Production Now: Inside the New Content Economy

Is media and entertainment facing a crisis, or entering a new golden age? DPP Founder and Chief Content Officer Mark Harrison's reflections on the DPP Production Event, hosted at UTA in Los Angeles in August 2026, examined how technology innovation, layered business models, and human creativity are reshaping the modern media supply chain.Mark's commentary, first presented in written form on the DPP website, is shared here on the DPP podcast as an audio essay.

At the DPP Production Now event in Los Angeles, hosted at UTA in Beverly Hills, the DPP brought together leaders from across the production ecosystem: both major talent agencies and established studios, but also AI innovators and creators. In this episode, Mark Harrison speaks with participants at the event, reflecting on a rapid shift in production and the content economy: from defensive cost-cutting and anxiety about AI to a more confident focus on opportunity, artistry, and growth.Show NotesDPP Founder and Chief Content Officer, Mark Harrison, speaks with:Eric Iverson, UTA | Partner & Chief Technology Officer [6min 05sec]Seth Hallen, Hallstone Ventures | Founder & Managing Partner [12min 23]Ebru Yildirim Gul, Ollang | Founder & CEO [18min 56sec]Melissa Harper, NBCUniversal | EVP, Production Management & Operations, TV & Streaming [23min 05sec]

What if your AI understood mood, story arcs, and emotional beats – not just "woman, bus, street"?In this episode of the DPP Podcast, Vionlabs CEO Arash Pendari joins DPP Editorial Director Edward Qualtrough to share his views on how domain-specific, multimodal AI can turn content libraries into genuine content intelligence. Arash outlines some real‑world use cases: microdramas built from telenovelas, resurrected archives, smarter discovery, and creative teams who now brief AI instead of agencies.Arash discusses the future of metadata, the limits of generic AI models, and why success with AI depends as much on change management and creative control as it does on model performance. The episode also features a 60‑second "speed pitch" from Vionlabs VP of Sales Viktor Carlsson, recorded live at the DPP Media Supply Festival in New York, setting the scene for how AI‑native content intelligence is already being deployed in media businesses today.

What does "premium" really mean when YouTubers fill cinemas, box office is just 5% of the content economy, and audiences decide what really has value? Recorded at a recent DPP event held at the British Consulate General in Los Angeles, we brought together studio leaders, creator economy pioneers, and industry vendors to explore what premium storytelling really means from the audience's point of view.Show NotesIn this episode of the podcast, DPP Founder and Chief Content Officer, Mark Harrison, speaks with:Paul Rennie OBE, British Consul General, Los Angeles [4min 20sec]Noelle Green, North Road Company and Chernin Entertainment | EVP/Head of Production [8min 09sec]Michelle Huynh, Fox Entertainment |EVP Studio Content Operations [9min 27sec]Sophie Taitt, Taitt Media | Founder [13min 06sec]Chris Saito, Vubiquity | Chief Commercial Officer [20min 16sec]Richard Fish, Eikon Group | Chief Operating Officer [21min 53sec]Sarah Macfarlane, DPP | Producer [27min 35sec]Join experts from across the industry to explore how new business models are reshaping the media economy at the DPP Production Now event in Los Angeles on Thursday 13 August 2026.

New York is buzzing: World Cup soccer, the NBA Finals, and the DPP Media Supply Festival 2026 are in town. In this special episode recorded at the event, Mark Harrison speaks with leaders from AMC Networks, Thomson Reuters and SDVI — as well as DPP CEO Rowan de Pomerai — to explore AI tools in the newsroom, measuring real supply chain transformation, and what it really means to be entering the Age of Agentic Engineering.Show NotesDPP Founder and Chief Content Officer Mark Harrison speaks with:Christina Barlowe-Villano, AMC Networks — SVP, Global Agile Business and Technology Transformation [2min 53sec]Ditha Kolkar, Thomson Reuters — Director of Engineering [8min 57sec]Simon Eldridge, SDVI — Chief Operating Officer [14min 34sec]Rowan de Pomerai, DPP — CEO [23min 02sec]

Not many people get invited to talk about media at the Vatican one day and digital transformation in Amsterdam the next. But that's exactly what happened to DPP Founder and Chief Content Officer Mark Harrison.In this episode of the DPP Podcast, Mark shares a selection of vignettes from his audio diary. These were recorded during his trip to Rome for the Vatican media arm's Dicastery for Communication conference, and in Amsterdam at the Fonn User Summit, to explore three big questions:What really drives trust between audiences and media brands?Why has 'digital transformation' delivered so little genuine change?And how does content still stand out when AI can create infinite amounts of pretty much anything?Drawing on the DPP's custom consumer data, international trust research, as well as the latest (and indeed significantly less recent…) DPP insight initiatives, Mark argues that the winners in the next wave of disruption won’t be the most "transformed" companies — but the ones that create content that is transparent, trustworthy, and truly for its audience.

Recorded at the SDVI Media Supply Chain Council in London in May 2026, SDVI Chief Marketing Officer Geoff Stedman sits down with the DPP Podcast to explore how broadcasters and media companies are really using AI in their supply chains, why the focus has shifted from cost-for-value to speed-to-value, and what that means for FinOps, metadata, QC, and cloud migration. Geoff also weighs in on the renewed build vs buy debate in an era of AI-assisted coding and rapidly evolving operating models, all topics which will be debated at the upcoming DPP Media Supply Festival 2026 in New York.Show NotesDPP Editorial Director Edward Qualtrough speaks with:Geoff Stedman, SDVI — Chief Marketing OfficerDPP Media Supply Festival 2026 programme and registration information is here.

In this episode of the DPP Podcast we digest some of the major themes that were discussed by the industry leaders who developed the DPP 2026 Predictions, and we ask what it really means for the media industry that 'Agentic AI will make hyperpersonalisation a reality'.Hear from Caroline Cardozo, VP, Global Head of Product at Vizrt, about why "good enough" quality is both a threat and a huge opportunity, how agentic AI could power one‑to‑one experiences across media, and why 'cloud vs on‑prem' is giving way to a more pragmatic hybrid mindset.And Ayush Chaturvedi from Comcast Technology Solutions shares his views on where the real innovation is happening — in business models, not just technology. Ayush explores how shifting consumer behaviour, ad tiers, consolidation, and AI‑driven localisation are reshaping TV and streaming in Europe and North America, and what it will take for providers to compete with the scale of global platforms.Show NotesDPP Editorial Director Edward Qualtrough speaks with:Caroline Cardozo, Vizrt — VP, Global Head of Product [1min 42sec]Ayush Chaturvedi, CTS — Director - Global Solution Architecture [17min 48sec]The DPP 2026 Predictions report is available here.

NVIDIA's Anaïs Hayes and Jamie Allan speak with the DPP's Rowan de Pomerai and Mark Harrison, in London and Las Vegas respectively, to explore the three waves of AI reshaping media and entertainment: cost reduction, revenue growth, and experience transformation.Anaïs explains how AI has moved from isolated experiments to being embedded across the production lifecycle, from virtual sets and open source physics engines to localisation and creative tools that democratise who gets to tell stories. And from the show floor at CES 2026, Jamie shifts the focus to AI's physical and real‑time future — from embodied AI and robotics to live media experiences.Show NotesDPP CEO Rowan de Pomerai, and DPP Founder and Chief Content Officer Mark Harrison, speak with NVIDIA's:Anaïs Hayes, Senior Director: Media & Entertainment, EMEAJamie Allan, Director, AdTech & Digital Marketing IndustriesThis episode of the DPP Podcast is sponsored by NVIDIA.

As Las Vegas fills with 150,000 visitors for CES 2026, DPP Founder Mark Harrison walks the halls as part of his research for the DPP Tech Trends 2026 report. And on his 17th visit to CES he asks if anything taking place in early January in Las Vegas really matters for the media and entertainment industry?From industrial robot demos and buzzing health-tech halls to the notable no-shows of some major global tech players on the exhibition floor, Mark's audio diary from CES 2026 tracks how "physical AI", specialist tech and the maker economy are quietly reshaping what really matters for media and entertainment.Mark also speaks with Akamai CTO Bobby Blumofe. Together they explore how AI-powered search is rewriting the web, why "agentic" interfaces could replace 30 years of pages and menus, and how physical AI and robotics are stealing the spotlight while consumer and creative AI quietly become table stakes.Show NotesDPP Founder and Chief Content Officer, Mark Harrison's audio diary from CES 2026, and conversation with:Bobby Blumofe, Akamai — CTO [6min 01sec]