Yeah, there are standards, but necessity is the mother of invention and change.Content is the fuel that powers M&E industry growth. To compete in an ever-evolving and expanding marketplace, writers, producers, directors, and distributors must find ways to differentiate themselves across audiences and markets.

Creativity happens typically without the oversight of laws, regulations, and guidelines. That is unless you live in a country where government officials look over your shoulder (they do exist). For most writers, however, you can write whatever story you want, up to a point.

Have the economy and increased regulation created content's "perfect storm?"Despite optimistic Q2/Q3 reports from studios and platforms and indications of no mid-year budget cuts, a real possibility remains that unless the economy recovers to where revenues are more stable, the next fiscal year could see reduced content budgets and fewer purchased titles.

Culture is the combination of language, music, geography, history, religion, and cuisine that describes people in different world regions. Culture permeates our identity; it is our societal fingerprint.

It's a challenging but manageable process if you know howImagine this scenario. You're a small production company, and you've just spent the last couple of years developing a series you're confident has international reach. Produced in the US in English, the story is an engaging drama, although a little edgy, with serious and comedic moments. The cast includes a broad mix of characters that reflect modern communities. Your lead character is a bisexual woman of color played by an up-and-coming actress who isn't yet a household name. The rest of the characters are a mix of adults, seniors, and children spanning many ages, races, identities, and religions. In each episode, renowned actors and actresses are cast as protagonists to attract viewers. Cultures typically portrayed as "the bad guys" are depicted positively.

Age ratings are coming to a platform you most likely use -- from TikTok rolling out content with a maturity rating system to prevent young audiences from seeing inappropriate videos to content regulators worldwide who have increased the extent to which they examine content for age and cultural appropriateness. We've previously discussed regulators' increased focus on violence , LGTBQIA+ , and cultural issues in film and television. As demonstrated by three announcements this past week, age ratings are making their way onto all types of media platforms.

The media is currently reporting and hypothesizing how a recession could impact the M&E industry. Will it reduce subscriber numbers, jobs, stock prices, and revenues? Who stands to win or lose? These are essential industry questions, but only one deals with the core product the industry creates: content.

Media companies spend a lot of time and money studying and modeling consumer behaviors. It's big business and a critical component of today's media marketplace. Entire companies, platforms with specialized engineering teams, academic researchers, entrepreneurs, and the public attempt to find the Holy Grail of search algorithms that provide the best way to recommend titles, so you don't change the channel.

Spherex and Parrot Analytics released the findings from a first-ever report on the connection between local age ratings, cultural factors and TV show audience demand in key markets worldwide. The ‘Global TV Snapshot’ report analyses the age ratings and cultural content of five popular US-originated TV shows worldwide while considering the audience demand for each show in seven targeted markets.