of it, but the people that do like it might actually watch it when they otherwise wouldn't have.
Having said that, I've recently moved away from thinking big corporations make woke decisions only because it directly improves their profit. It's hard to explain things like really aggressive diversity hiring at tech companies.
One possibility is that the best hires care a lot about progressive ideals. Even if the ideology causes the product quality to take a hit, it's still a better product than you would get hiring someone else. That seems to be the case with Will Graham.
Another possibility is that in elite circles progressive signaling gives you more status than the extra money you would have made not signaling.
More often I see it work out the other way; people who would've watched it end up skipping out (usually fans of whatever established franchise is being mutilated), and the "new fans" never appear, the agitators for change were never going to watch your show in the first place. Mostly those people only care about taking things away from their enemies, white men.
This, again, doesn't seem to track. I'm reminded of the Witcher controversy -- the actor committed to the source material who actually brought in the eyeballs, and the production staff obsessed with ideology who tried to kneecap him and the show at every single turn and ultimately ended up putting people off it.
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