Iterations: How ESPN Thinks About The Future Of Its Product And Technologies

After spending time in the valley as a founder, operator, and venture capitalist, my friend Ryan Spoon left the comforts of Silicon Valley to head east -- to Bristol, CT of all places -- to follow the intersection of his passion: technology and sports. And hes not just at another sports company -- hes at ESPN, a sports network which reaches over 100M homes with annual revenues approaching $8B. As one of the most valuable media networks out there, ESPN is also at an interesting point with respect to the shift happening in broadband, their subscriber fees, and the opportunities and challenges presented with mobile technology. Now as the SVP of Product for ESPN, the massive sports media and entertainment company, I invited Ryan and his colleague, Aaron LaBerge, who runs technology, to share some insights of how they left the technology world and ended up at ESPN, how ESPN thinks about the intersection of mobile and social in delivering content, how ESPN thinks about developers and their APIs, how ESPN thinks about the emergent hardware ecosystem for sports and fitness, and much more.