WNBC's move away from news at 5 p.m. with 'LX New York' could make waves in New York market

By Richard Huff
DAILY NEWS TV EDITOR
Tuesday, August 25th 2009, 4:00 AM

If a new promo for "LX New York" is any indication, WNBC/Ch.4's 5 p.m. time period will have a whole new feel come Sept. 14.

The tease, while giving no details about the content of "LX New York," is clearly telling viewers that what's ahead won't remotely resemble their father's newscast.

The show, less than a month away, may be the most closely watched launch in New York in a long time because it's a major directional change that could affect every other newsroom in town. The launch of "LX New York" is the first time one of the majors has fully turned over the time to an organization outside of the news wing.

No doubt, there should be some lament at the loss of news, anytime it happens. And rival journalists worry that if Ch. 4's shift works, their bosses will think dropping news is okay, too.

The idea behind "LX New York" is that it is not news, and offers an alternative to audiences not interested in news at 5 p.m.

More important to the equation, however, is that since "LX New York" is not a news product, but entertainment, the producers are able to build tie-ins with advertisers. Word is the show is drawing in new advertisers to the time period.

By working in product placements, the measure of success changes for "LX New York" because it's possible to make money, even if the ratings aren't spectacular.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv/2009/08/25/2009-08-25_wnbc_moves_away_from_news_at_5_pm_with_lx_new_york.html?print=1&page=all#ixzz0QbvqjqG3

NBC puts Jay Leno on the spot in competitive prime-time slot

By Marco R. Della Cava, USA TODAY

BURBANK, Calif. — Jay Leno never got the memo. The one that read: After nearly two decades topping the late-night ratings with The Tonight Show, it's time to sleep in late and buy more cars.

Instead, Leno, 59, has spent the summer buried under the hood of The Jay Leno Show(premiering Monday), NBC's bold and controversial attempt to battle 10 p.m. scripted dramas with his broad humor.

"Maybe it's just me, but 10 o'clock feels like the new 11:30," says Leno. "People have kids and jobs; they just don't stay up. For them, we've got some of our Tonight stuff, plus a whole lot more."

Few TV-world experiments are being as closely watched as this one. Leno is venturing into a territory dominated by dramas such as CBS' CSI: Miamiand The Mentalist as well as ABC's Private Practice. Such programs have the advantage of scoring well among the desirable 18-to-49 demographic, and the disadvantage of being expensive, says Chuck Ross, managing director of online trade publication TVWeek.com.

"Scripted dramas dominate with viewers, but each episode costs many millions, or likely a week's worth of Jay's shows," says Ross. "Leno's other advantage is he'll have 46 weeks of fresh programming going against reruns."

Ross adds that Leno faces two hurdles: earning ad dollars from a less lucrative audience (ages 50-up) and delivering that crowd to 11 p.m. newscasts and O'Brien.

An easy way to plug an advertiser in an era when TV commercials are at the mercy of the DVR. Leno describes himself as "advertiser friendly," and NBC has already struck a deal with McDonald's, whose Monopoly-based promotion will find Leno announcing the chain's ad featuring NBC stars. Visitors to McDonald's will be steered by placards to Leno's program.

Today's challenging economy could well rewrite the old ad playbook, says Brian Steinberg, TV editor at Advertising Age magazine. "We'll see how much he can weave into his show. Because when the ads are part of the program, you're less likely to hit the fast-forward button," he says.

Find this article at: http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2009-09-07-jay-leno_N.htm

Reluctant students of the classics, lend me your earbuds!

By Greg Toppo, USA TODAY

Kids, remember this name: Jenny Sawyer.

She may soon be American education's next "It" girl. Actually, make that its first and only "It" girl.

Only 24 and barely out of college, Sawyer has undertaken an audacious task: writing and shooting, with the help of a small band of filmmakers, more than 1,000 free, one-minute videos that help students understand and enjoy commonly assigned classic works of literature.

It'll take two years, thousands of hours on a Boston soundstage and countless outfit changes for Sawyer, the only person appearing on camera.

Her website, 60secondrecap.com, is scheduled to go live Tuesday with the first of 100 or so videos covering 10 universally loved (read: hated) works that teenagers have struggled to appreciate since English teachers first walked the Earth. Titles include: The Scarlet Letter, Of Mice and Men, Great Expectations, Hamlet and To Kill a Mockingbird.

U.S. Ad Spending

U.S. ad spending took a tumble during the first half of 2009 falling in almost every media and product category, according to Nielsen. A total of $56.9 billion was spent on advertising in the first six months of the year, more than $10.3 billion less than the same time period in 2008. Despite a 31% y/y drop, automotive remained the top product category, totaling $3.68 billion in spending through June. Sunday Supplements, Spot TV ads in smaller DMAs and magazine placements were among the hardest hit outlets. Cable TV was the only media category to see added spending with a 1.5% surge overall and a 0.6% increase for Spanish Language Cable TV. There were some growth categories, however, as ad spending on multi-function cell phones more than doubled to almost $233 million

Year-to-Year Change in Ad Spend, by Media
Media Category First Half 2009 vs. First Half 2008
Change
Cable TV 1.5%
Spanish Language Cable TV 0.6%
Internet -1.0%
FSI Coupon -5.5%
Network TV -7.0%
Network Radio -9.0%
Spot Radio -9.1%
Spanish Language TV -10.1%
Syndication TV -11.6%
Local Newspaper -13.2%
Outdoor -14.9%
Spot TV Top 100 DMAs -17.4%
National Magazine -21.2%
National Sunday Supplement -22.4%
National Newspaper -22.8%
Local Magazine -25.4%
B-to-B Magazines -31.8%
Spot TV 101-210 DMAs -32.1%
Local Sunday Supplements -45.7%
Grand Total -15.4%
Source: The Nielsen Company

It's all in the 'Modern Family': Comedy that's not so 'snarky'

By Gary Levin, USA TODAY
The classic sitcom family is about to get a makeover.
Modern Family, the centerpiece of ABC's new two-hour Wednesday comedy block, centers on three clans: a "traditional" family with mom, dad and three kids; a gay male couple who have just adopted a baby; and an older man (played by Married ... With Children's Ed O'Neill) and his much-younger Latina bride with a child of her own.

Family weaves stories about each of the families with mock-documentary "interviews" of them in a format similar to The Office. It isn't groundbreaking, but it reinvents a genre largely absent from network TV, where sitcoms have lately centered on groups of buddies and sex jokes.

Many of the situations in this situation comedy came from real life, says executive producer Christopher Lloyd. "Seventy-five percent of our stories are triggered by something that happened to us or writers in the room."

A fun surprise is that the pilot episode veers between the three separate family stories, revealing only at the end that they are connected: O'Neill's character is the father of Bowen's Claire and Jesse Tyler Ferguson's Mitchell, one of the gay dads.

The network's research revealed viewers would be more inclined to watch if they knew the show was about one big family rather than three separate ones, so promo spots airing for the last several weeks have already spoiled the surprise.

That "robs us of what we consider one of the greatest moments in the pilot, and that's a particularly tough thing for us to adjust to," Lloyd says. "We're not thrilled about it, but we fully understand why they're doing it."

TV producers/advertisers hope to make Nielsen ratings a thing of the past

Nielsen ratings have always been an imperfect system of projecting who is watching what when. The advent of DVR technology and internet-streamed programming have made the television ratings game even more challenging.

So the major TV companies -- General Electric's NBC Universal, Time Warner , News Corp., Viacom, CBS Corp., and Walt Disney -- have teamed together to fight against Nielsen, which not only delivers arguably flawed data, but charges a hefty fee to do so.

Advertisers, meanwhile, are also hoping for a new solution to figuring out the best time slots to reach a captive audience.Procter & Gamble  and AT&T  are already on board with the media giants to develop a better system that would measure viewership across multiple platforms. (Currently, Nielsen polls 18,000 homes and tracks their viewing habits via a special remote control).

The consortium's plan is expected to sign contracts for other companies who develop reliable ways of measuring viewers across all digital sources, including Hulu. No word on how the consortium proposes to measure iTunes downloads. 

Could this change the TV-ratings landscape? All of a sudden, will American Idol lose luster while 30 Rock rockets to the top of the charts? Or will Nielsen maintain its stranglehold of the ratings game? Stay tuned.

Beth works for The Options News Network (www.ONN.tv), which provides daily stock and options commentary. The above comments are not intended as trading advice.

How Will Television Reinvent Itself?

Because of growing competition and dwindling TV ad dollars, the big networks will be forced to make major changes, and fast

By Ronald Glover and Tom Lowry

It's not easy being a network executive these days. Consider the challenges: While NBC, ABC, CBS, and Fox continue to siphon upwards of 60% of the television advertising dollars and to attract the biggest audiences, broadcast revenues are down an estimated 9% this year and may never be what they once were. Competition, meanwhile, is everywhere. The cable guys are making some of the most popular shows on TV and are pressing for an increasing share of advertising dollars as companies target the kind of audience niches in which the likes of AMC, TNT, and Bravo specialize. And it goes without saying that the array of entertainment options—YouTube clips of improbable Scottish singers, online games, pirated movies and TV shows—is luring eyeballs away from destination television.

For decades network TV has been about reach. Programmers traditionally chose shows with broad appeal, the better to get millions of viewers and, in turn, persuade national advertisers to buy those eyeballs. That era is essentially over and the networks are scrambling to adapt to a fragmented landscape where even popular shows are lucky to pull in 10 million viewers. "They have to rethink what they put on the air, how many hours they'll do it, everything in their playbook," says a former top executive who now produces TV shows.

Read this fascinating Business Week article that discusses the future of TV by Clicking Here.

A series of articles and other resources on the Future of Television can be found by Clicking Here.