Elizabeth Olsen (Getty Images)
The head of the media industry’s Albanian army — namely, Reed Hastings — is slated to speak at the UBS Global Media and Tech conference on Tuesday, where he’ll likely face some tough questions about why Netflix has been firing on itself so frequently.
Media watchers will remember that at this same conference last year Time Warner boss Jeff Bewkes was so under pressure to defend his company from Netflix incursions in the premium TV space that he memorably quipped, “It’s a little bit like — is the Albanian army going to take over the world? I don’t think so.”
Just 12 months ago, Netflix seemed indestructible, with Hastings grabbing Fortune magazine’s Businessman of the Year cover. Bet even Bewkes couldn’t have foreseen such a spectacular fall from Wall Street grace.
Both Bewkes and Hastings are slated to speak Tuesday at the conference within hours of each other.
UBS investment-banking supremo Aryeh Bourkoff, will kick off the event with a bird’s-eye view of the media industry, ad trends, video consumption and implications for content companies and distributors alike. No doubt he’ll be trying to pin a host of media boldface names down on their game plans for 2012 and beyond.
It’s also been quite a year for Bourkoff himself. He’s been in the middle of this year’s big M&A action, from Edgar Bronfman’s Warner Music Group changing hands to Citigroup’s sale of EMI to Sony. Claire Atkinson
Oscar Olsen
Elizabeth Olsen (photo) may be getting a ton of awards buzz for her performance in “Martha Marcy May Marlene.” But the movie hasn’t gotten as much attention at the box office as some other Oscar favorites, including fellow Fox Searchlight film “The Descendants,” which had raked in nearly $12.5 million in two weeks, compared with “Martha Marcy May Marlene’s” $2.6 million since Oct. 21.
But the co-head of Fox’s movie division, Tom Rothman, told On The Money he hopes the critical acclaim for Olsen will help the film commercially.
“Anytime a new actor or actress comes blazing onto the scene, that helps spark interest, and I do think that will help people catch up with the movie,” Rothman said.
Rothman, who spoke to us at last week’s Gotham Independent Film Awards, where he received an Industry Tribute, also indicated that box-office success could be helpful on the trophy circuit.
But most consumers shouldn’t expect to see Fox’s films in their living room while those movies are still in theaters. Universal has indicated it has plans to make some films available to home viewers while they’re still on the big screen, and Oscar favorite “Margin Call” has been available on demand and in theaters since its release in October.
But Rothman told us that Fox believes very strongly in the theatrical window. “While we think there’s a time and a place where some windows can be accelerated, we’re very big believers in the theatrical window.” Hilary Lewis
Office offense
Joe Bohling is the senior VP, chief human resource officer for Aflac and although the holidays are a great time of year, Bohling has a sense of dread.
That’s because as the head of personnel for the insurance giant he has to deal with the fallout from the company’s holiday office party.
Holiday parties are a time when employees may not necessarily help their career, but they certainly can hurt their advancement as they let their hair down.
Here for your career education are some of the holiday faux pas Bohling told The Post he has heard about:
* A fistfight between co-workers over inappropriate comments made by one to the other’s significant other.
* After the party on a night of heavy drinking, a group of employees stripping down to their underwear and dancing in the hotel lobby pool.
* Employees’ significant others heckling the boss for going on too long in opening remarks.
* Open-mouth kissing on the dance floor for all the world to see. Post Staff
App stats
There’s plenty of APPetite for mobile apps.
According to Mobilewalla, the millionth mobile app should hit your smartphone screen by Wednesday.
Anindya Datta, Mobilewalla’s chairman, said there is an average of 2,000 apps entering the field each day, but that number increases with holiday-themed mobile apps.
Mobilewalla also says that Apple’s iPhone app store is leading the pack for the last 12 months with almost 600,000 apps, or 60 percent of the market. The Android platform has 320,000 plus apps, or 32 percent. BlackBerry
and Windows round out the field with 4.5 percent and 3.5 percent, respectively. Post staff