Disney CEO Discusses Future of Media

"There is more treasure in books than in all the pirate's loot on Treasure Island."
- Walt Disney



Disney CEO Discusses Future of Media
Iger explains lack of response to Hamas TV's Mickey Mouse look-alike
By TODD BISHOP
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/316561_iger22.html

ANAHEIM, Calif. -- The traditional trip to the movies won't be entirely replaced by the Internet, or by new methods of consuming digital media, but the amount of time between theatrical and home release will continue to shrink.

So says Robert Iger, Walt Disney Co. chief executive. Of course, one would expect nothing less than movie-theater bullishness from an executive whose company has large sums riding on the fate of the third "Pirates of the Caribbean" installment, due out later this week.

That was among the subjects addressed by Iger at the Society of American Business Editors and Writers annual conference at the Disneyland Hotel in Anaheim on Monday. Iger fielded a wide range of questions from the audience -- unlike Bill Gates, who created a minor controversy at the same convention in Seattle two years ago when he was interviewed by a selected reporter on stage but declined to take questions from the audience of journalists.

Todd Bishop / P-I

Walt Disney Co. chief executive Robert Iger addresses the Society of American Business Editors and Writers annual conference at the Disneyland Hotel in Anaheim.

Like the Microsoft chairman, however, Iger had plenty to say about the future of media and technology. He also addressed the use of a Mickey Mouse look-alike on Hamas-run television -- saying that Disney was "appalled by the use of our character to disseminate that kind of message," but didn't feel it would have been constructive to respond to it publicly.

Edited excerpts from his comments:


On the growing role of the Internet in entertainment: "This is the first medium, or mass media, that we have seen that enables us to actually get to know who our customers are and, in some form or another, be in direct communication or touch with that customer.

"When people go to a movie theater, we don't know who they are. When they watch TV, it's rare that we know who they are. When they go into a Disney theme park, we get a sense for who they are if they've stayed in one of our hotels, but by and large, we haven't captured their names.
"So we finally have a medium, the Internet, that gives us the ability to deliver entertainment experiences and other experiences in a way that is two-way in nature. We really can have a dialogue with consumers on a global basis who are accessing product that the Disney Co. creates. And we believe that will be a powerful growth engine for this company going forward."

On the future of the movie theater: "I got myself in the headlines a couple years ago by making comments about making DVDs available at the same time that movies were available in movie theaters. What I really meant was I thought that we had to listen to the consumer and make content available more aggressively, which meant that I thought at the time that the window, meaning the time that movies are in theaters, would probably collapse and should collapse.

"I actually believe that the movie-going experience, when you go into a theater with a number of other people and see it on a big screen, is a good experience and an important experience for the business, and I don't think that should go away. And I believe it actually should be protected in a few ways. One, we should all be working as an industry to make the product more compelling, which means everything from digital theaters, digital cinema to just a better movie-going experience.

"But I also believe that the window to when it's available in the next form ought to be maybe a little shorter than it has been in the past, and we've seen some of that compression. It ought to be designed to continue to maintain value for both windows -- for what I'll call the home-video window and for the theatrical window. I don't think we're going to get to a point where everything is available at all times, but you will see, thanks to technology, a lot more available than ever before."

On the use of a Mickey Mouse look-alike on Hamas-run TV: "The (Disney) corporate machinery did not kick in, I think, in a way that you might expect, in a sense that we didn't mobilize our forces and seek to either have the clip taken down or make any broad public statements about it. Instead, a few of us spoke about it and thought about the situation carefully. One thing that was clear was that we weren't going to rail against the theft of our intellectual property. That seemed to be a bit absurd in light of the messaging that was being distributed using that character.

"Secondly, I didn't believe that us making a statement would do anything to either change the direction I guess Hamas was taking or to cause them to do anything differently. We're the Walt Disney Co., we're not a major government. So we simply made a decision that we would not either create or prolong a public discourse on the subject by making a loud public statement. We did speak with a few government officials but did not engage in the campaign to have the clip taken down. ...

"That said, we were appalled by the use of our character to disseminate that kind of message. I think any time any group seeks to exploit children in that manner, it's despicable. But it didn't seem as though it made sense for this company to make any loud public statement on that subject at that time. I just didn't think it would have any effect. I think it should have been obvious how the company felt on the subject."

On the future of digital media copy protections: "I believe that the best way to manage intellectual-property value, or protect it, is to make your product available as broadly as possible. I talk often about well-timed, well-priced to market.

"I think the biggest problem that owners of intellectual property have in today's world, in terms of piracy, is access -- meaning, when access to product on a well-timed, well-priced basis is not available, the technology that is available today enables people to gain access either without paying for it or under illegal circumstances. While I believe in using technology as aggressively as possible to protect -- filtering would be one great example of that -- we're never going to prevent piracy completely. ... Unless we put the product out there well-priced, well-timed, we're not going to ultimately attack piracy in an effective way."

On News Corp.'s bid for Dow Jones, and its potential impact on The Wall Street Journal, the Dow Jones flagship: "I have a lot of respect for News Corp. They are a significant competitor of ours in a number of markets, and I think they are a well-run company, and what I mean by that is not just operationally but, I think, strategically, and I applaud a lot of their efforts. They're not necessarily things that we would do, not because we feel that they're bad business decisions but because they just don't fit into either our own set of assets or our own company strategy."

"I find what Rupert (Murdoch) is doing, or attempting to do, with The Wall Street Journal to be very interesting, both from a business perspective and a consumer perspective. I certainly believe that the notion of creating a global financial news brand that not only occupies more space territorially but more space technologically is a sound one and an interesting one.

"But we're not looking to grow in the global financial news space, so it wasn't something that we would necessarily look at anyway.

"I'm not worried about who owns The Wall Street Journal. I read The Wall Street Journal, both as a consumer and as an executive, and I'm just going to hope that whoever runs The Wall Street Journal, owns it or runs it, is going to do so in a fair and balanced way. And until such time as I see otherwise, I'm not going to lose sleep over it. I'm sticking to our knitting, and if I have worries, which you'd expect anyone in this job would have at some point or another, it's not about that. ...

"But I watch with interest."