Steve Safran
September 9th, 2006
Michael Rosenblum: Ideas, observations and what a pissed-off monk has in common with TV executives
There is a huge demand for content, but it is so spread out among channels and the web, that the old model of high expense for production no longer works.
Who is going to make this stuff? It’s the guy with the camera and the laptop.
There are vasts amounts of talent buried out there. The cameras and laptops allow them to come forward.
Rosenblum started “Trauma: Life in the ER” simply by hanging out at a hospital with a camcorder. Along with his future wife (and then future ex-wife…), he edited a presentation for The Learning Channel which immediately picked up 13 episodes at $200,000 per. Cost of production: two people, one camcorder, editing time.
He asks the bloggers: Who here would produce a show for $100,000? Everyone raises their hands. $90,000? No hands go down. $80,000? $70,000? You get the point. The price of production is no longer the issue. Have a quality idea and you can make it.
If you want to write, you sit down at your computer and write. Books aren’t written by Random House. Maybe you suck, maybe you’re great. Now, for the first time, cameras are cheap and the tools are there.
”Technology isn’t the mother of invention. What happens is, technology comes along and everyone says ‘Oh shit, get that thing out of here – it’s messing everything up!’ ”
What the printing press did was allow anyone with an idea to publish. (There is a marvelous routine Rosenblum does here that I cannot possibly do justice. Suffice to say it deals with Serfs, Monks, a lock on publishing the Bible and how Guttenberg screwed up their sweet deal.) What inexpensive video cameras and editing tools are doing is allowing anyone to publish video.
Television is controlled by ABC, CBS, NBC and the like. Little cameras are the Guttenberg press of the 21st century. They make it possible for anyone to publish in video – the lingua franca of the planet. Institutions will crumble. The power to change the world is in your hands with this technology.
Television no longer comes to us in a passive way. The means of publication and transmission is there. This is a dramatic democratic revolution – and you are all a part of it.
9 Comments Add your own
1. 5w50 | September 9th, 2006 at 11:06 am
Monorail, monorail, monorail.
From the Simpsons:
A fast-talking charmer (Phil Hartman) sells Springfield a monorail of dubious necessity and, Marge learns, highly dubious quality.
(FYI episode written by Conan O’Brien)
Just see any photographers’ board and you’ll see what’s really up.
In the United States … it doesn’t work.
2. Dan | September 9th, 2006 at 12:55 pm
Where do these concerns fit in to the discussion:
Newscasts:
- that used to have 12 minutes per hour of commercial
time now have twice that amount or more.
- that used to report the news, now spend many minutes per newscast, simply promoting the next story.
- that used to cover issues of importance to citizens
like city and state government, now don’t cover this
at all unless there is scandal.
- that make law breakers and police action the single, most important thing going on in their town.
How do these issues effect the number of viewers of a newscast? And how do they effect “who” is watching?
Or is the opinion that the newscast itself is not the concern, it’s simply that people don’t have time for it
anymore? And since viewership is going to be low,
then to survive you must produce a show at less cost.
Dan
3. Chris | September 10th, 2006 at 6:11 am
Rosenblum’s approach is also highly controversial among reporters. I’ve known many a talented broadcaster who left a station that was transitioning to a one-man-band system.
4. Dan2 | September 12th, 2006 at 1:39 am
Dan the word you are looking for is AFFECT not effect!
5. Tim Rutherford | September 12th, 2006 at 7:57 am
“It’s the GUY with the camera and the laptop.”
As for female reporters becoming VJ’s, I’ve worked with a whole lot of reporters who I believe,
simply could not do it.
Maybe they were just not good with electronics, or managing the subleties of a non-linear editor.
Or simply don’t want to be bothered.
You’re asking that the attractive 25 year old women working as TV reporters,
who grew up watching TV. praising TV,
and emulating all that is trendy on TV,
should now drop the makeup and the ruse,
and grab the camera, sticks and editor.
How many women in this business do you know that do that?
Some…
A few.
I don’t know any.
I’m sure there are some women doing a bang-up job with it professionally.
To me, it seems like a rare find.
When I do find her…beer’s on me.
Makes you wonder.
Will the business be trending towards more male VJ’s,
because of the inherent physical obstacles in gathering news?
I thought local news was now in the process of “feminization”.
Wasn’t local TV news being aimed at the women who actually watch the news at 5′o’clock.
All about the women…right?
I would very much like to meet the woman who steps up to the challenge of being a VJ.
If she showed up at one of my press conferences, she’d get plenty of help from me.
And props for making the effort.
6. Mateo | September 27th, 2006 at 12:57 pm
To 5w50:
Why won’t it work in the United States as opposed to Europe where it apparently is taking hold?
7. Current Thinking » &hellip | October 9th, 2006 at 10:04 pm
[...] I was a little taken aback, but the next day I realized I shouldn’t take it personally. He participated in a panel discussion at the regional RTNDA conference and it turned nasty quickly. Apparently he also lurks on a lot of online TV news discussion forums and lashes out at anyone who disagrees with his predictions of an all VJ-future… He may be a visionary, but maybe he’s not the best ambassador for the “future of television.” [...]
8. Harold&hellip | June 29th, 2007 at 7:34 am
Harold…
Many different ways to make money in the Computer Business Opportunity…
9. lisi | November 10th, 2007 at 4:58 am
Paradigm shift.on the flip side to tv becoming more interactive,which won’t truly happen til the tv is your pc,movies are becoming more technologically grandiose as the dawn of vr cinema fast approachs.
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