Netflix’s wins, Meta’s shifts, and Changemakers

Table of Contents:
- Inside Netflix's biggest subscriber jump to date
- How Netflix has scaled globally
- The evolution of streaming bundles
- A look into Meta's big changes
- Balancing brand safety with free speech at Meta
- The state of DEI in 2025
- How Changemakers highlights the women who have defied the odds
- CNBC's new vertical about media, tech, and women in leadership
- How the LA fires are disrupting Hollywood
- Reactions to the Oscar nominations
Transcript:
Netflix’s wins, Meta’s shifts, and Changemakers
BOB SAFIAN: Hey everyone, Bob Safian here. As we work our way through the first official week of the Trump Administration, there is so much change underway: new political and cultural shifts, new business and tech developments. For today’s episode, I’m speaking with someone who is face-to-face with this rapidly changing environment every day, CNBC correspondent Julia Boorstin.
Together, we explore how tech and media are doing right now, focusing on Netflix and on Meta and Mark Zuckerberg. The last time Julia was a guest on this show, we talked about her book, “When Women Lead,” before DEI was quite the lightning rod that it is today. So we explore that a bit as well, along with the impact of the LA fires on Hollywood, her insights about the Oscar nominations, and more. So let’s get to it. I’m Bob Safian, and this is Rapid Response.
[THEME MUSIC]
SAFIAN: I’m Bob Safian, and I’m here with Julia Boorstin, Senior Media and Technology Correspondent for CNBC. Julia, thanks for joining.
JULIA BOORSTIN: Thanks for having me. Always great to see you.
Inside Netflix’s biggest subscriber jump to date
SAFIAN: So there has been a lot going on in tech and media. Maybe there always is, but it feels particularly momentous. Just this week, Netflix reported their biggest subscriber jump ever, bigger than during the pandemic. Now, do they have like Mike Tyson and Jake Paul to thank? Is it Squid Game 2? What’s going on?
BOORSTIN: Yeah, so much news in the tech and media space. And I agree. It seems like there’s never been a bigger spotlight on the tech ecosystem. And we saw all those tech CEOs on the dais with incoming President Trump. But when it comes to Netflix’s earnings, you’re right. This was the biggest quarter ever. And it’s not just because of the Jake Paul-Mike Tyson fight.
I’ve been covering Netflix for, I would say, decades now. And what’s amazing is that this is a company that’s continued to defy expectations and be able to keep growing. They added 20 million subscribers, or 19 million subscribers, more than 10 million more than expected.
They were asked on the call if this is just due to the NFL Christmas Day games or the Mike Tyson-Jake Paul fight. And they said, yes, we did see an increase in subs around those big events, but people stuck around, and it was not due to any one single event.
This is a company that is so global, so massive, and is now spending $18 billion on content this year. It’s really a diverse assortment of content and also local language content that’s allowing this company to succeed across the world, not just in the U.S., but in all these different markets.
And this is the last quarter they’re going to report quarterly subscriber numbers, and they’re certainly going out on a high note.
How Netflix has scaled globally
SAFIAN: Do the numbers indicate anything about the debate over investing in tent-pole properties versus a range of content? I mean, I know the first season of Squid Game was set to earn almost a billion dollars.
BOORSTIN: Netflix is so big, they’re doing a portfolio approach. When you look at the investment in a couple of these football games, $100 million for an NFL game may sound like a lot, but it’s a drop in the bucket if you’re spending $18 billion on content over the course of the year. Netflix is increasingly investing in sports events.
They have the FIFA Women’s World Cup. They have WWE live content. They made a big deal with WWE. And part of that is it’s live programming on Monday nights, but this is just part of the broader strategy for Netflix. A couple of months ago, I attended an event at Netflix showcasing all the international content that’s coming up.
And what’s remarkable is just seeing how every single region that Netflix is operating in has local language content. And what Netflix has been able to do is get people used to watching content with subtitles. And they found that really authentic local language content not only works in that market, but also can carry internationally. And Squid Game is obviously the best example of that.
I do think they will continue to invest in event sports. I wouldn’t be surprised if the NFL puts together a package of international NFL games, and Netflix is the partner on that. They would be a natural partner. But I don’t think it’s about buying NBA rights, which, by the way, are all tied up anyways.
I think it’s more about finding the events that are going to be high profile, but the stuff that people stick around and watch are the seasons and seasons of TV shows and occasionally the $200 million movies that Netflix invests in.
The evolution of streaming bundles
SAFIAN: And so the live sports investment, it’s not necessarily a shot across the bow to Disney, owner of ESPN.
BOORSTIN: Yeah, I think it’s a different strategy. I mean, look, Disney’s business is ESPN. They’re building out the ESPN direct-to-consumer streaming app, which is going to launch before the football season this fall, but what Netflix is doing is very different.
They’re finding the events that are global and that are going to bring in a new audience and also make it the kind of thing people want to stick around for. Netflix owning Christmas Day football is not competition for ESPN being the everything channel for sports.
SAFIAN: Disney started the year by buying a different sports streamer, FuboTV, seemingly to protect this new sports kind of super app with Fox and Warner Brothers Discovery called Venu. I’m not sure how you pronounce it even.
BOORSTIN: Venu was a joint venture between three different media companies. It was threatened in a lawsuit by Fubo, which is a sports-focused streamer. The legal battle ultimately ended up shutting down Venu, and as a part of the settlement with Fubo, Disney struck a joint venture with Fubo to create a partnership there. Venu is done.
It’s over, but Fubo is continuing to persist and now in partnership with Disney. So I think the future is going to have a lot of streaming services that are skinnier bundles. And what’s interesting is Comcast just announced that they’re gonna have a new, just Thursday, new streaming bundle that’s focused on sports and news.
So this is all part of the new rebundling. What’s old is new again. A la carte is, it turns out, not so convenient.
SAFIAN: Wow. You need a scorecard to keep up with it all.
BOORSTIN: Yeah, the bottom line though, linear TV is in decline, and skinnier bundles are on the rise, and they’re still going to be pretty expensive. I mean, Comcast’s Sports and News bundle is $70 if you have Xfinity, $90 if you don’t. And as people sign up for things like Hulu with Live TV or YouTube TV, it’s cheaper than a traditional cable bundle, but not a fraction of the price.
It’s just a little cheaper.
SAFIAN: And I guess this is part of the reason it gives Netflix a little more confidence to say, yeah, we’re going to raise our prices a little bit more.
BOORSTIN: Yeah, so Netflix, along with their record subscriber additions this quarter, announced they’re raising prices, depending on the package. The subscriber growth indicates why they’re raising these prices. If you can add 20 million subscribers after already getting through the crackdown on password sharing, they know that they have pricing power.
Speaking of what’s old is new again, Netflix started off ad-free. Now it’s embracing ads. Everything is really turning into cable TV just over streaming. And Netflix is keeping the ad-supported version of Netflix the lowest price as they want to push people towards watching Netflix with ads so Netflix can get that dual revenue stream.
Just like old-fashioned cable TV.
A look into Meta’s big changes
SAFIAN: I want to turn to a different part of the tech media landscape, Mark Zuckerberg’s moves with Meta. So over the years, Mark has shown a willingness to make these big moves quickly when he feels like the landscape is changing.
Most of which have been hugely successful, moved aggressively from desktop to mobile. He spent big to buy Instagram and WhatsApp. He leaned into generative AI, which got him on the shortlist for Time’s Person of the Year. He spent billions on AR, which is yet to pay off, although maybe the metaverse will arrive at some point.
But lately it feels like he’s made a different sort of shift, not technological per se, but more cultural — this is ending fact-checking across the Meta platforms, started talking about the need for more masculine energy in the workplace, and then announcing these performance-based layoffs on an ongoing basis.
What’s going on?
BOORSTIN: Well, I would say that some of these things aren’t actually a change. Mark Zuckerberg talked about the year of efficiency a couple of years ago, and I think his performance-based layoffs are just an acceleration of that. I would say that those layoffs are simply a continuation of trying to focus on not just efficiency, but productivity.
I think that that’s actually not a departure. It’s an acceleration of something he’s been working on for a while. I also think that he has made this shift to focus on AI and specifically open-source AI. And for a long time, he was all about the metaverse, right? He renamed the company.
But what’s been really interesting is, as he shifted to focus on AI, we’ve actually seen how augmented reality and AI-powered devices like his Meta Ray-Ban glasses are the wave of the future. These Meta Ray-Bans were a huge success, particularly last year and in the holiday season.
And so what’s amazing to see is that his shift to focus on AI is actually in a lot of ways bringing his interest in the metaverse to life by augmenting the way people interact with the world by wearing these glasses. From a company standpoint, Meta is an AI-driven company.
It’s focused on open-source, which really distinguishes it from its rivals, and it’s infusing AI into everything it does, whether it’s AI-powered advertising, AI-powered fact-checking, and now AI that you could talk to whether it’s in your glasses or on one of its platforms with Meta AI.
I think where he has changed is with the political messaging around fact-checking and also around this accusation of censorship. Don’t forget that just a couple of years ago, President Trump said he wanted to jail Mark Zuckerberg because he thought Meta was censoring conservatives.
Among other things, also, Meta removed Trump from its platforms in the wake of January 6th. So I think what Zuckerberg is saying now is we are changing our fact-checking policies. We are expanding the kind of content we’re allowing on our platform to be more permissive of content around political issues, and we are going to be less limiting of that content.
And this is sending a message to the president that he is not trying to censor conservatives and he wants to be as inclusive as possible. Will there be an increase in violent or offensive content on the platform? I think it’s worth noting, as someone who’s been covering this company for a long time, that Meta is an ad-based company. And Mark Zuckerberg is necessarily going to be very careful about how he manages this change and the shift away from third-party fact-checking to this community notes model, in order to make sure he’s protecting his bread and butter, which is advertising revenue.
Balancing brand safety with free speech at Meta
SAFIAN: Right. Those advertisers need an environment that they can trust to be part of, right? He’s got a financial incentive to maintain that.
BOORSTIN: He has a financial imperative to make sure that Meta remains what they call a brand-safe platform.
I just think that Mark Zuckerberg is going to be very, very careful. I’ve reached out to a bunch of advertisers in the wake of this change. And I said, what do you think? Are you worried? Are you concerned that your content, your brand content could be next to violent content, extremist content? What’s the worst-case scenario here? And this news came out around the Consumer Electronics Show, and there were a lot of companies that had a big presence there. I was there talking to a lot of CMOs, and they said it’s too soon to say. It’s too soon to say we’re going to be watching this carefully.
But for now, we have to believe that Zuckerberg is going to be incredibly careful. And perhaps make sure that content that’s coming from big brands as opposed to small advertisers is going to have extra levels of protection.
AI is an incredibly valuable tool to scan for offensive or inappropriate content.
I think in shifting from third-party content moderators to a community notes model here in the U.S., that would indicate a lower cost of that moderation. But if you look at the amount of money that’s going into research and how AI could help supplement or complement the role of humans, I think, no matter what, their costs are going to go down there.
SAFIAN: I mean, it’s as much a business decision. AI can more efficiently do some fact-checking using AI. And at the same time, it’s sort of a political position that allows them to sort of defend himself and Meta with the new administration.
BOORSTIN: I think it is no coincidence that Meta made these announcements in the lead up to the inauguration. And I think perhaps even more important than the shift from third-party fact-checkers to community notes is this announcement that they can be expanding the varieties of content and perhaps controversial content that’s allowed on the platform, and also the decision that they’re going to be focused on pulling down the most offensive content as opposed to things that have sort of minor offense.
So I think that this is all a political message to the Trump administration that Meta does not censor conservatives, that Meta is not interested in being overly cautious about what types of content they’re gonna allow, and they want to show Trump that they really want to work with his administration.
I mean, Mark Zuckerberg also in the early weeks of the year appointed Dana White to his board, who’s a longtime Trump supporter, and all of that sends a clear message to Trump.
SAFIAN: It’s instructive to hear Julia explain how business decisions and political realities interact in this moment, but also how tech pioneers — like Netflix, like Meta — continue to be disruptors in their own right.
Next we get into how different types of leaders and leadership might fare in the evolving business and cultural environment. That’s after the break. Stay with us.
[AD BREAK]
SAFIAN: This is Rapid Response, I’m Bob Safian. Before the break, we heard CNBC media and tech correspondent Julia Boorstin talk about the different streaming strategies of Netflix and Disney, and Meta’s imperative to be a brand-safe platform. Now we talk about Joe Rogan, what Mark Zuckerberg means by “masculine energy,” and how women leaders are continuing to set an agenda that’s worth paying attention to. Let’s jump back in.
The state of DEI in 2025
SAFIAN: So in some ways, the most unexpected or bizarre action from Zuckerberg is that he went on Joe Rogan’s podcast and talked about Meta needing more “masculine energy.” Now, men are by far the majority of the tech workforce, and women in executive roles in tech are still the exception. You were on this show, Rapid Response, previously as a guest to talk about your book, “When Women Lead,” you run the Changemakers program at CNBC, identifying impactful women leaders. So what do you make of these comments by Zuckerberg?
BOORSTIN: Well, you said they were an action, and I would say they were comments, but not an action, because he was commenting to Joe Rogan, who is a sort of notoriously male energy podcast host. But I don’t really know what Mark Zuckerberg means by that. I do know that there’s been this move away from having DEI roles and, sort of, talking about a focus on DEI. And Mark Zuckerberg did change some of the titles of some of the people who were working on DEI at his company. But I don’t really know what he means by that. About 90 percent of all CEOs in the Fortune 500 are men, and about three-quarters of all the C-suite are men. I’m just not really sure what he means by that. So I guess we’ll have to see.
SAFIAN: Yeah, I mean, in some ways, it feels like a slam on corporate DEI overall, showing maybe how much it’s been resented by executives.
BOORSTIN: Yeah. I mean, look, we’ve seen the Trump administration take a really critical approach to DEI, been working to remove it. There’s been a lot of question about sort of what the future of DEI is. I think that the word DEI has sometimes gotten weaponized or confused. And so what’s so funny to hear about is the sort of need to have more masculine energy. One of the numbers that really inspired me to write my book and to dig into the women who had defied the odds is over the course of a decade.
The percent of VC funding that has gone to female leaders has been around 3%. An incredibly small number. And it was my fascination with why that number is so small, especially given the fact that statistically female-founded companies are more likely to be successful.
To outperform, despite having raised less money. I was really curious to understand those odds.
How Changemakers highlights the women who have defied the odds
SAFIAN: Do you feel any different pressure in putting together CNBC’s 2025 Changemaker list in this sort of anti-DEI environment?
BOORSTIN: Well, I would just say what we’re doing with Changemakers really isn’t about DEI. Women are 50 percent of the population. Women make 80 percent of purchasing decisions. I think it’s notable that women are such a huge force in the economy.
They still represent a very small percentage of leaders, both in the C-suite and corporate America. Now, I believe it’s about 11 percent of CEOs of the Fortune 500 are women. If you look at the VC ecosystem, just about 2 percent of those VC dollars this year are going to female founders. But despite those odds, the women who are succeeding are accomplishing amazing things.
And what we’re doing with Changemakers is highlighting the women who have defied those odds and who are driving change, not only in their own companies but across the business landscape.
There are other lists out there that highlight the most powerful women in business. Fortune does an amazing job with its most powerful women’s list. What we’re doing with Changemakers is something different. It’s looking at women who are changing their industries, and this list that we’re putting together now, it’s going to be amazing.
We’re launching the 2025 Changemakers list on February 26th, and then we’re going to have an event celebrating these Changemakers and bringing together women from the list on April 8th here in Los Angeles.
These are women who are really impacting not just their own little ecosystem but driving change about the way people think about leading, whether it’s men or women, and also the way businesses operate.
SAFIAN: I mean, I can see how in this environment people might look at a list like this and say, well, why is it women leaders who are making change? Why isn’t it just leaders who are making change, like, is it a DEI effort to focus on just women?
BOORSTIN: We are a culture that celebrates success despite the odds. We all want to figure out how to be the one in a million who manages to make the impossible happen.
And women who are running successful companies are perfect examples of that. If you’re figuring out how to do geothermal heat in a way that’s far more efficient, then that has lessons that are relevant for everyone.
So I think it’s really just a separate conversation. And one thing that I think is really important in our work at CNBC covering initiatives focused on diversity is: why are companies doing them? I did some stories a couple of years ago about why Salesforce and eBay were both working on projects, not on equal hiring, but on equalizing pay.
And what both of these companies discovered is they didn’t have a traditional pay equity issue. They had a promotion issue. And what they did by digging into the data is they realized that they were promoting men statistically much faster inadvertently.
And so what was so interesting to me about that is a company like Salesforce, which is run by a white man, Mark Benioff, said we’re going to be more successful if we can identify what the gap is in promotions here, understand what we’re doing to accidentally promote men much faster than women.
Why is that? What kind of systems can we put in place to make sure we’re promoting based on merit? There’s been a lot of talk about how to make America more of a meritocracy. Some people think DEI is distracting from that. I believe in the power of data. I’m a business journalist. I’ve been a business journalist since I started my career in 2000, and I believe that the numbers tell the story, and what Salesforce and eBay found when they were working on those initiatives is that they needed a data-driven system for promotion and pay increases.
Do it based on the numbers. And then what they found was they actually end up promoting men and women far more equally. So I believe the best way to have a meritocracy is to go back to the numbers, to look at the numbers, and to strip out people’s personal instincts or bias when it comes to making decisions around pay or promotion and just really look at the data.
And if you look at the data, it indicates that female-led companies tend to outperform.
They tend to take fewer big risks and have higher returns.
CNBC’s new vertical about media, tech, and women in leadership
SAFIAN: Changemakers is part of a new vertical at CNBC that you’re leading centered on media and tech and women in leadership. How much do you think the stories you cover in this vertical are going to be impacted by the new administration?
BOORSTIN: Well, I think that this whole idea of creating a vertical is giving reporters like me an opportunity to go deep on our programming on CNBC. We have live programming throughout the business news day, and we’re focused so much on big public companies and the stocks that are moving, and what we’re doing with these verticals.
And you see a vertical that we’ve been working on for a while in the CNBC sport vertical led by my colleague Alex Sherman. And my colleague Robert Frank who is working on a vertical around wealth. We’re taking these stories and giving an opportunity to tell them off just linear TV. We were talking earlier about Netflix and how the media landscape is moving away from the linear model, and at CNBC we have this great content, and now we’re bringing it so much onto all these platforms, not just CNBC Plus streaming, podcasts, videocasts, and creating content that we’re sharing, whether it’s on YouTube or on Instagram.
And we’re trying to dig deep into the way leaders think about things and the way leaders approach questions, challenges, and problem-solving, and beyond just the day-to-day. I think everyone wants this economy to be successful.
And so I think there’s hope right now that this will be another administration where businesses can continue to grow.
How the LA fires are disrupting Hollywood
SAFIAN: Well, I have to ask you about this. You’re based in Los Angeles where fires have disrupted everything. I know you and your family had to evacuate for a little while, though you’re back safely and watching things warily. Oscar nominations were delayed. Finally out now, has Hollywood seen other disruptions?
BOORSTIN: Hollywood has seen its share of disruptions. Obviously, the COVID pandemic brought not just production to a halt, but theatrical movie-going to a halt for quite some time. And then we had the Hollywood strikes, which stopped all production: the actors and writers strikes.
So this latest blow to Hollywood is coming at a time when this industry has already suffered so much. The actual impact on production has been relatively minimal in part because of where the fires were and are, that they didn’t actually impact any of the studios themselves.
The Hollywood community has been greatly impacted. Altadena and the Pacific Palisades are two neighborhoods that have very high concentrations of people who work in the industry.
A lot of these people have lost their homes or are still displaced. So I think there is a lot of concern and distraction right now in the industry. But it’s notable that the actual shooting of projects has not been that impacted. And that’s in part because a lot of production has moved out of California.
We saw that last year was the lowest amount of production in the LA area, with the exception of 2020, in many, many years. And this is something that Governor Gavin Newsom is trying to counter with a new $750 million production tax credit that’s in the works. I would expect to see a big push to bring production back to California to support these jobs here and to make sure there isn’t a brain drain.
Reactions to the Oscar nominations
SAFIAN: On a more upbeat note, do you have any reactions to the Oscar nominations?
BOORSTIN: Well, this is the year that Netflix, I think, has its best shot of winning a Best Picture. Netflix was the underdog for a while when it came to the Oscars, having been nominated for Best Picture a number of times. But this year, Netflix has more nominations for its “Emilia Pérez” movie, 13 nominations for that movie, more than any other movie nominated this year.
It’ll be interesting to see how that actually plays out when it comes to Oscar wins. Traditionally, Academy voters have given Netflix a lot of nominations, but not as many wins as the traditional studios.
SAFIAN: Well, thank you again for doing this, Julia. I hope you stay clear of any smoke and fires as things proceed there. And we’ll look forward to Changemakers coming out in February.
BOORSTIN: Yeah. Look out for our Changemakers list, February 27th, and then we have our second Changemaker Summit, April 8th in Los Angeles.
SAFIAN: Julia’s interest in how leaders seek outcomes that lift up the economy as a whole is encouraging, and her point about using data to better understand and improve our decisions is spot on. She doesn’t have a crystal ball when it comes to how the new administration will impact business in 2025, but none of us do! We all just have to stay flexible for whatever rapid responses are required ahead. I’m Bob Safian. Thanks for listening.