Story behind Drudge’s Prince Harry ‘exclusive’
So you’ve likely heard by now that the Drudge Report outed Prince Harry’s 10-week tour in Afghanistan, which amazingly, the British press had agreed to keep secret all along. Now the NY Times published a story that reveals that Drudge wasn’t the first to break it. Way back on January 7th, an Australian magazine had [...]
YouTube to offer live video
While several sites have started to offer live video streaming capabilities, that feature has been missing from the internet’s largest video site, YouTube. Well, according to video blogger and lifecaster Sarah Meyers from pop17.com, live video is coming to YouTube this year. YouTube says that Google’s resources are making it a reality. (Via TechCrunch) Meyers [...]
Zucker takes sucker punch at print reporters
“The thing they want is for the [TV news] business to die faster [than the newspaper business], because that’s what makes them feel better.” That’s NBCU chief Jeff Zucker’s take on why print reporters have gone after NBC News’ efforts to downsize and adjust to changing viewership patterns.
Bush presser kept off NBC to benefit MSNBC
If it wasn’t obvious before, NBC signaled that everything after 7:25am on the Today show is no-news zone. President Bush held a news conference in the 10 a.m. ET hour – which was carried on ABC, CBS and all the cable news nets. But not NBC – which is the only of the broadcast networks [...]
‘First Flash-driven site’ for pro sports
The Seattle Sonics have just debuted a new site, Supersonics.com, that they say is the “first Flash-driven site in major professional team sports.” The site took 2,000 hours and $100k to build, and it’s certainly a unique experience. “It is a much more immersive and high fidelity experience,” said Cypress Consulting founder Nate Thompson, the [...]
Hulu to add Warner Brothers content?
While Hulu is still not out of beta, it’s a great site. I’ve watched many shows, and enjoy the experience. Well, that experience might get even better as more content is added. According to NewTeeVee, Warner Brothers will add their programs to Hulu. WB produces several shows on their co-owned CW, as well as shows [...]
Study on local TV news ads, websites
Hearst-Argyle and Magid teamed up for a research study (of local news viewers 25-54) that drilled down on the effectiveness of ads in TV newscasts compared to other programming. “Respondents reported that ads on local TV news drive greater product/service awareness than those within any other program type,” reads a press release previewing the results. The same study also looked at the power of local TV websites. “After search engines, local TV news websites are the most frequently used for local news and weather.” And interestingly, the study found that “online video viewing of local TV news content is higher than that for any other genre,” 37% for local news compared to 31% each for cable news and primetime programming.
Update: Aaron points out in comments that the study was isolated to local news viewers, 25-54, which naturally would result in a local TV skew. This is one of the biggest dangers, in my opinion, of local TV research. By limiting the sample to TV viewers, we’re missing some of the more disturbing trends in our industry. For example, why is an increasing number of 20 and 30-somethings not watching local TV news? Is it just because of the internet, or it also because of a “live, local and latebreaking” style that these same consultants have spread across the country? What can local media operations — don’t call them local TV stations, anymore — do to get in front of this? I do, however, applaud the effort to trumpet the many positives of local TV news programming and local TV websites, two terrific platforms for local advertisers.
More nuggets in the press release below…
Briefs: iPhone, NBC Direct, MSNBC, TMZ
- Apple to announce “exciting new enteprise features” for iPhone – NBC Direct revamping with P2P deal with Pando Networks – MSNBC sets all-time ratings record with Democratic debate – TMZ-branded video channel to debut on MySpace
Gannett out to ‘re-engineer’ its TV stations
There are some interesting nuggets in this interview with Dave Lougee, the president of Gannett Broadcasting. First off, Lougee said the group’s TV sites are close to launching new designs with a new video player. (Let us know when you see one launch.) Plus, Gannett is getting ready to roll out Metromix entertainment sites in [...]
Lin planning entertainment niche sites
Similar to the Gannett interview above, there’s some news in this TVNewsday interview with Lin TV’s online chief, Robb Richter. “It was just unbelievable the traffic we got and the interest we got on those sites.” Richter says about Lin’s network of 17 political microsites on Super Tuesday. As we’ve reported before, Lin has purchased [...]
Ongoing discussions in ‘The Circuit’
It’s always challenging get the conversation rolling in a new discussion forum, so please help us out on The Circuit, Lost Remote’s new forum for media/technology folks who want to vent, share ideas or ask questions to the group. There are three ongoing discussions: – Journalists and their political Facebook groups – Two-person [...]
‘Quarterlife’ debuts with miserable ratings
How bad were the ratings for the web original show Quarterlife when it premiered on NBC this week? It was “the network’s worst time-period performance in at least 17 years,” says Hollywood Reporter. Why? Let’s count the reasons, shall we? First, the show has already run on MySpace. Second, it premiered on MTV earlier on [...]
Obama’s big local web buy
WFAA.com and DallasNews.com are serving this big expandable Obama ad. Once it resolves, it has an embedded player and a link to find voting locations. (Full disclosure: Both those sites are owned by Belo, the same company that owns KING5.com, where I work.) Update: Obama also bought the same ad on 24 other sites, including [...]
Newspaper job ads ‘ineffective,’ HotJobs grows
Another nail in the coffin for print recruitment ads, this time from Classified Intelligence, which conducted a study on the effectiveness of job postings in newspapers. A survey of HR execs revealed that print is the most ineffective way to find good job candidates. So what’s the most effective? HotJobs. Explains Editor & Publisher, “Classified [...]
‘Wire’ files obit for newspapers
Do you watch The Wire on HBO? It’s a great show, a crime drama based in Baltimore, but recently it’s been chronicling the decline of the Baltimore Sun. Turns out, series creator David Simon used to be a reporter for the Sun. And go figure, not everyone is happy about the newspaper subplot on the [...]
First NFL, now MLB imposes online restrictions
This shouldn’t surprise you. Major League Baseball is instituting new restrictions for web content. Websites will now be held to two minutes of video (or audio) a day gathered at MLB facilities — but formal press conferences are exempt to this rule. Similar to the NFL, there’s no live streaming. But in an unique twist, [...]
The Rivers duo covers the Oscars
This was an interesting content strategy from the AOL blog Stylist. They had Joan and Melissa Rivers cover the Red Carpet in a video for the site. According to the site, it’s been viewed over 250,000 times. No matter your opinion on the duo, there is an audience for them, and a blog was their [...]
Cable, satellite continue battle with NFL Net
The NFL Network, which would like each and every cable and satellite user in the country to indirectly pay for its niche service (end mini-rant) continues to wrestle with providers over carriage. An appeals court reversed a lower court ruling that backed up Comcast’s decision to sweep the channel to a sports tier. The NFL [...]
