Many media ventures’ Silicon Valley funds burn out and fade away. So when folks see MTS, the livestream network, they’re inclined to cast a side eye and move on.
The project, funded by venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz and angel investors, is the latest in a long line of attempts by Silicon Valley to bypass the legacy media brands and tell the tech industry’s story on its own terms. It’s the mother of all tech podcasts, promoting executive visibility in a direct-to-audience media format for a largely technocentric target audience.
MTS stands for “monitoring the situation,” lifted from a meme about repeatedly refreshing real-time news. The network launched on X last April as a self-described “chronicler of the singularity.” As in, the AI singularity. In that vein, it has good company in Anthropic (hahaha).
The set-up is this: A rotating cast of hosts, many of them tech industry luminaries themselves, interviews Bay Area power brokers in live, unfiltered conversations. Sometimes smart folks opine on things that are normally out of their swim lanes, making it more compelling.
MTS picked up 570,000 X followers in its first seven months, according to this SF Standard profile. X isn’t what it once was, but that’s not nothing.
In this current media climate guided by social media mentions, MTS has a better shot at staying power than its predecessors, on which we needn’t cast aspersions. It also presents another messaging destination for some lucky tech brands.
We are entertained: MTS’ appeal to AI and tech brands
Let’s start with the format. In one spot, a founder appears on MTS and engages in a long conversation with a host who grew up in tech or business rather than a newsroom. That means less time spent explaining what a GPU cluster is and more time on the argument you came to make. Guests get more control over their messaging. What founder doesn’t want that?
At minimum, it’s entertaining, even as the conversations can register as rarefied-air people explaining how their tech business works, or even how AI intersects with politics, to the rest of the world. Guests have included Marissa Mayer (currently of Dazzle AI assistant fame) and Travis Kalanick (formerly bedazzled Uber co-founder).
Speed is a premium. Just as in traditional broadcast journalism, talking in real time is faster than writing. But more than that, during the Musk vs. Altman trial, MTS published a play-by-play and a searchable collection of public evidence, plus a near-real-time AI transcript of testimony.
Searchable, text-heavy archives are sources that AI systems pull from and award primacy relevance. As the world increasingly turns away from SEO to GEO and AEO, it will be worth monitoring whether MTS content gets cited in AI answers.
Attack of the clones, served TBPN style
Now, for some caveats. While some segments performed well on YouTube and X, the sponsored interview slots matter more. Unlike traditional media outlets, MTS appears to have no public editorial policy explaining how it separates coverage from commercial relationships, according to the aforementioned Standard reporting.
For a brand, a paid segment is advertising, not earned media, and audiences and answer engines can both tell the difference. And there is the fact that backers of the network have also been openly dismissive of traditional journalism.
Then there is the fact that history has not been kind to MTS predecessors such as TBPN, which was acquired by OpenAI in April and canceled its sponsorship deals. Because of the auras and star power of its guests, A16z’s earlier bid in this space, a techno-optimist publication called Future, folded within 18 months. This despite 1.3 million monthly readers at its peak.
The client strategy for MTS
So how is one to view and/or treat MTS? Add it to your pitch target list to get your tech clients on there. Think of it as a channel that works sitting beside earned media rather than replacing it. Tell founders they should appear on MTS because they will be able to stake a claim to their market, or at least land a messaging narrative.
Be sure to ask for audience data in writing before transferring that Bitcoin. Ask for the editorial policy and how sponsored segments are labeled on air. This is important: Pitch the hosts a story rather than just a CEO, and when it airs, cut crisp clips for your own channels. Snackable, TikTok-style clips are where this format travels best.
Definitely prepare your founder clients as you would for any live tech show. That is, ensure that they bring their A game, as the live medium is for heavy-hitters who can speak confidently on myriad topics.
MTS has a plausible claim to being the place where AI founders get a long, informed hearing. Whether it earns the trust to keep that claim remains to be seen.
