Can Hollywood Escape an Oligopoly Outcome?

A decentralized future for entertainment

Last time I outlined how streaming platforms are evolving toward super apps that will likely combine content, community, and commerce. But what if there's another path forward—one that distributes power rather than concentrates it? I have touched on this before but this seemed like a good time to revisit this as an alternate to the superapp oligopoly outcome.

When Bigger Isn't Better

The super app oligopoly model assumes that scale conveys benefits and wins. This thinking has dominated media for decades, and it tends to be true. But I would note that nothing lasts as long as people think it will. The brief dominance of Blockbuster and Wal-Mart, even of Comcast, all had their day but we did move on.

Open systems have historically often outcompeted closed systems. The internet defeated AOL. Android (built on open-source Linux) dominates iOS globally. WordPress powers 43% of all websites. When platforms become too extractive or controlling, sometimes alternatives become attractive.

The Problem with Centralized Development

Big, centralized media systems have inherent creative limitations. Development executives are, today, incentivized to avoid risk and seek social consensus, which usually leads to less risky and more mediocre outcomes. A pilot that 30% of viewers might rate a "10" but 70% might give a "3" can often be exactly the kind that breaks new ground—but these "rule breakers" often won’t survive a social consensus development process. Think about how Game of Thrones and Squid Game kicked around for years before getting made. How many potential masterpieces never make it at all?

Remember, we saw a massive decline in new, original American fictional TV series after 2017. There are a few reasons for this, but I would argue that consolidation is one major reason.

The best recent content has often come from creators operating with relative autonomy: Parasite, White Lotus, Everything Everywhere, Curb Your Enthusiasm. These creators aren't conforming to development systems. As I understand it, in each case they enjoyed a lot of independence.

What if there was a Hollywood in a parallel universe that was more like a commercialized BitTorrent (i.e. BitTorrent — but you have to subscribe to it)? You can put wherever you want on BitTorrent. In our commercialized version, you could choose to charge something and Bittorrent would enforce that price and take a small portion of your transaction. BitTorrent is a technology, like email or html. So this would be like if we didn’t have Spotify, but we had stuck with LimeWire (but a commercialized version).

Currently Netflix has ~$25B in annual cash flow, which dominates the entire industry. Its market cap of ~$400B reflects the market’s expectation that (a) Netflix will be able to preserve its dominant position, and (b), in overwhelming the total market cap of all other studios, it reflects the centrality of Netflix within the industry. One could imagine a world where this platform part of the value chain acts as a utility and only takes in as much as it needs, in which case the $400B in surplus is distributed to the many studios, entrepreneurs and creators who supply it. So instead of decision making being concentrated in one office, as in a “queen bee” model with one queen and many drones, it’s the opposite; it is what you might call a “human model” where many people are separately making their own important decisions that yield new creations and profits (or not as the case may be).

I think the human or distributed model would yield better creative outcomes and would distribute wealth in a more attractive way. And I think the customer experience would be about the same for people.

A Decentralized Vision

Imagine a three-part system that separates the infrastructure from the user experience and financing:

1. Basecamp (Content Protocol): This is our back end in the sky. It handles storage, streaming (through a decentralized content delivery network), encoding, transactions, etc. So this is an open-source protocol that handles video storage and distribution on decentralized networks. Content owners upload directly, and enter into an agreement including a transparent revenue-sharing formula enforced by smart contracts. Governance tokens give stakeholders voting rights over platform policies.

2. A1 (User Interface): A sleek front-end application built on top of Basecamp. This provides everything customers see — the recommendation algorithms, user experience, and discovery or social features. If A1 becomes too controlling or tries to suck too much money out of the system (seeking “rents”), anyone is allowed to build their own A1 (A2) on top of Basecamp.

3. Dealflow (Financing Marketplace): This is where you get your “green light” and your financing. This is a decentralized platform where creators can secure funding directly from studios, investors and/or fans. Projects range from indie films to ongoing series, with transparent performance metrics and various investment structures. This means you don’t have to ask anyone to make your movie. You don’t have to send them a holiday card or invite them to lunch. Your financiers are hundreds of interested punters probably larping as frogs on the internet. The major advantages here would be that creators would get more control and upside.

Nothing about this is fantasy. The technical components already exist. Livepeer provides decentralized video infrastructure. Smart contract platforms enable transparent revenue distribution every day. Token-based governance systems are operating successfully in various domains.

Super App Features Without Super App Control

An open-source ecosystem can incorporate virtually all the features we discussed for super apps—social interaction, commerce, gaming elements, personalization—without centralizing control.

Imagine community features that travel with content across different front-ends. AI companions that creators design for their own shows. Merchandising opportunities where creators keep the majority of revenue. All of this is technically possible in a decentralized architecture. The platform is just a sort of farmer’s market.

The difference? Value and control flow primarily to creators and users rather than platform owners. Features serve the content experience rather than trapping users in a single corporate ecosystem.

The Cold Start Problem

The biggest question: how does a decentralized system overcome the chicken-and-egg problem? If we launched this tomorrow, it would have o content and therefore no users. How do we get from there to 1,000 customers to 1,000,000 customers?

Here's one plausible path:

1. Start with underserved markets: Focus on content categories and audience segments currently neglected by major streamers. Maybe comedy?

2. Secure anchor content: Partner with 2-3 established studios or producers willing to experiment with this model, providing credibility and initial quality content. I imagine this would be possible.

3. Target creator dissatisfaction: Actively recruit showrunners, directors, and producers frustrated with the creative restrictions and economics of traditional platforms. (And once creators see their peers doing well, they will want to do well, too.)

From there it actually should build up its own momentum and flywheel.

Success doesn't require stealing Netflix's entire audience. If Basecamp+A1 captured 1% and then 10% of the global streaming market with a more creator-friendly model, it would represent a massive shift and I’m not sure why the momentum would ever stop.

Is There Enough Capital Out There?

This approach requires a fundamental shift in how entertainment is financed, raising the important question: is there enough capital out there willing to flow through a marketplace like Dealflow?

This is not strictly required. You could retain a system where studios finance and greenlight shows. But i think it would be even better if creators could manage that themselves.

There is no way to know about the capital. But i think it is credible that the maximum amount of accessible capital would be sufficient. If the projects as a whole are offering good returns, then theoretically why wouldn’t it be? Global capital is always seeking alternative categories that aren’t necessarily correlated to the markets and we have seen a lot of money run through the (much less regulated and more speculative) NFT markets.

The traditional film financing system is notoriously inefficient and opaque. A more transparent marketplace could potentially unlock billions in previously inaccessible capital by reducing friction, improving information symmetry, and enabling smaller minimum investments.

Why Blockchain? Preventing Another Monopoly

The fundamental reason for building this on blockchain technology is simple but powerful: to prevent the emergence of yet another rent-seeking monopolist.

The history of media platforms follows a predictable pattern:

1. Platform launches with creator-friendly terms to attract content

2. Platform achieves critical mass and network effects

3. Platform gradually increases its take rate and control over creators

4. Creators become dependent with few alternatives

Even platforms that begin with good intentions inevitably face shareholder pressure to extract more value once they achieve dominance.

Blockchain fundamentally breaks this cycle by encoding the rules of engagement into the protocol itself, where no single entity can unilaterally change them. The revenue split between creators, infrastructure providers, and other stakeholders is transparent and requires broad consensus to modify.

When content owners participate in Basecamp, they're not helping create another aspiring oligopolist that will one day use its market power against them. They're contributing to infrastructure that they collectively govern.

This isn't about using blockchain for its own sake. It's about using the right technology to ensure that the next generation of entertainment platforms remains structurally aligned with creator interests.

Traditional technology could create a more open platform today, but it would lack structural guarantees against future capture. Blockchain provides those guarantees.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

While the technical foundations for this vision exist today, practical implementation would require optimizing for security, transaction speed, and cost efficiency. Several Layer 1 and Layer 2 solutions are already demonstrating the necessary performance characteristics, with transaction costs falling to fractions of a cent and confirmation times measured in seconds rather than minutes.

So Who Wins — Who's At The Polo Lounge in 2032?

Rather than one insufferable tyrant nibbling all the cheese toasts because after the merger of Amazon and Iqiyi his network is the biggest network in the universe, power becomes distributed.

The next hit series might be backed by thousands of investors worldwide, with creators maintaining creative control. The platform it streams on might be governed by a mix of creators, fans, and operators through token-based voting.

The new "martinis at the Grill" will be a wallet ping silently recorded on some validator node running Ubuntu, flipping some bits before packaging them into the next block. Revenues divided by smart contract and sent to DAOs, then wallets in Dubai, Singapore, Dublin, Memphis...

In Hollywood, only the real estate is forever—and the illusions. Power is always more temporary than people imagine. Technology is once again offering us a choice about how entertainment is financed, produced, and distributed.

The oligopolistic super app world isn't inevitable. It's just the most likely possible future. The decentralized alternative would create a more vibrant, creator-friendly ecosystem—one where power resides with the many not the few.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

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Roy Price was an executive at Amazon.com for 13 years, where he founded Amazon Video and Studios. He developed 16 patented technologies. His shows have won 14 Best Series Emmys and Globes. He was formerly at McKinsey & Co. and The Walt Disney Co. He graduated from Harvard College in 1989.