The Sideletters

Can a film change the world and make business sense? This week on The Sideletters, Joanna Szymanska and Fabian Massah talk with Sarah Mosses, founder and CEO of Together Films, about impact producing.

Sara explains her “3 Rs” framework(Reach, Revenue and Reaction), her CAST audience model(Commercial, Affected, Supportive and Tactical audiences), why independent producers should pitch issue funders, not just film funders, and her new release-planning tool, impactdistribution.io, which she describes as “the operating system for independent film”

Before the interview, Joanna Szymanska and Fabian Massah cover two big stories:

Elon Musk’s reported $1 billion investment in Skydance, the company now bringing Paramount, Warner Bros., HBO, CNN and CBS under one roof. What does more media concentration mean for creative independence and for European producers?

Public broadcasters teaming up with YouTube. RTL’s Alarm für Cobra 11 reached 30 million views on YouTube, and the BBC is making YouTube-first originals. Is YouTube a threat or a new audience channel? And should platforms help finance production when the AVMS Directive is reviewed next year?

Links:

🔗 impactdistribution.io

🔗 Together Films

🔗 BBC Joining Forces With YouTube (Deadline)

🔗 Elon Musk investing in Skydance (The Hollywood Reporter)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

In this episode of The Sideletters, Joanna Szymańska (Warsaw) and Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris) cover the week’s biggest topics in European film financing and the creative industries:

🇪🇺 AgoraEU budget cut. The Irish Council presidency has proposed cutting the EU’s next culture and media programme by almost 30%, from about €8.6 billion to around €6 billion for 2028–2034. Why cultural sovereignty is a security issue, and why you should write to your MEP now.

🇮🇹 MIA Market Rome. The new European Investment Hub, and a €100 million direct-lending fund to ease cash-flow problems for productions in Italy. Is private capital the missing piece? And how can producers take the money without giving up their IP?

🎬 Trouble in paradise at Netflix. Record profits, layoffs, a lower ad forecast, and a new Chief Content Officer: Peter Rice replaces Bela Bajaria. What European producers can learn about diversifying buyers, keeping rights and the value of strong EU regulation.

🌍 El Gouna Film Festival. A new fund and mentorship programme for filmmakers forced to leave their countries, and why Arab cinema is one of the most exciting places in the industry right now.

Links:

🔗 AgoraEU Petition

🔗 Netflix Layoffs

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

Québec is one of the busiest film and TV production hubs in the world. Hollywood blockbusters, high-end series and world-class VFX all happen there, and foreign productions now account for more than half of the province’s screen business. So what happens when Washington wants those shoots back? And what’s in it for European producers?

In this episode of The Sideletters, Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine and Fabian Massah talk with Stéphane Cardin, CEO of the Quebec Film and Television Council (QFTC), which turns 20 this year.

Links:

🔗 Quebec Film & Television Council

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

In this episode, Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine and Fabian Massah discuss:

The Paramount-Warner merger: More releases, fewer decision-makers. Does consolidation help or hurt European films? Plus a look at the box-office flop of Tom Cruise's Digger.

Neon's open-source horror film: The studio plans an anthology based on the community-written SCP Foundation universe under a Creative Commons license. Is this a new way to source IP, and how do you split profits among thousands of writers?

Who gets credit and profit? A lawsuit around the $500M hit Obsession raises a question every co-producer knows: how do you fairly measure a producer's contribution?

Too many movies, or too few? Releases are up, many films around, and buyers say there is nothing to buy. Is the real problem curation?

Explorer Konferenz Hamburg: Takeaways on laughter, human connection and independence in the industry.

Links:

🔗 Are there too many movies in the market? (IndieWire)

🔗 NEON’s open source horror project based on SCP Community

🔗 Producers credits (The Hollywood Reporter)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

Two films based on the same Polish classic, released within weeks of each other. Is that a risk or an opportunity? And what does an Oscar campaign for Best International Feature really cost?

Producers Joanna Szymańska and Fabian Massah look at two hot topics for the European film industry.

​Poland's "Barbenheimer" moment:Lalka (The Doll)The 1890 novel Lalka is back with two very different adaptations. Netflix released a bold, modern reinterpretation. A €15-18 million feature film, the most expensive Polish film ever, follows a classic approach. We discuss:

Why two versions of the same IP can help each other instead of "cannibalizing" one another

What an Oscar campaign really costs, from publicists to screenings in Los Angeles

The dilemma for producers without a US distributor

Links:

🔗 International Feature Academy Award entries (Cineuropa)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

The Paramount-Warner merger is settled, and David Ellison got his way. In this episode of The Sideletters, Joanna Szymanska and Fabian Massah look at what the deal means for Europe's film and TV industry.

The EU regulated distribution, but not commissioning. With fewer buyers and SkyShowtime possibly winding down, European producers lose another financing partner. Fabian and Joanna discuss Europe's dependence on US money, rising pressure on public funds, how that moment is an opportunity to incentivise other financing sources such as private equity. They cover what Europe could do about it, from tax incentives and investment obligations to transnational co-development funds.

In this episode:

The Paramount-Warner settlement and why the definition of a "blockbuster" matters

SkyShowtime's possible exit and what one less player means for Central and Eastern Europe

Public funds, public broadcasters and how to attract private investment

Why culture is missing from von der Leyen's State of the Union

Could Chinese streamers and distributors step into the gap?

The MEDIA Mini Slate deadline crash and shrinking access to soft money

Joanna's premiere of "Time That Never Came" at the Polish Film Festival in Gdynia

Links:

🔗 Paramount-Warner Merger (IndieWire)

🔗 SkyShowtime Closing Down (Reuters)

🔗 EU State of the Union (PDF)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

Only 1 of ~20 Venice competition films was directed by a woman. And she won the Golden Lion. Joanna Szymanska, Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine and Fabian Massah break down the numbers and the backlash.

Woman Unknown, directed by Denmark's May el-Toukhy, just won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, the only woman-directed film in a competition of roughly 20 titles. Under jury president Maggie Gyllenhaal, the win reignited a familiar controversial question: did she win becausebeing the only woman in the room?

The Sideletters unpack what the Golden Lion controversy actually reveals about festival curation, pulling real numbers from Cannes, Berlinale and Venice's last few competition years to ask: is this a talent gap, a submissions gap, or a gatekeeping problem?

Also on the table: the improbable box-office comeback of Coyote vs. Acme, the finished Warner Bros. film that was shelved for a $30M tax write-off in 2023, rescued by indie distributor Ketchup Entertainment, and partly funded by Legion M, a community-equity fund whose investor shares reportedly sold out in 48 hours. Is this the start of a new "protest ticket" economy, where audiences vote with their wallets? And can it be replicated?

Links:

🔗 Coyote vs. Acme (IndieWire)

🔗 Coyote vs. Acme (Letterboxd)

🔗 Venice Awards (Variety)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

This week Joanna and Fabian discuss: An extremist party just won big in Germany’s Saxony-Anhalt region, and public broadcasters are already bracing for what comes next. The US is fast-tracking a national film tax incentive that could stack up to 60% with state rebates. And France and Korea used the Lumière Summit in the south of France to put audiovisual culture on the geopolitical agenda.

Then Jennifer sits down with Malika Rabahallah, Director of Filmfest Hamburg (opening September 24), who has worked all three sides of the industry: producer, public funding commissioner, and now festival chief. She talks about:

Programming a festival with no checklist and no theme. 
Why Filmfest Hamburg built a free-admission day for the whole city. 
What she's actually looking for on the market circuit (and why films are too long).
Her case for more hope on screen: "Pessimism is a privilege".
This year's line-up, including Helen Mirren receiving the festival's Douglas Sirk Award, a Barbie production-design masterclass, and a growing industry program built around the Explorer Konferenz that also hosts French filmmaking masters Éric Toledano and Olivier Nakache

Links:

🔗 Lumière Summit (Variety)

🔗 Tax Incentives (PDF of Deloitte Report, German language)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

This week on The Sideletters, hosts Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine, Fabian Massah and Joanna Szymanska tackle the question every producer wants answered: what actually makes film and TV attractive to private capital?

Sparked by Screen Scotland's new "Lights Camera Capital" initiative, pairing local producers with angel investors, the team digs into why equity money is suddenly flowing into an industry that's leaned on subsidies and pre-sales for decades. They unpack why vertical drama has become the hottest ticket for investors, how data access is de-risking the business for capital, and why producers may finally be learning to speak the investors' language, including a first look at how vertical drama's budget splits (development, production, marketing) are rewriting the producer's role.

Plus: Meta's record $18 billion settlement with 48 US states over child-addictive platform design. The hosts break down the new safety measures (screen-time limits, night mode, no notifications during school hours), ask whether this is the US finally catching up with Europe's Digital Services Act, and what it could mean for marketing family entertainment.

Links:

Meta settlement: Wall Street Journal

Screen Scotland: Screen Daily

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

Joanna Szymanska and Fabian Massah recap the standout moments from Sarajevo CineLink, including Celine Sciamma's Sister Sister Initiative, preview Oct. 1st Explorer Konferenz at the FilmFest Hamburg Industry Days, and sit down with Everbright Everready, founder of Tanzanian startup Bright and Ready Labs and winner of this year's EFM Startup Award.

Everbright walks us through Open Air Fest, her open-air cinema venture in Dar es Salaam that legalizes and monetizes East Africa's amazing VJ (video jockey) culture. We dig into her business model: mobile-money ticketing, revenue-sharing with filmmakers and VJs, brand sponsorships, and how she's building a loyal community from scratch with almost no starting capital.

Links:

🔗 Sister Sister (Cineuropa)

🔗 Bright & Ready Labs (Instagram)

🔗 Explorer Konferenz

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

Joanna Szymanska sits down live at CineLink Industry Days with Maša Marković, Head of Industry at the Sarajevo Film Festival. They dig into how CineLink builds a 20-year talent pipeline from film school to Cannes and back, why the industry needs better success metrics than box office numbers, the rise of microdramas as a format for public broadcasters, and why Southeast Europe's film industry might be "under-distributed" rather than oversaturated.
But before that:
Germany's biggest film funding schemes just ran dry, months earlier than expected. Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine and Fabian Massah unpack why the DFFF and GMPF incentives have already hit their cap, what it means for producers, crews and suppliers across the German film industry, and how France's "automatic funding" model offers a more predictable alternative.

And a discussion inspired by the Locarno Film Festival’s panel which asked whether classic film critics can still compete for attention against influencers and user-generated reviews - and why independent criticism still matters for how audiences discover films.

Links:

🔗 Acquired podcast Disney

🔗 Cinelink Magazine

🔗 Locarno’s Panel “A World WIthout Film Critics”

🔗 Germany’s Production Incentive at its limit (The Spot / German language)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

Everyone's saying "cinema is back". But is it? In this episode of The Sideletters, Joanna Szymanska and Fabian Massah dig behind the headlines to find out what's really happening at the box office.

We open with a wrap-up on the Wim Wenders–Nastassja Kinski controversy, now resolved with a joint statement and an apology, before turning to the never-ending Warner Bros.–Paramount merger drama, complete with daily penalty fees running into the hundreds of millions and a trial now pushed to 2027. 

We also unpack the EU AI Act's new transparency rules, which came into force this August, and what they actually mean for filmmakers, podcasters, and anyone generating content with AI.

Then it's the big topic: Spider-Man: Brand New Day and The Odyssey have pushed box office numbers to record highs, but ticket sales are still far below 2019 levels. We break down what's driving the "recovery": premium formats, a re-release boom, and a growing gap for mid-budget films. And we ask what this means for producers, marketing budgets, and the future of European cinema.

Links:

🔗 The Governance of Competitiveness in the European Film Industry (publication)  https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-032-14889-6_1

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

It's summer. This week we want to give you a one of our earlier episodes which is already a classic. We'll be back next week with a new recording. Enjoy!

In Episode #005 of The Sideletters, Joanna and Jennifer have a conversation with Kristina Trapp, CEO of EAVE(European Audiovisual Entrepreneurs), on 35 years of training international producers and why success isn't just about money. How EAVE's Impact Think Tank imagines a better industry through equity, inclusion, and social responsibility. Plus: an exclusive outlook on upcoming workshops, Creative Europe MEDIA's critical role, and why producers in war-torn countries without funding inspire her most.

Trapp's message: "You are not only working in this industry, you are the industry. You are agents of change."

Also in this episode:

Fabian's deep dive on the Great Consolidation (Paramount-Warner Bros, Showmax shutdown, Banijay-All3Media merger) and what previous consolidation eras teach independent producers about positioning for what comes after.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg)

→ EAVE

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on ⁠LinkedIn⁠.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Fabian Massah sits down with Nairobi-based producer and entrepreneur Osoo Omondi. Ahead of the release of his groundbreaking book, "Film Business in Africa", Osoo challenges the outdated perceptions of the African market and explains why African stories are the ultimate unexploited, renewable resource in the global industry.

We explore the urgent need to build an architecture for local IP ownership and unpack the diverse regional markets across the continent, from the entrepreneurial engine of Nollywood to the technical infrastructure of East Africa to the regulatory frameworks in South Africa. Osoo also breaks down the "poverty porn trap" of NGO-funded cinema, reframes piracy as distorted market intelligence, and discusses how AI intersects with data ownership and cultural preservation.

Links:

🔗  Osoo Omondi (LinkedIn)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

In this episode, Joanna Szymanska and Fabian Massah explore:

• Netflix's "What We Watched" Report (H1 2026): A deep dive into the latest engagement numbers. With more choices leading to "comfort food" viewing, has Netflix lost its curatorial edge? We discuss the platform's evolving DNA, the decline of the middle ground, and how Apple TV+ and Prime Video are stepping up to compete.

• Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey: The massive summer blockbuster is out and breaking box office records. We share our spoiler-free thoughts, discuss the eventification of cinema, and spark a debate: Could this film be a frontrunner for the European Film Awards?

• Gender Parity in the Film Industry: Despite the "50/50 by 2020" movement, recent data shows a concerning backward trend for female directors, particularly in high-budget categories. We are joined by special guest Lisa Herbert (Producer at JUNA Film and board member of WIFT Germany) to break down the systemic blockages, harmful stereotypes, and why giving women the reins on bigger budgets isn't just equitable, it’s better for business.

Links:

🔗  WIFT Germany

🔗  WIFT International

🔗  What We Watched 1H 2026 (Netflix)

🔗  What We Watched 1H 2025 (Netflix)

🔗  Podcast on The Odyssey (NYT)

🔗  Who Owns The Odyssey? (New Yorker)

🔗  Krnov 70mm Film Festival

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

This week, Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine and Fabian Massah break down the latest shifts in the audiovisual industry.

EAVE's New Era: Jennifer discusses her exciting new role taking over as Co-Head of Studies for the prestigious EAVE Producers Workshop, her vision for equitable co-productions, and empowering the next generation of independent producers.

Then it’s Netflix vs. YouTube: Netflix is pivoting strategy by adding short-form and lifestyle videos. Is this a genius move to capture attention, or a "cheap content" panic? And more importantly: Why is Europe still waiting for its own competitive, independent video platform?

Letterboxd for sale: With the independent film community Letterboxd in $250M sale talks with giants like Paramount and Netflix, we debate the future of independent film discovery. Will a corporate takeover ruin its editorial independence? We look at how monopolies shape content discovery and potential European alternatives.

Links:

🔗  Netflix going after YouTube (Matt Belloni / Puck)

🔗 Letterboxd for sale (Inidewire)

🔗  EAVE

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

Joanna Szymanska and Fabian Massah dive deep into the heated debate surrounding streamer investment obligations in Europe. With tech giants like Netflix and Amazon pushing back against regulations in Germany and France, what does this mean for the local creative economy? Is it an unfair tax on success, or a necessary contribution from an "extraction business" to fuel cultural diversity?

At the same time, there is an engagement problem especially with 2nd and 3rd seasons. We discuss why they are still producing them. And that actually leads to the question: How do streamers measure the economic value of their production in investments in their balance sheets?

Later in the episode, Joanna sits down with Hugo Rosák, Head of Industry at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (KVIFF). They discuss the festival's ongoing mission to spotlight Central and Eastern European talent, foster cross-border co-productions, and the new "Book to Screen" initiative. Plus, they explore how independent producers can build resilience in an ever-shifting market.

Links:

🔗  Streamers engagement problem (Lucas Shaw - Bloomberg)

🔗  KVIFF Industry Programme

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

This week, we're starting with some exciting news close to home: our own Jenniferis taking over as co-head of studies at the prestigious EAVE Producers Workshop. 👏

Plus: We dive deep into A24's controversial $75M deal with Google’s DeepMind and what it tells us about Big Tech’s tightening grip on indie film. We also dissect Amazon MGM’s sudden cancellation of Luca Guadagnino’s Sam Altman movie and its move to Neon.

We cover the growing battle over digital services taxes between Europe and the US, Comcast's strategic split of NBCUniversal, and wrap up with a look at the unprecedented scale of the FIFA World Cup and why live sports remain the ultimate draw for streamers.

Links:

🔗 Comcast’s Split (Variety)

🔗 Luca Guadagnino on the Amazon MGM deal on his film (The Wrap)

🔗 Jennifer’s new role at EAVE (Screen)

🔗 Trump’s Tariff threats (The Guardian)

🔗 FIFA World Cup Numbers (Nielsen)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

In this episode of The Sideletters, Jennifer, Joanna and Fabian discuss

European Social Media: Is WSocial the new European alternative to X? We discuss the push for digital sovereignty and new platforms emerging in the EU.

A24 & Google's DeepMind: With Google investing $75 million in the indie darling A24, what does the future of AI-powered filmmaking tools look like? Are the tech giants coming for indie cinema?

Instagram vs. Netflix: Meta is bringing Instagram to your living room TV. Could this episodic format challenge the streaming giants for sofa viewing?

TF1 & Netflix Partnership: A landmark distribution deal in France. What happens when public broadcasters hand over their distribution to streamers, and how does it affect the ecosystem?

Film Revenue & Waterfalls: We break down the complex reality of backend deals, inspired by a viral analysis of box office receipts, and explore new equity models for risk-sharing among film crews and producers.

The Amazing Digital Circus: How an indie YouTube animated series from Glitch Productions dominated global box offices, proving that original creator-led IP can rival traditional studio blockbusters.

Links:

🔗 Mynette Louie breaking down (possible) Obsession waterfall

🔗 The Amazing Digital Circus

🔗 Netflix / TF1 Deal (Deadline)

🔗 Google Investing 75m USD in A24 (Variety)

🔗 W Social

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.
Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

We dive into the ever-shifting landscape of the European creative industries, starting with two major stories:

the sobering Europe 2031 report on AI and digital sovereignty(including the recent Anthropic model shutdown for European users),

and the $250M launch of Compound Creative Holdings by CAA and TPG.

Then stay tuned for a thought-provoking conversation on what we need to focus on: We sit down with media analyst and futurist Johanna Koljonen, author of the renowned Nostradamus Report.

We discuss its 2026 edition, "Challenging Projections," exploring how film, TV, streaming, and the creator economy have merged into one connected ecosystem. Johanna challenges the European "snobbery" dividing art from commerce, urging the industry to build meaningful direct connections with audiences, stop acting out of fear, and start tracking essential data to measure true cultural impact.

Links:

🔗 The 2026 Nostradamus Report

🔗 Europe 2031

🔗 Variety on CAA, TPG 250m EUR fund

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday. Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

The Backrooms / Obsession debate gets sharper. And one of Europe's most experienced distributors asks the question nobody can answer: is all this hype a wave, or just a drop?

Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine, Joanna Szymanska and Fabian Massah cut through the noise, and sit down with Torsten Frehse, CEO of Neue Visionen and founder of European Work in Progress.

In this episode of The Sideletters:

💥 Backrooms vs. Obsession: Disruption or Just a Great Story? Backrooms is now at $200M, Obsession at $175M, and climbing. While Backrooms opened huge, then dropped, Obsession has stronger ratings and week-on-week audience growth through word of mouth. Is that really a shift in the business model, as some argue?

💸 Who Gets Paid When a $750K Film Makes $150M? The art director on Obsession claims she was paid $300/day, around $7,000 total. The film has grossed over $150 million. We break it down: how do back-end deals actually work in Germany and France. What does Germany's transparency law require producers to disclose? And could a film cooperative model, where every crew member becomes a co-owner, be a real alternative? Plus: a new Polish industry salary report reveals that crew members earn decent wages, but 50% are still unhappy.

🎬 Guest Interview: Torsten Frehse, CEO Neue Visionen & founder of European Work in Progress One of Germany's most successful independent distributors and the founder of European Work in Progress (EWIP) joins Fabian to talk about the market's 9th edition, now anchored in Hamburg as part of the Filmfest Hamburg Industry Days. Around 25 European features in post-production are pitched each year to leading sales agents, distributors, and festival curators, with awards worth €100,000. The 2025 cohort produced the Cannes Certain Regard Jury Prize winner Elephants In The Fog, plus another film selected in Cannes, and a further title showing this month at Tribeca.

Links:

🔗 European Work In Progress - Call for Projects

🔗 The Wrap on Obsession’s Art Director speaking out

🔗Article on Crew Salaries Report (in Polish language)

🔗 ⁠Crew Salaries Report (PDF) (in Polish language)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday. Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

German film had its biggest awards night, and it got complicated. Two young YouTube creators just shattered US box office records. And Netflix is quietly trying to rewrite European media law. All in one week. In this episode of The Sideletters, Joanna Szymanska and Fabian Massah unpack what's really moving the creative industries in Europe right now:

🏆 The Lola Awards & the Wenders Controversy Sound of Falling swept Germany's most prestigious film awards. But the night's most talked-about moment came when honorary Lola recipient Wim Wenders addressed a very uncomfortable question on stage: actress Nastassia Kinski has been asking him for years to cut a scene from his 1974 film Wrong Move, a scene in which she appeared as a 13-year-old. Wenders asked the audience: Would cutting it set a precedent? Fabian and Joanna dig into the bigger question: How should the creative industry handle the ethics of its own heritage?

Note: This topic includes a brief description of a disturbing scene involving a minor. The hosts flag this at the top of the episode.

📱 YouTube Creators Are Winning Hollywood. What Does Europe Do? Kane Parsons (aka Kane Pixels) just opened Backrooms, released by A24, to $81M domestically in its first weekend. The biggest-ever debut for a non-sequel, non-IP horror film. The original "IP"? A single creepy photo on 4chan. Meanwhile, 26-year-old TikTok creator Cory Baker's Obsession, shot for $750K, has grossed over $100M. A new talent pipeline is reshaping Hollywood, one built on audience trust, not development deals. Does Europe have an equivalent? And if not, why not?

⚖️ Streamers vs. Europe: The Direct Investment Battle Gets Serious Germany just tabled an 8% streaming reinvestment obligation. Belgium took Netflix to its Constitutional Court, and the AVMS directive revision is open for consultation right now. This is the moment for European professionals to have a say.

🖥️ EU Tech Sovereignty Package. What to Watch. The European Commission is about to publish its cloud and AI development act, with a goal of tripling EU data center capacity within five to seven years. We're gonna follow this.

Links:

🔗 WSJ on “Backrooms” and “Obsession”

🔗 THR on “Backrooms” and “Obsession”

🔗 about “Crocodile“ (2026)

🔗 Süddeutsche Zeitung about Wim Wenders/Nastassja Kinski controversy (in German language)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn. 

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday. Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

The dust has settled on the Croisette, and Episode 17 of The Sideletters delivers a wrap-up of Cannes 2026. Joanna and Fabian discuss the major winners, including a historic Golden Palm, a landmark award for African cinema, an outstanding deal, before diving into an insightful interview that Jennifer had with Guillaume Esmiol, Executive Director of the Marché du Film. Discover how the world's largest film market continues bridging the gap between traditional markets, the creator economy, investors and the integration of AI in our industry.

Plus:

Why the Enhanced Games did not turn out to be the media phenomenon it wanted to be.

And even the Vatican wants to say something about AI.

Links:

🔗 Cannes Winners 2026

🔗 Enhanced Games

🔗 Pope Leo’s Magnifica Humanitas

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday. Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

While the Cannes Film Festival 2026 buzzes on the Croisette, Joanna Szymańska and Fabian Massah analyze the industry from an observer's distance. This episode tackles the major political and structural shifts that impact European production. From the much-discussed AgoraEU mega-program to Canal+ leadership's shock announcement of blacklisting industry professionals, we dive deep into why cultural sovereignty, a new report from EAVE on producers‘ mental health are now at a critical breaking point and into Netflix's recent "Global Economic Cultural Engine" report and the massive expansion of their ad-supported tier. Is Netflix saving the industry or merely recreating "old TV"?

Links:

🔗 Screen quotes Henna Virkkunen

🔗 The Guardian on Canal+ vs 600 industry professionals

🔗 EAVE Report on Producers Mental Health

🔗 WSJ on Streamers taking over Ad Market

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday. Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

Join us as Thibaut Bracq, Head of La Fabrique, a game-changing program at Cannes that supports emerging filmmakers and producers from around the globe, reveals the secrets to launching your first feature film at the world's biggest film market.

In this episode, Thibaut shares, what industry professionals look for in emerging projects, how La Fabrique selects 10 projects from 150+ applications, why bold cinema attracts major players, and pitching & networking strategies that actually work at Cannes.

Plus, more about the future of the industry:

Joanna caught statements from Lodz Film School students who will be in Cannes for the first time. Pretty insightful. Thanks to Ola Nowakowska, Marta WitkowskaandJulia Pietrasik.

And our support of the open letter “Cinema needs Europe. Europe need Cinema.” - signed by more than 5,000 professionals including Juliette Binoche, Sandra Hüller, Joachim Trier - calling on the EU to continue dedicated support of the movie sector within the MEDIA frameworks.

Links:

🔗 Sign the Open Letter: Cinema needs Europe. Europe Needs Cinema.

🔗 La Fabrique Cinéma

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday. Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

On the eve of Cannes 2026, The Sideletters go behind the scenes with Alexandra Zakharchenko, head of industry programs at the Marché du Film, the beating heart of the global film business.

In this special episode, Alexandra reveals how the Marché connects thousands of producers, distributors, investors, and creators annually, explains the innovative Investor Circle program that bridges public and private financing, highlights emerging regions (sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia, Japan), and discusses what independent cinema actually needs to thrive in 2026 and beyond…and at the end, we found a unique German language expression that describes it very well 🙂

Links:

🔗 Marché du Film Industry Programs

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

With major industry shifts happening simultaneously - the Academy rewrites Best International Feature rules, Netflix commits to theatrical windows for Greta Gerwig's Narnia, and NATO holds closed-door meetings with European filmmakers - we discuss the fundamental question: How relevant is cinema?

This episode explores how development cycles lag behind cultural moments, why festival-qualifying films now bypass national committees, what streamer theatrical commitments actually mean for windows and revenues, and whether military-cultural partnerships constitute narrative influence or healthy consultation.

Links:

🔗 Greenlight Analytics on Production Cycles out of Sync with Culture

🔗 New Academy Awards Rules for International Film

🔗 The Guardian on NATO meetings with European Filmmakers

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

How is one small country building a golden era of cinema while larger markets struggle? Kjersti Mo, CEO of the Norwegian Film Institute since 2019, shares the strategy behind Norway's recent Oscar wins, Berlin and Cannes successes, and multiple European Film Awards. Her insights reveal a roadmap for sustainable, culturally relevant audiovisual production in the age of consolidation, streaming, and geopolitical uncertainty.

Plus:

Links:

🔗 Norwegian Film Institute Strategy 2026-2029

🔗 European Commission approving purchase of Sky by RTL

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

In this deep-dive episode, Joanna and Fabian pull back the curtain on how they actually run their production companies in the age of AI. They’re sharing insights, and discussing specific tools, workflows, and philosophies driving their daily work. From practical implementation of AI agents, automation platforms, to self-hosted European infrastructure - an essential guide for creative professionals navigating digital sovereignty, data protection, and smart AI adoption.

Plus: The joint statement regarding the AgoraEU proposal and the UK Creative Europe petition, to the revealing statistic that 50%+ of internet traffic is now done by AI bots.

Links:

🔗 AgoraEU Joint Statement

🔗 SIGN HERE: Petition on UK’s return to Creative Europe

🔗 AI Bots create more that 50% of today’s internet traffic

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

With Cannes 2026 fresh off the announcement and CinemaCon underway, The Sideletters explore the festival landscape, US box office recovery, and dive deep into global co-productions with Brazilian producer Leonardo Mecchi, whose film Elephants in the Fog just landed in Un Certain Regard at Cannes.

Discover how cross-border co-productions work, what it takes to build equitable partnerships across economic imbalances, and how Brazilian cinema survived the Bolsonaro era through resilience and international collaboration.

Key Topics:

• first thoughts on the Cannes 2026 competition lineup

• US Box Office & Cinema Culture

• Warner-Paramount merger opposition: 1,000+ Hollywood creatives sign open letter

• Leonardo Mecchi: Global co-production dynamics and decision-making structures, power imbalances based on funding, experience, and economic differences, how treaty systems enable cross-border partnerships (Brazil-Germany treaty as gateway)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

In this deep-dive B2B episode, Jennifer Sabbah-Imagine and Fabian Massah compare the theatrical film financing structures of Europe's two largest cinema markets: France and Germany. Discover and discuss with us!

Key Topics:

• French Cinema Financing: The CNC, broadcaster obligations, Sophica vehicles, and regional funds

• German Cinema Financing: ARD/ZDF duopoly, and the Rundfunkräte governance challenge

• Box Office Trends 2019-2025: France's 26.5% decline vs Germany's 4.5% growth momentum

• National Language Films: How French and German films are performing in their home markets

• The Role of Regulation: Mandatory investment requirements and their impact on film production

• Broadcaster Obligations: Legal requirements in France vs voluntary investment in Germany

• Recent Reforms: Germany's new 8% investment law and why it's not enough for theatrical cinema

• Tax Incentives & Private Investment: SOFICA, regional funds, and diversified financing models

• Cultural Policy & Political Challenges: Defending public broadcasting in an era of critique

• Market Strategy: What Germany can learn (and innovate) from the French model

-> CNC Financing Scheme

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

Note: Our virtual studio let us down this week - bear with us on the audio.

Europe just got a brand new rulebook for TV series co-production. And OpenAI quietly killed Sora, its much hyped video-generating product.

In this episode of The Sideletters, Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine, Fabian Massah and Joanna Szymanska dig into two stories that signal a major shift for the European creative industry.

First: Jennifer breaks down what the Council of Europe's new Convention on Co-production of Series actually means in practice. It was signed at the Séries Mania Forum on March 26 by nine countries: France, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Greece, Georgia, Montenegro, Malta and Luxembourg (notincluding Germany... yet, we hope).

Then: OpenAI shut down Sora. Less than two years after its splashy debut. The team unpacks what that says about OpenAI's strategic overstretch, how Claude and Anthropic quietly took over the professional AI space, and what the collapse of the Disney/OpenAI deal reveals about how Big Entertainment is really thinking about AI and IP.

The conversation gets provocative: Is AI-generated content a threat to independent European producers? Or a window of opportunity? Will audiences accept full-AI mainstream series while still craving human-made originals? And could a European token tax actually redirect AI profits back into the creative economy?

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn.

-> The New EU Convention on Co-Production of Series

-> The Guardian on Sora being closed

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

Note: Our virtual studio let us down this week — bear with us on the audio.

Is culture just a nice-to-have for society, or a superpower driving economic and social progress? In this episode of The Sideletters, Joanna Szymanska and Fabian Massah dig into UNESCO's International Decade of Culture and the Reshaping Policies for Creativity report to challenge how we measure success in the creative industries.

You'll hear candid insights on why box office numbers don't tell the whole story.

Fabian shares the behind-the-scenes model of "Symphony of Now" - a documentary that convinced a car brand to invest without appearing in a single frame. Joanna unpacks how Canadian policy metrics now reward female filmmakers and indigenous storytelling, and why South Korea's cultural exports exceed those of engineering giants like Samsung.

The conversation moves beyond money to the harder question: What's the real value of culture?

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on ⁠LinkedIn⁠.

→ RE / SHAPING POLICIES FOR CREATIVITY - UNESCO https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000397330?posInSet=1&queryId=53c2be71-1cd7-4fa4-a98e-1ebfc525fcee

→ UNESCO CULTURE INDICATIORS 2023 https://whc.unesco.org/en/culture2030indicators/#:~:text=The UNESCO Culture|2030 Indicators,transversally across many other sectors.

→ CANADA SUCCESS INDEX (2021) https://telefilm.ca/wp-content/uploads/tfrfconsultationeng-final-5mars2021.pdf

→ OECD https://www.oecd.org/content/dam/oecd/en/publications/reports/2022/06/the-culture-fix_fda3a600/991bb520-en.pdf

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg)

Note: We just started. Still fine-tuning our sound.

In Episode #006 of The Sideletters, we explore the forces reshaping European series production with Francesco Capurro, Director of Series Mania Forum, and on what to expect at this year’s edition.

He also speaks about why co-productions aren't optional anymore, they're essential, about the new EU legal framework that is unlocking international partnerships, and the European vs. the American models for creative teams in series.

Also in this episode:

Joanna's breakdown on AI predicting the Oscars, and why diversity in governing bodies changes what algorithms can never predict.

→ [Series Mania Forum](https://seriesmania.com/forum/)

→ [Prompt used by Joanna](https://files.studiomassah.com/s/SmpXsJZ7w7tFw4E)

→ Links to documents mentioned by Joanna:

https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/TA-10-2026-0066_EN.pdf

https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/TA-10-2026-0066_EN.html

https://www.parliament.uk/business/lords/media-centre/house-of-lords-media-notices/2026/march-2026/uk-creative-industries-face-a-clear-and-present-danger-from-generative-ai-government-must-not-sacrifice-our-outstanding-creative-capacity-for-speculative-ai-gains/

https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld5901/ldselect/ldcomm/267/26702.htm

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on [⁠LinkedIn⁠](https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-sideletters).

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg)

*Note: We just started. Still fine-tuning our sound.*

In Episode #005 of The Sideletters, Joanna and Jennifer have a conversation with Kristina Trapp, CEO of EAVE(European Audiovisual Entrepreneurs), on 35 years of training international producers and why success isn't just about money. How EAVE's Impact Think Tank imagines a better industry through equity, inclusion, and social responsibility. Plus: an exclusive outlook on upcoming workshops, Creative Europe MEDIA's critical role, and why producers in war-torn countries without funding inspire her most.

Trapp's message: "You are not only working in this industry, you are the industry. You are agents of change."

Also in this episode:

Fabian's deep dive on the Great Consolidation (Paramount-Warner Bros, Showmax shutdown, Banijay-All3Media merger) and what previous consolidation eras teach independent producers about positioning for what comes after.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg)

→ EAVE

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on ⁠LinkedIn⁠.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Note: We just started. Still fine-tuning our sound.

In Episode #004 of The Sideletters, Joanna and Jennifer sit down with Katharina Gellein Viken, CEO of Metrotone and creator of the Raynmaker Project, to discuss what it actually looks like to build an AI-native production company in Europe.

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris) and Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw) today. (Fabian Massah will be back next week)

→ AI & The Creative Professional Podcast

→ Screenburn App

→ “Say Chickabang!” - Raynmaker

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on ⁠LinkedIn⁠.

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

Note: We just started. Still fine-tuning our sound.

Episode #003 of The Sideletters tackles the uproars on the Berlinale jury statement, major industry consolidation moves, and César Awards predictions.

This Week:

Hosted by Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw, and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg).

→ McKinsey Report on the impact of AI in Film & TV

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on ⁠LinkedIn⁠

Note: We just started. Still fine-tuning our sound.

Episode #002 of The Sideletters comes to you live from the European Film Market and Berlinale 2026!

This week, Fabian Massah and Joanna Szymanska report directly from the EFM, with Joanna - whose film “Dust” premiered in Competition - delivering a personal dispatch from the market floor, and Fabian sitting down with Yohann Comte, co-founder and chairman of French sales company Charades.

Joanna reflects on:

In Conversation with Yohann Comte (Charades): Charades has “A New Dawn” by Yoshitoshi Shinomiya premiering in Competition tonight. Yohann discusses:

→ Film i Väst

→ Charades

The Sideletters is a weekly European B2B conversation on film, tech & future business. New episodes every Wednesday.

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on ⁠LinkedIn⁠

Note: We just started. Still fine-tuning our sound.

Finally, white smoke in Berlin! After years of uncertainty, the new German Film Law is here. In this episode, we break down what the new 8% investment obligation means for Netflix, RTL, and ZDF - and why the numbers might not be as scary for them as they look. And above all: What does it mean for producers?

Then, we head to Potsdamer Platz. With the European Film Market (EFM) kicking off this week, we sit down with Tanja Meissner (Director of Berlinale Pro) to get the inside track.

In this episode, Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris), Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw), and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg), discuss:

Boosting the incentive volume to 250m EUR, including a rights escalator for producers: Is one of the biggest European markets finally competitive again?

The Investment Quotas: We run the math on broadcasters and streamers.

EFM 2026 Preview: From the future of Indie Film to the AI-driven tools in the Innovation Lab. What to expect for the 12,000 film industry professionals landing in Berlin. And how the EFM amidst its focus on technical innovation, always keeps the human in the centre.

→ EFM Event Schedule

→ EFM Industry Insights Podcast

→ German Film Law (from The Spot, German language)

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on ⁠LinkedIn⁠

Note: We just started. Still fine-tuning our sound.

Is the independent film model broken, or is it just changing hands? In this pilot episode of The Sideletters, we look at the numbers that confused the industry this week.

While Sharon Waxman (The Wrap/NYT) writes about the "Death of Indie Film" post-Sundance, two "independent" films just stormed the US Box Office top 3: The controversial Melania documentary and the YouTube-creator-led horror Iron Lung.

Joanna Szymanska (Warsaw), Jennifer Sabbah-Immagine (Paris) and Fabian Massah (Berlin/Hamburg), analyze the divide between the US hype and the European reality.

In this episode:

Joanna reports back from a screening of Melania. Why the documentary grossed $7M in the US, and hardly had any impact in European cinemas.

-> The Guardian on Melania

-> Sharon Waxman in the NY Times

👉 Connect with The Sideletters community on LinkedIn

Note: This is our pilot recording. We are fine-tuning our sound, but the insights were too hot to wait.