Regarding the potential of such deals mushrooming across Europe, Francois Godard at Enders Analysis predicts that more will follow, especially in Germany where Prime Video already launched linear channels from broadcasters ARD and ZDF several years ago. Godard says Max will likely be the next streamer to form a deal with a local TV group.

As for the U.S., there’s even less chances of pacts between TV groups and streamers, says Godard, because there are “fundamental differences” between those two markerts. “European free-to-air channels are genuinely free and possess substantial audience power, unlike their American counterparts which are typically part of a paid cable package,” says Godard.

Karen Egan, head of telecoms at Enders Analysis said that CityFibre securing new funding was “absolutely central” to the future of the altnet sector.

She added it would give the company “the horsepower that they need to drive consolidation by acquiring smaller players in the sector and continue expanding their footprint”.

Claire Enders, founder of media and telecommunications research company Enders Analysis, said Rose "epitomizes the reasons women have increasingly succeeded to these roles."

"She's a peacemaker, she's very non-confrontational, very thoughtful, and she works very well in very large organizations," Enders added.

Moreover, Enders Analysis’ senior research analyst Claire Holubowskyj said she still believes Google’s promise of a new reporting line showing the impact of AI Max is little better than other black box reporting. 

“While useful to identify an impact, the ‘how’ and ‘why’ have always been the more interesting (and difficult to identify) insights,” she said.

In Holubowskyj’s view, Google is providing the base level of visibility necessary in AI Max to build trust in the system among marketers. “But part of widespread AI adoption will be trusting the outputs and ceding limited control in some areas — the key questions are which areas, and how much oversight is required?,” she continued.

“Consistency is incredibly important to investors and Ofcom has largely been consistent,” says Karen Egan, head of telecoms at Enders Analysis.

Openreach hosted internet service providers including Sky, TalkTalk and BT’s own retail units on its network, which comprised about 80 per cent of the market by 2016, according to Enders Analysis.

Others see it differently. Although the altnet drive had been crucial, the UK’s meteoric rollout is largely owed to Ofcom’s decision to guarantee Openreach its fair bet, argues Egan. 

“I just don’t think that you can [say] to your board and to your shareholders, ‘We’re rolling this out because the government’s kind of really leaning on us to do so,’” Egan says. “I think it was more about the fair bet from Ofcom.”

Tom Harrington, a broadcast expert at the research firm Enders Analysis, says of YouTubing: “You’re completely at the whims of a platform, an algorithm that can change any time. If you do well, you do very, very well. And if you do badly, you do very, very badly, and no one ever sees your content. There’s incredible risk being on that platform and having your entire existence on that platform.”

Harrington thinks that many presenters would prefer the old, risk-free broadcast system, where they would accept payments upfront for commissions, rather than YouTube’s “performance-based” model. He adds: “It’s kind of precarious even for someone like him.”

“It’s a generational shift — text is less important [to young people] than video and audio,” says Douglas McCabe, chief executive and director of publishing at Enders Analysis. 

Tech is also a problem for parents, says Douglas. “They are not modelling great reading habits because they’re always on their phones. They are also more likely to put kids on a device. There is a decline in parents reading to children.”

"This could attract new people who could then subscribe to the League's channel," explains François Godard, an analyst at Enders Analysis. "This would be a good thing for the League, which needs to reconnect with the population."

An analyst note from media research service Enders Analysis suggests that, “Having turned Sky Deutschland around, this divestment allows Sky to be much more focused on core regions with more diversified businesses.”

Gill Hind, of Enders Analysis, said: “A lot of the news out in the US is very, very biased. And for people that are interested in what’s happening, not just in the US but globally, there’ll be a lot of news on the BBC that you wouldn’t get on things such as Fox.

“So if you actually want to have a greater understanding of what’s happening on the world scene and also how the US has been seen by others, then actually something like the BBC is the most obvious channel to go towards.”