https://techcrunch.com/2020/08/24/conan-is-coming-to-disrupt-2020/

In 2010, TV show host Conan O’Brien was abruptly asked to give up the time slot he’d been handed just six months earlier by his longtime employer NBC. Instead, he famously gave the network the figurative finger, taking his act to the basic cable network TBS later that same year and — embraced by legions of fans who tweeted “I’m with CoCo” in the aftermath of the NBC fiasco — launching an online media company of his own, Team Coco.

Network executives might have tried laughing off these moves, but O’Brien has in subsequent years become more ubiquitous, and more popular, than ever because of them. While TV viewing has grown increasingly splintered, he has attracted 28.5 million Twitter followers, and Team Coco has garnered more than 8 million YouTube subscribers. Meanwhile, his nearly two-year-old podcast, “Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend,” is now among the most popular podcasts in the country.