I was quoted in two articles last week, both paywalled: 

* “Why Netflix’s New Ad-Supported Tier Could Lead to More Ratings Transparency” by The Wrap’s Brandon Katz

* “With Rings of Power, Amazon Bets a Billion on One Show to Rule Them All” by Bloomberg Businessweek’s Felix Gillette

There is a counterpoint to my essay from two weeks ago that “Amazon’s ‘Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power’ series is shaping up to be a seismic event in streaming”. Quite simply, Amazon's ecosystem isn't built to deliver a global hit with  “The Rings of Power”.

That was the premise of a Business Insider article reporting that Amazon insiders believe the series will make or break the futures of Amazon Studios and Amazon Prime Video ($ - paywalled): 

"The reason why it's going to succeed is because the executives at Amazon need it to succeed. If it doesn't succeed, there's going to be a big question from Andy Jassy and the board," said one former senior Amazon Studios exec. "If we can't take this piece of IP and make it successful, why is Amazon Studios even here?" 

"It has to succeed," this person added. "There's no option."

In my essay I argued that success would be driven by how Amazon’s entire ecosystem is structured so as to be able to put “The Rings of Power” one click away from anyone who may be browsing Amazon.com, watching a Twitch livestream, or logging into their Fire TV.

But what if it isn’t? This anonymous executive is implying that all those conversion funnels and proprietary bells and whistles to drive clicks within Amazon’s global ecosystem may not matter because Amazon cannot connect the dots across all its competitive advantages. 

That, alone, would be significant. But the deeper implication would be that neither a global commerce titan nor the free market can connect the dots to produce a global hit in streaming.