Disney and Pixar - Make Nice Now!

Fabled Film Company May Get a Reanimator - Los Angeles Times

I suppose this goes in the "If you can't renegotiate with em, buy em" file. Anyone who pays passing notice to this industry would have seen the following:

1- Pixar is a money printing press for Disney.
2- Pixar felt burned by Eisner over Toy Story 2.
3- Pixar's contract was expiring.
4- Pixar was interested in exploring life without Disney, in the George Lucas model.
5- Disney had yet to do what Pixar does well with any other partner.

So, you're Bob Iger at Disney. Knowing the score, as presented above, what do you do? Well, you certainly explore anything you can to keep the relationship going. Including giving a chunk of the company away and handing over the keys to the car to some outsiders and former insiders.

While I think this is a pretty good move by Disney, those in the know will wonder if it will work. Forget the finance aspects. The big brained investment bankers will figure that junk out. The marketing is similarly easy. Probably most of the world thought that Pixar was part of Disney already. The operations probably aren't going to chance very much. And strategically, this is a money play. You keep your cash cow and don't let them free agent for your rivals. So, where's the problem?

Astute observers of M&A activity will have pegged it already, because it's the problem in most M&As. The culture. There are about a billion questions for the organizational consultants here. Here are a couple of them:

1- How do you fit a bunch of Hawaiian shirt wearing computer guys into a VERY straight laced, suit and tie company like Disney? At the senior management level.

2- How do you keep Pixar sharp in the Disney Behemoth? There is debate about the feasibility of maintaining two separate corporate cultures in one company. I think it can be done and I think Disney is well suited to do it, but just can it can doesn't mean it will. After all, look at Disney's non-Pixar animation lately.

I think the big winner here is Steve Jobs. He gets a big role in Disney to go with his big roles in Pixar and Apple. I like visionary leadership, even though I'm not a big Jobs fan, and I think Disney hasn't had good visionary leadership since Walt died (I think of Eisner as a mean bean counter with two key insights {Synergy and Big Slate} that turned out to be a very mixed bag). Plus, it's a big platform for Jobs to selfpromote from.

As with all business deals, time will tell.

Message from the Voices inside my Brain -- You Really DO like Jewel Music

At various times during the past week or so, I have had Jewel's "Hands" stuck in my head. Just the chorus. Actually, just the first two lines of the chorus. Since it has been so persistently in heavy rotation on the playlist of the radio station in my mind, I am left to wonder.

Am I really a fan of Jewel Music?

I don't think I am. The fact that I can only recall one song that I don't like, and that I think of it as torture to have it in heavy rotation, would seem to speak to my fandom. But perhaps my unconscious is a big fan of Jewel's. Or at least a minor fan, since it only knows two lines to a less than major song.

Part of me blames Joe Rogan for Jewel being stuck in my head. On his comedy disc, "I'm Gonna Be Dead Someday", he drops a line about Jewel while talking in his girl voice about how love is supposed to be. The disc is funny from top to bottom (except the song, but that's a whole other thesis paper: Why do comedians insist on putting one musical track on otherwise great comedy discs?), and this is a throwaway line, about how women view long term romance vs. the reality. Jewel music is thrown in with candles and long walks contrasted with sex, doggy style, wearing a helmet. I think that's what put the Jewel music in my head.

If you believe in God and the Devil, you might suggest that the bad songs that get stuck in your head are the work of Satan. But if you believe that, I think you should knock out all of your teeth and see what the tooth fairy will give you for them. Maybe it's karma. When you are a less than great human, you get muzak on your mind. Ghandi and Mother Teresa must have had great inner soundtracks. Genghiz Khan probably got a lot of Christian Rock, which explains the whole invasion of Europe. Or maybe your unconscious, being all unconscious and what not, just can't tell music you like from everything else.

I think I might have to accept the fact that my unconscious is not particularly crazy about my conscious mind. Maybe it just doesn't like me. Why else would it torture me? Right now, I'm listening to Nas's "Rule" but I have Jewel as the background singer. While I think this could make a great mash up, it's very rough at the moment. Maybe my unconscious doesn't like me. That balances the equation.