subscription-media
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Betsperts Built a Sports Media Portfolio by Learning When to Leave Good Communities Alone
The Chicago company raised millions to build a social betting app. Its more durable idea was quieter: buy beloved niche sports brands, keep their identities intact and sell useful tools to the fans who already live there.
Scribd Split Its Library Into Four - and Found a Bigger Story
The company once pitched one enormous digital shelf. Now it is betting that documents, decks, books and book clubs work better in separate rooms - connected by a single subscription strategy and a growing layer of AI.
The Ankler
The Ankler (Ankler Media) is an independent, subscription-driven media company covering the business of Hollywood and the collision of entertainment, media and technology. Founded as a one-man newsletter by Richard Rushfield in 2017 and expanded into a full media company with former Hollywood Reporter/Billboard chief Janice Min as CEO in 2022, it has grown into a multi-platform operation of roughly 15 newsletters, podcasts, video and live events - read by studio chiefs and moguls it covers, raised $1.5M at a $20M valuation via Y Combinator, and reportedly aiming for $10M in annual revenue in 2026.
Sarah Personette
Sarah Personette is the CEO of Puck, the journalist-owned media company often described as 'Vanity Fair for the Substack era.' She took the top job in January 2024 after a career spent on the revenue side of media's biggest platforms - head of ad sales and Chief Customer Officer at Twitter through its 2022 sale, VP of global business marketing at Facebook, COO of Refinery29, and U.S. president of Universal McCann. At Puck she is betting that journalists are the original influencers, fusing the financial incentives of the creator economy with old-school reporting rigor, and pushing the company toward profitability while expanding into fashion, sports, and live events.
JaeKwon Son
JaeKwon Son is the founder and CEO of The Miilk (더밀크), a Silicon Valley-based subscription media and tech-intelligence platform that delivers technology, economy, and investment insight to Korean readers worldwide. After 17-plus years as a tech and business reporter in Korea and a stint as Maeil Business Newspaper's Silicon Valley correspondent, he immigrated to the U.S. and launched The Miilk in 2019 to bridge American innovation and Korean enterprise. Under his leadership the company raised roughly $4.8 billion KRW (about $3.8M) in Series A funding, broke the exclusive that Tesla was entering humanoid robotics, and built an ad-free subscription model focused on perspective over raw news.
The Miilk 더밀크
The Miilk (더밀크) is a Silicon Valley-based cross-border media startup that translates the technology, economy, and investment stories of the U.S. for Korean-speaking professionals. Founded in 2020 by former Maeil Business Newspaper correspondent JaeKwon Son, it runs a subscription news platform at themiilk.com plus the free ViewsLetter newsletter, delivering on-the-ground reporting, analysis, and market intelligence from the heart of Silicon Valley.
Hamish McKenzie
Hamish McKenzie is the New Zealand-born co-founder and Chief Writing Officer of Substack, the subscription newsletter platform that has fundamentally reshaped how writers monetize their work. A former journalist and Tesla lead writer who wrote a book about Elon Musk's EV revolution, McKenzie pivoted from covering disruption to causing it - co-founding Substack in 2017 with Chris Best and Jairaj Sethi. Today the platform hosts over 50,000 earning creators and has raised $213 million total funding including a $100M Series C. McKenzie hosts The Active Voice podcast, delivered a TED2025 talk on the future of media, and is writing a book called 'How to Save the Media' due in 2026.