Major kids platforms and revenue streams for the kids business, including Roblox, Spotify and  others, were down Monday as part of an Amazon Web Services outage, which highlights how important it is for producers to diversify their business.

Producers with Roblox games say the industry dodged a bullet. The disruption only lasted roughly three hours; since it was resolved quickly, producers with Roblox games told Kidscreen that, while any outage affects their wallets, this one didn’t have a huge impact. And Dubit, which has made multiple Roblox games for kids, including ones for brands such as Nascar and Elf on the Shelf, tells Kidscreen that the damage was limited because of when the outage happened: early enough that it was resolved before much of North America was awake.

This sort of disruption is a (thankfully) low-cost reminder of how important it is to not just count on one platform when it comes to reaching kids, producers say.

“Since it wasn’t terribly long, we were OK,” says Catherine Winder, CEO of Vancouver-based Wind Sun Sky, which launched the Roblox game Future Chicken Obby (1.8 million visits) in 2023. “However, given our industry is essentially digital first, I think producers are at risk, given how centralized the internet infrastructure is—and the potential massive ripple effect, should a much larger outage take place.”

That centralization is also a concern for Ken Faier, president and CEO of Epic Story Media. “If Roblox and our mobile games were offline, then it definitely hits our wallet,” he says. “It certainly shows how reliant companies and governments get with major US tech companies.”

It’s a similar story for podcasts, since Spotify was down, too. Focusing on just one platform is not the key to podcast success, notes Ira Singerman. A former Cyber Group Studios exec, Singerman now works with Tumble Media, consulting the kids business on podcasts. His advice to podcast creators is to be on Apple, Spotify and YouTube. “Just like most content endeavors these days, we always recommend being on as many platforms as possible,” he says, not only for instances like this, but also “primarily for reach, convenience and ubiquity.”

While Roblox and Fortnite—two major gaming platforms for kids—were disrupted, YouTube and TikTok were unaffected, as were many standalone apps with their own kids audiences. And don’t forget about linear channels just because Roblox is so hot, notes Faier. “We need to be wherever kids are. Linear, FAST, AVOD, Roblox, live, you name it.”

It’s a familiar refrain, but it never rings as true as when platforms that businesses count on go down.

“The outage validates, confirms and reminds me not to have all eggs in one basket,” says Winder. “It is critical to diversify the platforms we are building our content on with the goal (if possible) of not being overly dependent on any one format for long-term sustainability in your business.”

Image courtesy of Roblox.