The Media Odyssey
Each week, two of media’s most influential thinkers, Evan Shapiro & Marion Ranchet, take on the hottest media topics with their hottest takes, helping their audience chart a course through the maelstrom that is today’s Media Odyssey. Based in the US, Evan Shapiro is the Media Industry’s official Cartographer, known for his well-researched and provocative analysis of the entertainment ecosystem in his must read treatises on Media’s latest trends and trajectories. Marion Ranchet, French expat based in Amsterdam, has become the industry’s go-to expert in all things streaming, building a following for turning even the most complex problems into easily digestible and actionable insights. Ranchet and Shapiro are known for their sharp-yet-accessible content on Media consumption, audience trends, and the shifting fundamentals of the business itself. Even during the toughest of topics, they each make talking about Media fun. Together every week, these two will offer entertaining, often humorous, and always educational content on today’s Media Odyssey.
Episodes
Demand for high-quality kids' content has never been higher, but the supply has never been more broken. And YouTube, the most powerful kids' platform on Earth, is running it like an algorithm, not a network.
This live panel episode of the Media Odyssey Podcast, recorded at the Media Universe Summit, features Evan Shapiro and Jamie Shapiro alongside Andy Donner, Head of Partnerships at Common Sense Media, and Sara DeWitt, Senior ...
59% of people now watch video on their phone first. If your content strategy doesn't account for that, Evan Shapiro has a message for you: you're already losing.
This keynote episode of the Media Odyssey Podcast features Evan Shapiro's live Stream TV Europe presentation. It is a fast, data-driven breakdown of where streaming media, social media, YouTube, and TikTok are headed next. Built on original research from MX8 Labs and Evan's...
Valerie Bertinelli has been a content creator since she was 12 years old. She just stopped asking permission to make the shows she wants.
This episode of the Media Odyssey Podcast features special guest co-host Valerie Bertinelli — television icon, actress, author, and Food Network — alongside Billy Cooper, CEO and co-founder of Visible Things, the direct-to-consumer platform infrastructure company behind Valerie's brand...
1.7 million subscribers. A Global deal. Live Bundesliga rights. And a studio in Brooklyn for the World Cup. The Overlap built it all without owning a single match.
This episode of the Media Odyssey Podcast features Scott Melvin, CEO of The Overlap, the multi-award winning sports channel, for the beginning of the 2026 World Cup. What started as a side hustle for a Sky Sports pundit itching to do long-form conversation has grown into ...
Full Disclosure meets Media Odyssey in this crossover episode of The Media Odyssey podcast with Roben Farzad, host of Full Disclosure on NPR and former Wall Street reporter for BusinessWeek and Bloomberg.
The episode covers a wide sweep of interconnected stories: the proposed Paramount-Warner merger, the editorial independence implications of foreign money in US media, the GameStop-eBay bid as a case study in social media-driven mar...
Eight episodes, $25,000, 2 million views. One indie creator just proved you don't need a studio, a streamer, or a greenlight to break into the fastest-growing format in streaming media.
This bonus episode of the Media Odyssey Podcast features Eli Shell, founder of Sidewise Studios and creator of In-House, a vertical comedy series he wrote, funded, and launched entirely on his own. The vertical video market is almost entirely dominat...
10 billion views. 200+ episodes. A Random House deal and a streamer announcement incoming. Toonstar built it all without asking anyone's permission.
Welcome to this episode of The Media Odyssey Podcast with hosts Marion Ranchet and Evan Shapiro featuring John Attanasio and Luisa Huang, co-founders of Toonstar, a next-generation animation studio built from the ground up to produce kids' and family content at the speed of the internet...
Pure play digital is now capturing 75% of every US ad dollar and 60% of that goes to just three companies. What's left for everyone else?
This episode of the Media Odyssey Podcast brings in Mike Shields, founder of the Next in Media newsletter and podcast and one of the sharpest voices in streaming media and advertising analysis working today. Recorded during Upfront week, this snapshot of the advertising ecosystem addresses who's w...
What if fans could own a piece of the films they love and get paid when they hit? One company is making it happen, and Hollywood gatekeepers are not invited.
Welcome to The Media Odyssey podcast featuring Marc Iserlis, Head of Film at Republic, a platform built one simple but radical idea: fans should be able to invest in the films and studios they care about. Evan and Marion have spent the season exploring what they call the "affin...
Five companies just committed $725 billion to AI in a single year. Meanwhile, kids content is in freefall and the people who can least afford it are paying the price.
Welcome to the Media Odyssey Podcast! Evan, fresh off a surprise Webby Award win for Best Creator Thought Leadership, breaks down Q1 earnings from the five biggest tech companies (Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, and Apple) and the AI Loop. Big tech’s collectiv...
What if the future of entertainment fits in your pocket and a six-year-old startup from Ukraine is already building it?
Welcome to the Media Odyssey Podcast, recorded live at StreamTV Europe, featuring Bogdan Nesvit, founder of HOLYWATER TECH and the microdrama platform My Drama. What started six years ago as an interactive fiction app has quietly evolved into one of the most data-sophisticated entertainment companies operating toda...
Europe’s media industry leaders gathered in Lisbon this past week for the inaugural Stream TV Europe, and the prognosis is—to everyone’s surprise—refreshingly optimistic. Welcome to The Media Odyssey podcast!
In this episode, Evan and Marion break down the biggest moments from Stream TV including: the "renaissance" of the living room and the shift in digital strategy by global players. They are later joined b...
You have six subscriptions, can't remember what's on any of them, and still can't find something to watch. Welcome to the subscription economy in 2026.
Get the full Subscription Signals 2026 report here: https://bango.com/reports/reserve-report/?utm_campaign=2026_Campaigns_SubscriberReport_ReserveReportMO
In this episode, Evan and Marion dig into Bango's Subscription Signals 2026 report: an annual study of subscription attitudes and ...
He helped create the most listened-to podcasts in history and then walked away from the New York Times to start over from scratch. Welcome to The Media Odyssey Podcast!
In this episode, Evan and Marion sit down with Brian Reed, documentary podcaster and co-founder of Placement Theory, whose career spans documentary podcasts This American Life, S-Town, and now Question Everything.
The conversation traces the origin story...
AI can't replace your editors, but it can do 80% of their most tedious, repetitive work in a fraction of the time. Welcome to The Media Odyssey Podcast!
In this episode, Evan and Marion open with the news that OpenAI is shutting down Sora's B2C offering, unpacking what it signals for the AI and media landscape. They welcome Olivier Reynaud, Co-founder and CEO at Aive, a platform Aive built around the central challenge facing every c...
244 million followers and a six-month content calendar: Jordan Schwarzenberger explains why showing up daily is the only strategy that matters. Welcome to The Media Odyssey Podcast!
In this episode, Evan Shapiro and Marion Ranchet break down the Nielsen/MRC measurement crisis that rocked the US advertising industry, then sit down with Jordan Schwarzenberger, CEO and co-founder of Arcade Media and manager of the Sidemen. The conversa...
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Paramount's $110B acquisition projects impossible growth, while Tubi data shows 80% canceling paid services. Welcome to The Media Odyssey Podcast presented...
Versant spins out with $2B free cash flow, ITV faces Sky acquisition, Banijay grows experiential 18%, and Canal+ hits 42.3M subscribers. Welcome to The Media Odyssey Podcast live!
In this earnings coverage episode, Marion Ranchet and Evan Shapiro break down results from four companies undergoing major transformations: Versant's spinout from Comcast, ITV's potential acquisition by Sky/Comcast, Banijay's post-Endemol Shine merger perf...
Archive content finds new life on YouTube while broadcast TV is officially "a blip in history." Welcome to The Media Odyssey Podcast live from MIP London!
In this special live episode from MIP London, Evan Shapiro sits down with Martin Trickey, who runs Zoo 55, ITV Studios' digital distribution arm that launched just over a year ago. The conversation reveals how traditional broadcasters are finally waking up to the massive untapped ...
Netflix backs out of the bid for Warner Bros. Discovery (aka “Disco Bros”), leaving Paramount Global — sorry, “Nepomount” — as the likely merger partner. Welcome to another live earnings edition of The Media Odyssey.
In this episode, Evan Shapiro and Marion Ranchet break down the bombshell developments between Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount. Is this smart consolidation… or a true &ldq...
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