Sumner Redstone belonged to the Age of the Media Mogul, a time before Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Google, when street-smart executives like Rupert Murdoch, Barry Diller and John Malone brawled in a bid to dominate the world's screen time.

That era is all but done. The swashbucklers have essentially ceded the Hollywood stage to a group of cool-headed executives who like to give the impression they earn their billions more through their knowledge of algorithms than with the brutal tactics of corporate warfare.