Douglas predicts that, without subsidies, as many as one in three journalists working for print titles could lose their jobs — 5,000 across the country. “It is a terrifying picture,” he said.

Gill said that thanks to the lockdown, consumers — especially younger viewers who had cut the cord of “normal” television in favour of Netflix and other streamers — were “reconnecting with ‘the box’. They are realising TV is more than just drama and comedy. It’s about national culture. The challenge for terrestrial broadcasters now is to exploit this shift.”

Tom said that while the pandemic had driven an upsurge in daytime TV viewing in the UK, especially around news, families are watching primarily on the big-screen TV, while Quibi is available only on mobile. “I don’t see the evidence for [demand for] this gap” between YouTube-style short clips and traditional TV shows.

He added “People have done short-form services before, but not at this level or quality. Quibi is trying to do something quite different. They won’t know whether it works for some time . . . and by then they’ve already thrown away hundreds of millions of dollars worth of investment in content.”

Douglas said widespread quarantine measures had effectively “put a pause button [on the] entire outdoor advertising sector."

Douglas warned “If your entire business is sports journalism, this is a challenging period.”

He added The Athletic is not alone. Every media outlet was going to have to “think very creatively” about its sports coverage.

Tom said “The problem with streaming services is that audiences expect every TV show ever made to be available right now, but subscriptions are underpriced. Netflix gets around that by borrowing and Amazon uses it as a loss leader for e-commerce. Disney used to make a lot of money selling shows to other broadcasters, but its businesses with the largest profit margins now are amusement parks, cruises and merchandise. They want to reach massive scale, because if kids watch Frozen 2, they’ll want to go to Disney World and spend hundreds of pounds a day going on the ride or buying the outfits.”

Douglas said “When a lockdown phase is initiated it is unlikely to make much sense for free print media to continue. Any business that is designed for commuters, or at the very least relies on people moving around, will find it very difficult to continue as normal."

Douglas said the Independent’s “lean newsrooms focused on a distinctive take and curation” offered a guide to the future of news media for smaller publishing brands. 

Francois said any decision to ditch the Premier League’s existing business model would be “crazy” because Masters would “lose billions” as existing agreements were unwound: “He’d have to start afresh with nothing, no subscribers.”

He added that the operation would have to be supported by vast cloud servers. “That would be very expensive and take a long time."