New Rockstars Gets 70% of Net Ads in Non-Exclusive Deal

In its October 21, 2026 announcement, Disctopia said New Rockstars had begun streaming its podcast and video catalogue on the platform under a non-exclusive agreement that returns 70% of net pre-roll advertising revenue to the studio. New Rockstars retains ownership, continues publishing through its existing outlets, and is to receive monthly reporting and payouts.

The pilot gives the film and television commentary studio another place for audiences to find its work. For the studio, the disclosed payment is a share of advertising revenue earned on Disctopia, rather than a fixed amount for each play. Neither audience volume nor expected revenue was disclosed, so the percentage establishes the terms of the split without establishing what the catalogue will earn.

What the net advertising split means

Disctopia serves pre-roll ads against the New Rockstars catalogue and calculates the studio’s share from net advertising revenue. That distinction matters: an advertiser’s gross spend cannot be multiplied by the studio’s share to produce a payout. The public announcement does not define the deductions used to arrive at net revenue, or disclose the price and volume of ads sold against this catalogue.

Once the monthly net figure is known, the calculation is straightforward. These are conditional examples of the disclosed split, not estimates of the pilot’s performance:

If net pre-roll revenue is $1,000, the studio’s share would be $700.
If net pre-roll revenue is $10,000, its share would be $7,000.
If net pre-roll revenue is $50,000, its share would be $35,000.

The difference between those examples depends on the revenue base, not on a change in the agreed percentage. More plays could create more opportunities to serve ads, but they would not by themselves establish how many ads were sold or what those ads earned. An audience figure, even if released later, would therefore be insufficient on its own to calculate the studio’s payment.

Monthly reporting should give New Rockstars a recurring account of the revenue attributed to its catalogue and the resulting payout. The announcement does not say that those reports will be public. Until a revenue figure is released, the disclosed split offers a clear way to model possible payments, while the pilot’s actual financial result remains unknown.

Why New Rockstars can keep publishing elsewhere

The agreement leaves New Rockstars in control of its work while adding Disctopia as a distribution outlet. Its existing publications can continue alongside the new catalogue placement. For a studio publishing both podcasts and video, that means the deal concerns where those programmes can be found and how ads on Disctopia are shared; it does not set a new payment rate for every outlet carrying the studio’s work.

In the company release hosted by Podnews, New Rockstars general manager Zach Huddleston said the studio wants its work to “find people where they are,” and Disctopia said the ownership, continued distribution and majority-earnings structure is also available to creators publishing a first episode. That broader statement does not publish a standard advertising percentage for every creator. The specific net-ad split disclosed in the New Rockstars announcement remains the figure available for this catalogue.

Keeping existing outlets matters to the economics as well as to audience access. A viewer or listener who stays on another service does not generate a Disctopia pre-roll impression through this arrangement. Conversely, any revenue from ads sold against the catalogue on Disctopia belongs in the calculation governed by the pilot. The studio can add a potential source of income without making the new platform the sole route to its programmes.

The arrangement also gives Disctopia a catalogue spanning audio and video. That breadth may create different kinds of advertising inventory, but the disclosed terms do not separate podcast earnings from video earnings or say how much either format is expected to contribute. The meaningful measure will be the net ad revenue actually recorded against the catalogue, followed by the studio’s reported share.

TruePlay is a separate payment claim

Disctopia also markets a per-play creator product. Its podcaster product description advertises $0.02 for a verified TruePlay by a paying subscriber across a creator’s catalogue, including non-exclusive episodes, with advertising revenue on top. That description concerns the platform’s creator offering; the New Rockstars announcement identifies a net pre-roll advertising split and does not state that the studio receives a TruePlay payment under this pilot.

Eligibility language also depends on the type of content being discussed. Disctopia’s filmmaker product description ties its $0.02 qualifying-view claim to a title released exclusively on the platform and says other catalogue titles earn ad revenue. Those film terms cannot be applied to New Rockstars’ mixed podcast and video catalogue to calculate an additional payment. The distinction is between product claims with different stated conditions and the payment term actually disclosed for this studio.

Adding a per-play amount to the conditional ad-revenue examples would assume a benefit absent from the announced agreement. The first useful performance figures will be the pilot’s monthly net pre-roll revenue and the corresponding studio payout. Disctopia has given no public date for releasing either figure, leaving the size of this additional revenue stream to be established by the pilot’s results.