Archive for June 17th, 2007
Since ABC made the landmark decision to put many of its shows on iTunes - there’s been a mad rush to put traditional TV content online. But there’s one group that’s still pretty much tied to their TV set: the deaf and hard of hearing. Most of that video content makes it to the web without captions. TVWeek says it really isn’t a cost issue - at about $200 per program. TVWeek asked several major players about captioning plans - CBS, ABC, Apple and The CW had no comment or no plans. Fox says it is working on it - and NBC said its new player, set to debut this fall will have captions. PBS already offers captions on many of its shows.
June 17th, 2007
Broadcasting and Cable says NBCU CEO Jeff Zucker has a new target in his sights: Daily Show anchor Jon Stewart. B&C says Zucker “wined and dined” Stewart and his agent recently for “exploratory” talks. If that isn’t juicy enough, the magazine says Conan O’Brien’s succession to the Tonight Show in 2009 may not be a certainty. With the Tonight Show an oasis among NBC’s ratings woes, the network could opt to pull the rip cord on a $40 million golden parachute for O’Brien, and keep Jay Leno in place. Either way, NBC will have a hole to fill at 12:35 a.m….
June 17th, 2007
Brightcove has inked a company-wide deal with the Fox Entertainment Group to power online video spanning its network, studio, cable and local affiliate websites. The first properties to roll out the new service will be FX Networks, SPEED and Fox Broadcasting. Brightcove has been making great strides in the broadcast media space — the company recently signed a deal with CBS and CBS News.
The immediate upside is Fox video will now be shareable with copy-paste players — a basic Brightcove feature. Press release…
Read the full post June 17th, 2007
Despite all the new ways of getting news, The Atlantic Monthly (sub req.) reports that Americans don’t know appreciably more about current events than they did before 24/7 news became the norm. There is an exception: People who get their news from the web and viewers of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report know a lot more about the news. A Pew Research Center study found that Americans’ awareness of the U.S. government, current events and international affairs is pretty much the same as it was in 1989. However…
The most knowledgeable Americans were those who got their news from the Web sites of major papers and those who watched programs like The Colbert Report or The Daily Show; they correctly answered 54 percent of the questions about current affairs, while regular viewers of local TV news and network morning shows got only about 35 percent right.
Of course, there’s the question of cause and effect here: it’s possible Daily Show and Colbert watch those shows because they know more about the news - a prerequisite to understanding the jokes. Still, in case you think we pop culture junkies are wasting our brain cells - “Respondents who demonstrated a “high” knowledge of politics and world events were also adept at identifying celebrities such as Beyoncé Knowles.” (Thanks, LR alumnus Frank!)
June 17th, 2007
GE still may be in the hunt to snatch Dow Jones from the hands of News Corp., the Wall Street Journal reports. GE’s NBC Universal is said to be in discussions with Pearson PLC to make a joint bid for Dow Jones. The deal would reportedly put CNBC, the Wall Street Journal, Pearson’s Financial Times newspaper and Dow Jones’ other businesses into a new privately-held venture. The Bancroft family would keep a minority stake in the new company. The Wall Street Journal says News Corp. is becoming increasingly frustrated with negotiations: “We’re not going to spend $5 billion and then leave them the keys to the house,” an unnamed News Corp. source said.
June 17th, 2007
Over the weekend, MSNBC weighed in on my earlier post analyzing the new Nielsen-Netratings data that shows CNN Digital Network surged above MSNBC in the May web rankings. “This lift is a result of their new definition,” explains MSNBC.com’s Gina Stykes, pointing to CNN’s recent investment and partnership with Internet Broadcasting, which appears to have resulted in CNN rolling up Internet Broadcasting’s unique users (minus NBC’s owned-and-operated stations, which did not take part in the IB-CNN deal). “The year-over-year data show that without the new partnership, CNN.com would be down 7% year-over-year, while MSNBC.com increased 14% in the same period,” Stykes explained.
Two Lost Remote readers who are knowledgeable with the CNN-IB deal confirmed Internet Broadcasting’s uniques have been rolled up into the CNN Digital Network — which goes to show, it’s all how you slice it in the metrics.
June 17th, 2007
One graph says so much…
It’s from this story in NYTimes.com that provides a terrific overview of mobile initiatives at media companies like ESPN and CBS. Meanwhile, MTV is planning to air a half-hour TV special that originated from its original mobile series, Dances From Tha Hood.
June 17th, 2007
NYTimes.com leads Nielsen-Netratings’ list of the top newspaper sites in May.
June 17th, 2007
Nielsen has released a report that attributes the recent drop in ratings to DVRs. “When DVR playback is included, people are watching the same amount of—or in some cases more—television than they did a year ago,” the report said. “Almost all viewing declines this season can be attributed to the increase in DVR use.” Well, except for broadcast primetime, which is down 3 percent even when you account for DVRs. So is this good news for television? Not when you consider around 60 percent of that time-shifted viewing is without commercials.
June 17th, 2007
In a must-read article in Newsweek, MLB’s BAM details the start of the company and the successes they have enjoyed. The stats are impressive: a growth rate of 30%, 50 million uniques a month, 1 million paying subscribers, $80 million in merchandise, and a billion minutes of streaming video. MLB took an unusual approach to launching the operation in 1999 when it launched as a separate company. Each team invested $2.6 million to get it started. That leads to an obvious question: How much has your station invested in the online operation to make it succeed?
June 17th, 2007
