Evidence since 2021 points in the opposite direction of Chamath’s prediction on all three key elements (costs, margins, and commoditization):

1. Production costs have not continued to fall; they’ve risen.

   • Ampere Analysis and others estimate that the six biggest global content companies (Disney, Comcast/NBCU, Google/YouTube, WBD, Netflix, Paramount) will spend a record $126B on content in 2024, up 9% year over year, with Netflix’s own content spend rising from about $10.9B in 2020 to $16B in 2024. (mediapost.com)
   • In the UK, overall spending on high‑end TV grew 11% in 2024, even though the number of shows dropped from 223 to 181, which industry analysts explicitly attribute to rising production and talent costs; local broadcasters say they’re being priced out of premium drama. (theguardian.com)
   • Lists of the most expensive TV series show that big‑budget streaming shows like The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (≈$58M/episode, 2022), Citadel (~$50M/episode, 2023), Secret Invasion (~$35M/episode, 2023), and upcoming Stranger Things S5 ($50–60M/episode) represent new highs in per‑episode budgets, not declines. (en.wikipedia.org)
   • Trade and analyst commentary across TV, streaming and music repeatedly notes that content costs continue to rise, both for traditional TV operators and for streamers like Netflix. (advanced-television.com) The 2023 WGA strike and concurrent SAG‑AFTRA deal further locked in higher minimums and residuals for streaming, structurally increasing labor costs. (en.wikipedia.org)

2. Margins have not structurally fallen because content got cheap; leading streamers’ margins have improved despite higher costs.

   • Netflix’s operating margin rose from about 19% in 2020 to 26.7% in 2024, with management targeting ~29% in 2025, even as analysts emphasize that its content costs are still rising and may reach $20–21B annually. (ainvest.com)
   • Disney’s direct‑to‑consumer streaming segment (Disney+, Hulu, ESPN+) swung from a $2.6B loss in fiscal 2023 to a $134M full‑year profit in 2024, and then to over $1.3B in streaming profit by fiscal 2025, helped by repeated price hikes and ad‑tier monetization, despite higher programming and production costs. (thewrap.com)
   • Other major platforms (Warner Bros. Discovery’s Max, Paramount+, etc.) also moved from heavy losses toward positive streaming EBITDA by 2024–2025; sector scorecards explicitly report mid‑teens or better EBITDA margins for Netflix and double‑digit margins for Disney’s entertainment streaming bundle. (thedailymesh.com) This is inconsistent with a world where falling content costs drive permanently thin or deteriorating margins.
   • It’s true that streaming margins are structurally lower than the legacy cable bundle’s peak ~30%+ network margins, but the actual trend since 2021 has been margin expansion via price increases and ad tiers while content remains expensive, not margin compression because content became cheap.

3. Professional content has not become an economic commodity that “almost doesn’t matter.”

   • The same Ampere data show the largest media groups driving content spending to record highs, with original content alone accounting for over $56B of their investment since 2022. This ongoing arms race in premium series and films reflects that distinctive content still materially differentiates platforms. (mediapost.com)
   • Analysts emphasize that “critical franchises and tentpole series remain crucial for differentiation” in streaming, directly contradicting the notion that individual shows are economically interchangeable. (stockscounting.com) Massive per‑episode budgets for flagship series (Rings of Power, House of the Dragon, Stranger Things S4–5) further demonstrate that platforms treat these titles as high‑stakes, non‑commodity assets. (en.wikipedia.org)
   • Viewing data from Nielsen/Gracenote show a power‑law outcome: about 6% of streaming titles account for roughly 75% of U.S. viewing minutes, with the rest described as “digital landfill” – indicating that most content underperforms, but a small set of hits captures the vast majority of value, which is the opposite of uniform commoditization. (linkedin.com)

Overall, from 2021 to late 2025 the empirical record shows rising production and talent costs, record‑high aggregate content spend, improving margins at leading streamers driven by pricing and ads, and continued economic importance of standout IP and franchises. That is materially at odds with Chamath’s claim that content costs would keep falling, margins would structurally deteriorate as a result, and most professional content would become an economic commodity that “almost doesn’t matter.”