Mike Litman

The Pattern

News EN ↓ 137 episodes

Before it's obvious. A daily briefing scanning 150+ sources across fashion, design, tech, brands, and music. Finding the patterns others miss, every morning at 8:30am UK time.

Author

Mike Litman

Episodes

No. 112: Fox buys the remote control. Distribution just became the only content strategy. 16.06.2026 4:24

Culture Pulse: 74. Fox bought Roku for $22bn. That's not a streaming deal — it's a real estate play. Whoever owns the interface owns the attention economy. @ThePatternn Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-16.html

No. 111: Challengers are eating incumbents by refusing to act like brands. 15.06.2026 4:34

Culture Pulse: 71. TikTok-native challengers are eating Lululemon's lunch. Target rehires Mizrahi. OpenAI makes AI look like craft. The pattern: culture before commerce, always. @ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-15.html

No. 110: Sovereignty is the new brand strategy. AI just proved it. 14.06.2026 4:42

Culture Pulse: 71. AI dependency just became a sovereignty risk. The brands paying attention are building their own infrastructure. Today's Pattern: before it's obvious. Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-14.html

No. 109: Death makes the canon. Hockney's exit reshapes what British art means now. 13.06.2026 4:45

Culture Pulse: 74. Hockney's death opens a British visual identity vacuum. China's brands own the World Cup without qualifying. London's galleries endorse remix. Culture is rewriting authorship. @ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-13.html

No. 108: Size is a system. Balenciaga just declared it optional. 12.06.2026 4:57

Culture Pulse: 74. Size is a system. Balenciaga just declared it optional. Today's Pattern: the brands winning right now are the ones that decided inherited categories were arbitrary. #ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-12.html

No. 107: Ownership is the new creative brief. Culture's power brokers are buying the source. 11.06.2026 4:39

Culture Pulse: 74. Ownership is the new creative brief. Bailey buys a pottery maker. Warner buys attribution tech. Luxury defers to TikTok's Lyas. The brief is losing power at every level. @ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-11.html

No. 106: Editing is the new creative superpower. Omission beats addition. 10.06.2026 4:36

Culture Pulse: 72. AI makes infinite addition free. The brands winning right now are the ones that edit hardest. Today's Pattern: restraint is the new creative advantage. #ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-10.html

No. 105: Tactile culture is winning the attention economy. Screens cannot replicate touch. 09.06.2026 4:49

Culture Pulse: 72. Touch is the new moat. TikTok is reviewing atomisers. Packaging is now a content channel. The body is fighting back against digital commoditisation. @thepatternbrief Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-09.html

No. 104: Regional beauty is rewriting who gets to set global taste. 08.06.2026 4:28

Culture Pulse: 68. Filipino beauty is building global export logic without Western validation. Taste no longer gets granted from the centre. It gets asserted from the edges. @ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-08.html

No. 103: Scarcity is the new strategy. Culture just proved it with bodies. 07.06.2026 4:49

Culture Pulse: 72. The AGI economists said it plainly: robots scale, ballerinas don't. Today's signals show that principle repricing everything from sport archives to fragrance temples. @ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-07.html

No. 102: Physical space is the new media buy. Brands figured this out. 06.06.2026 4:43

Culture Pulse: 74. Physical space is the new media buy. Zara, a house party album launch, and anti-screen startups all point the same way. The room is the prize. @ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-06.html

No. 101: Heritage IP is the new infrastructure. The content wars shifted quietly. 05.06.2026 4:54

Culture Pulse: 72. Amazon needs Bond. Universal rejected Ackman. OTB completed Viktor & Rolf. IP is infrastructure now. Platforms are subordinate. The Pattern, 05.06.26. Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-05.html

No. 100: Brands that own the moment beat brands that own the message. 04.06.2026 4:56

Culture Pulse: 72. Inditex beats the macro. TikTok builds an events app. Bottega Veneta sponsors Björk's national museum show. The pattern: owning the moment beats owning the message. @thepatternbrief Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-04.html

No. 99: Physical togetherness is now a product category. Someone noticed. 03.06.2026 4:44

Culture Pulse: 74. Physical presence is now a product category. Board's $20M raise, Tianya's return, and Pharrell's utility-luxury pitch all point the same way. Scarcity of presence is the next market. #ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-03.html

No. 98: Personality is the last moat. Brands with none are already losing. 02.06.2026 4:36

Culture Pulse: 72. Personality is the last moat. Brands optimising for broad appeal are now the risky ones. Today's Pattern connects TikTok, Taylor Swift, and Helsinki. #ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-02.html

No. 97: Luxury is moving its runways west. The money already did. 01.06.2026 4:52

Culture Pulse: 72. Luxury is planting flags in LA. Apple is targeting eyewear, not tech. AI costs are outpacing AI value. Geography is the new strategy. #ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-06-01.html

No. 96: Bundling won the streaming wars. Now it rewires every subscription business. 31.05.2026 4:59

Culture Pulse: 72. Bundles now drive 33% of new streaming subs in the US, up from 10% in 2024. The single-product subscription era is closing. @ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-05-31.html

No. 95: Ferrari went electric. Jony Ive designed it. The car is almost beside the point. 30.05.2026 4:44

Culture Pulse: 74. Ferrari went electric and hired Jony Ive to design it. That's not a car decision. It's a desire decision. Today's Pattern: object logic beats category logic. Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-05-30.html

No. 94: Slow retail is the new luxury. Speed was always the wrong bet. 29.05.2026 4:35

Culture Pulse: 72. Slow retail is the new luxury. A Chinese fashion brand just commissioned friction as a growth strategy. The speed era is over. #ThePattern Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-05-29.html

No. 93: AI search killed the click. Now brands have no map. 28.05.2026 4:34

Culture Pulse: 74. AI search killed the click and most brands have no map. Today's Pattern: distribution is gone, culture is the only channel left. Before it's obvious. Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-05-28.html

No. 92: Creators without credentials are rewriting who gets a seat at the table. 27.05.2026 4:50

Culture Pulse: 72. A $440 film. A Hollywood job offer. The credentialling argument for creative access just collapsed. Today's Pattern: before it's obvious. Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-05-27.html

No. 91: Heritage brands are making nostalgia do commercial work again. 26.05.2026 4:43

Culture Pulse: 68. Heritage stopped being backstory. Palace, Dunhill, and Kith are using history as a pricing mechanism, not a mood. Today's Pattern. #ThePatter Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-05-26.html

No. 90: Tech companies are lobbying the Pope. The authority gap just got theological. 25.05.2026 5:03

Culture Pulse: 72. Meta and Google lobbied the Vatican ahead of the AI encyclical. When tech seeks papal authority, the platform legitimacy era is over. @thepatternbrief Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-05-25.html

No. 89: Exploitation is the business model. Fashion just stopped hiding it. 24.05.2026 4:33

Culture Pulse: 72. Shein just bought Everlane. Fashion's ethical branding era didn't end with a scandal. It ended with an acquisition. Today's Pattern: authenticity ran out of places to hide. Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-05-24.html

No. 88: The hand is back. Craft just became the sharpest competitive signal. 23.05.2026 5:02

Culture Pulse: 74. The hand is back. Chanel, Cartier, JR on the Pont Neuf: irreproducibility is the moat. Scale was yesterday's play. Today's @ThePattern. Read the full edition: https://thepattern.media/editions/2026-05-23.html