Jill Goldsmith Co-Business EditorMedia patriarch John Malone in a rare appearance said he’d pushed DirecTV to buy Netflix when he was chairman of the satellite broadcaster – a position he held from 2008 to 2010.The Liberty Media founder and chairman said he had invited Hastings to a Liberty board meeting “and he assured us all that he had no intention of producing his own content ..
to which I responded ‘bullsh-t.’ It was clear where he was headed. If he didn’t understand [yet], he would.,” the man regarded of one of media’s savviest investors said at the Paley Conference where he was interviewed by longtime colleague Mike Fries, CEO of Liberty Global. “I tried when I chaired DirecTV to acquire Netflix and that was when he [Hastings] was.