Totally disagree. The Direct TV deal was an absolute disaster that cost AT&T tens of billions. AT&T made back most of the money they spent on WarnerMedia either through the divestment or via revenue through the ownership period. The two deals are totally different. Neither good but only one an outright disaster.

Stankey’s vision for programming was cheap and short-form content? Funny how none of that was what happened under his leadership. HBO got their budget increased and delivered more volume and awards quality shows than any other period in their history. It was the same story in terms of budget and volume at the broadcast network The CW. It was a similar tale at Warner Bros TV where output was at an all time high. You can criticise the money spent by Stankey but one absolutely cannot question the commitment they made to producing scripted content throughout the company. Hell, Zaslav’s main criticism is that the company was spending far too much on content! His reasoning being they could make a similar revenue and far more profit producing significantly less content.

AT&T dumped Warner to get rid of debt and boost short term quarterly numbers. It was an easy choice as media companies transitioning from linear to streaming is proving expensive in the short term and even long term it has become clear to all that thanks to Netflix, Amazon, and Apple being players in the market that the profit levels in streaming are just not going to be the same as they were in linear. AT&T cut WarnerMedia as it was only ever going to be a declining asset. Nobody can change that.