Brian Morrissey

New York

Writer, Editor and Founder at The Rebooting

Host at People vs Algorithms

Columnist at Medieninsider

Writing about sustainable modern media businesses at The Rebooting.

Articles

The reinvention of Cosmo

1 week ago | therebooting.com | Brian Morrissey

Reminder: Through a partnership with Subtext, I’m doing text updates all week from out and about in Cannes. Sign up here. I was asked yesterday if Cannes is still an accurate representation of the media ecosystem. In some ways, yes, and in others, not so much. The key way Cannes is still representative of the media ecosystem is how it’s a bizarre jumble of different companies from far different sectors.
Media is media

2 weeks ago | therebooting.com | Brian Morrissey

Greetings from Camogli, an Italian fishing village on the Liguorian coast. I’m taking the roundabout way to Cannes. Any local tips – Cinque Terre doesn’t count – are appreciated. Speaking of Cannes, a final reminder to sign up to get text updates throughout the week. I’m bracing for a juxtaposition of people downstream from tech wringing their hands about AI eradicating, or at least severely compressing, much of the media ecosystem while on the French Riviera.
Inside Time's AI playbook

2 weeks ago | therebooting.com | Brian Morrissey

This week, I had a conversation with Time CEO Jess Sibley. We spoke about how Time is rapidly diversifying its business to play defense against the AI tsunami while also relying on many partnerships with AI companies to embed AI into its product and business. This is the essential work of reinvigorating legacy brands. I will be having a similar conversation in Cannes next week in Cannes with Cosmopolitan editor-in-chief Willa Bennett and Hearst global CRO Lisa Ryan.
The messy end of the pageview economy

3 weeks ago | therebooting.com | Brian Morrissey

New York City in early June is undefeated. Last night, I went to a Tech Week gathering at the Axel Springer Haus on a quiet street in Nolita. It’s a great space: a townhouse with multiple floors and enough space for a small corporate team to work and gatherings to be held with a rare Manhattan backyard. The vibe was a bit muted, considering the cutbacks at Business Insider and the general tenor of the industry.
BI’s next chapter

3 weeks ago | therebooting.com | Brian Morrissey

Below, a TRB Pro piece on how Business Insider emerged as a winner of the traffic era, only to end up on the wrong side of the equation when the environment changed and it failed to shift quickly or decisively enough. Plus: Wall Street Journal CRO Josh Stinchcomb joined me on The Rebooting Show to discuss how the Journal uses its brand trust to build business lines adjacent to its journalism.
The Rebooting in Cannes

1 month ago | therebooting.com | Brian Morrissey

A quick update on our Cannes plans:Sign up for a pop-up Cannes text edition of The RebootingLet me know if you're interested in coming to any of The Rebooting's gatherings in CannesHouse partiesIt’s that time of the year when people ask someone who lives in the same city if they want to meet up 3,000 miles away.
Neil Vogel on Google Zero

1 month ago | therebooting.com | Brian Morrissey

The media business is about to enter AI mode. In the latest episode of The Rebooting Show, I speak with Dotdash Meredith CEO Neil Vogel. We spoke during the keynote session earlier this month at the Media Product Forum, which was a collaboration between The Rebooting and WordPress VIP. I appreciate that Neil is a pragmatist who doesn’t waste energy by complaining about our tech overlords. Cross-channel platform exclusively for publishersYou don’t need a huge team or tech stack to market smarter.
Wholesale vs retail

1 month ago | therebooting.com | Brian Morrissey

Welcome back to The Rebooting. This week, I wrote about something I’ve been noodling for a while: The differences between operating a wholesale and retail business. Almost all of my conversations with media operators who are not starting from scratch quickly land on the difficulties of operating the old model while building the new model. I see that happening between wholesale and retail. Be sure to check out our new research done in collaboration with BlueConic.
The messy middle of AI adoption

1 month ago | therebooting.com | Brian Morrissey

In today’s newsletter:New research from The Rebooting and BlueConic finds that publishers are stuck in an ambition-execution gap when it comes to implementing AIA conversation with Dynamo CEO Nicholas Carlson on skipping words on webpages for video on YouTubeReminder: Join us next week for a deep dive into how Recurrent migrated its tech stack without going insaneCross-channel platform exclusively for publishersYou don’t need a huge team or tech stack to market smarter.
The decline and fall of the article page

1 month ago | therebooting.com | Brian Morrissey

Yesterday, we held our second annual Media Product Forum in collaboration with WordPress VIP at Pier 59 in New York City. We convened over 100 product leaders at publishers for an afternoon of discussions that centered on an essential question: What should publishers be building now? More on that answer below. Also, we will be turning the sessions into podcasts that I’ll publish over the next couple weeks.