Roy Price Roy Price founded Amazon Video and Studios.

“I used to say if you're not a little afraid when you greenlight something, maybe you shouldn't be greenlighting it at all, because maybe it's just very average and passé. You and all your friends and your mom, everybody just thinks this is the best idea for a TV show. That probably means it was a good idea for a TV show like three years ago.”

The AI XR Podcast. · October 2026

Context

Roy was explaining the strategy behind Amazon's early original series, which took bigger creative risks than traditional networks. This is his rule of thumb for judging whether a show is bold enough.

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Transcript

The AI XR Podcast. Around 30:12 into the episode

Roy Price

…are set up at the company, it was necessary, uh, no matter who you were, you know, even if we were doing it and we had raised a billion dollars or whatever, it was just the correct strategy because the worst possible outcome would be that you become kind of like CBS, but not quite as good.

Speaker 3

Right.

Roy Price

You know, so you try to do things that are going to be popular, but you're not necessarily first in line. You know, you're Amazon, you're not, these other people have been in the TV business 40 years and they know all the agents or whatever. Um, so you kind of have to spend this minute dealing with your brand and getting your brand, you know, stood up in a, in a strong way where it really has that quality association. And only then can you go broader. And definitely, you know, I used to say if you're not a little afraid when you greenlight something, maybe you shouldn't be greenlighting it at all because maybe it's just very average and passe because you're you and all your friends and your mom and you know, everybody just thinks this is the best idea for a TV show. That probably means it was a good idea for a TV show like three years ago.

Ted Schilowitz

Yeah, I would say, I would, I would say that's largely my thesis as well. And I agree with that. I would say that HBO kind of had that comfy seat for a very, very long time for generations. And I would say that Apple has sort of, interestingly enough, taken over a lot of that seat. Not all of it.…

Speaker 3

of Us or something like that. But it's not like every single show at HBO is a knock it out of the park. Oh my God, this is really pedigree content. And Apple has largely really taken that sort of spot on the shelf as the best sort of pedigree content. And Amazon is always interesting to me because…

Roy Price

Well, you know, very, yeah, very few large retailers in 2013 would say, okay, well, you know, our first really high-profile show is going to be about this, you know, UCLA professor who goes trans. Right, exactly. Which, by the way, in 2013, like wasn't even a thing. And, you know, by the way…

Speaker names come from our own diarization. The position is estimated from where the line sits in the episode.

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