Staci Kramer took over the reins in the third panel, Social Media Meets Hollywood. Joining her on stage were:
- George Kliavkoff, CEO of NBC/News Corp.’s new site.
- Ilene Chaiken, Executive Producer the L World, CEO OurChart.com
- Alan Citron, GM TMZ.com
- Carson Daly, Host Last Call with Carson Daly
- David Eun, VP Content Partnerships Google
- George Kliavkoff, Chief Digital Officer NBCU
This was one of the panels I was looking forward to, given that our WatchMojo.com is a major producer of content. Nestled in between the TV content atop the content pyramid and on top of UGC, this one was of special interest to me.
Kliavkoff - who deserves some credit for making MLB.com the best sports league website around before moving to NBC - is now doubling up duties as Chief Digital Officer of NBC as well as CEO of the new NBC/News Corp. NewSite project, called by outsiders NewYtube…
Anyway, he started off with a refreshing take on things: ”the more time consumers spend interacting with our media, the longer they will watch it on the couch.” Of course, this got me to thinking: Interesting that the end goal is the couch, ie. TV, are TV networks aware that wireless and web (all broadband outlets) represent a challenge to TVs or not? I myself have long argued that what you see on TV and the Web will differ due to economics and what you will see on the Web and wireless will differ due to technology, but the fact is that content will overlap in many ways, and so long as TV heads see the TV as the end goal, they might be in for some hard times. More on this at the end, under the question I wanted to ask but never did…
Kliavkoff’s main theme was that:
- “NBC views the Web as the great marketing tool it is, and not a threat.
- The wisdom of masses will suggest who the best directors.
- Tens of millions of dollars required to market traditional shows, so any a network can get in data is perfect and welcome, in fact they have seen a correlation between blogs mentioning of shows, blgos mentioning of shows in a positive light, with a) SEO optimizization and b) ratings… lesson: the public knew the results before the results were in.
Then it was onto TMZ.com’s Citron, with whom I chatted the earlier night at the pre conference mixer. Naturally, Alec Baldwin’s tirade came up, Citron mentioned that the most powerful thing of it all is that “the feedback rolls in after we get a story and publish it, and then the comments ricochet around the Web.” He joked that TMZ knows when something is going to be off the charts when the “paparazzi or agent threatens to sue you or other sites start to ask for permission to use the content…
Should be noted that TMZ.com has been around for 18 months, and it has a lot of offline mojo going now. Part of the AOL Time Warner empire, naturally that helps.
Citron seems like one of those nice guys who’s just having a good time and gets the broader context of Time Warner and that TMZ is one small part, its success does not seem to have gotten to his head; you wouldn’t know that he could seamlessly destoy your reputation in a heartbeat with one video upload… that was a joke Allan (please)?
The L Word/OurChart.com’s Chaiken then was asked “Does every show need a social network?”
“No, every show has some manifestation in this medium, but does not need a social network per se. There was no social network for lesbians… ” - although what about dating sites methought, or even something like Craigslist.org? Then again, I wasn’t moderating the shindig…
There was a theme that the
- Web is a sandbox and a project could grow to be something more on TV.
- Can this medium be an end to itself?
- Can it have value just on the Web?
It was refreshingly honest and not a wrong perspective, rather, it’s a reflection of the “Hollywood crowd’s vantage point,” I’d say.
Carson Daly - who joked what am I doing here? - added that “as the Web grows, there will be more and more stand alone” properties and projects, listing Rosie Odonnell as one example. “She’s a premium personality,” indeed she is, indeed she is Carson.
I’m not a Daly viewer, mainly due to the time it’s on. When asked about the “importance of social media?”; Daly was quick to answer: “My show is on the middle of the night…” suggesting to one of the main values TV gets from the Web… reaching folks when the show is long off the air, though that suggests a threat to them as well.
I’m sure he’s got as many fans as he’s got denigrators, but the fact is he seems very down to earth for a young TV guy and the best part is that he seems to get the value and place of the Web in the landscape. I also did not have a clue as to how low budget his operation is, or maybe he just wants to portray it that way. In that light, WatchMojo.com just might be the Web’s answer to Late Night with Carson Daly. Oh-oh, did I just say that? But the point is that Daly seems to take a very hands-on and low overheard operation to his show, saying that he will scour MySpace, for example, to line up music acts himself. Daly will be working on some .TV domain name extension, will report as that comes up.
Citron then took over the mike and added something that is obvious [to some] but important: “I had a smart boss who once said that everythng is additive. Imus can go to the Web or satellite, and that’s positive thing.” He’s right, the Web does not take away, in theory, it adds to TV networks’ audiences, so I was priming myself to ask the question I never did… more on that later.
Google’s David Eun’s was an interesting addition to the panel, since so much of what his company is doing seems to be at odds with the TV networks vision of how and what the web needs to fit in their landscape. This of course, is evidenced by Viacom’s $1B lawsuit against Google’s YouTube.
Eun started off by stressing that Google is in this for the long haul, despite its leadership position with YouTube: ”it’s ok not to be first, but you don’t want to last [in video], it’s very early.” You get a sense that YouTube understands its size will hurt its chances with the big networks, as YouTube is going for the middle part of the maket, the so-called torso area of the video landscape. Eun positioned YouTube’s value proposition quite well: ”Leverage the data and demo you get on YouTube to do your own thing.”
When Kramer asked about the legal cloud overhanging Google, “the IP issue is being worked out, but YouTube is about more than just copyrighted stuff,” once again hinting at torso power.
He conceded that no one has really figured out the right balance of ads and content in video programming, regarding “Preroll/Postrolls”, Eun added “No one knows. We want to experiment and try different combinations of things… we’re syndicating content and then embedding ads, then syndicated it to thousands of sites in Ad Sense, but in terms of how long should an ad be, the frequency, etc… all that remains to be seen.”
One thing is clear, YouTube “does not favor pre-rolls…”
Google would know since YouTube scaled because of that… though YouTube could not run ads because it did not have rights to the content.
Kliavkoff added that “users will tell us if (the ads) are too little or too much.”
There was some talk of whether online video is a manifestation of the “15 seconds of fame” syndrome, and whether only the incentive to be famous for 15 seconds will drive users to upload low budget content for free. What will happen when the “revenue realization kicks in?”
Eun said that the “15 seconds motivation does not go away,” let’s hope he’s right cause that drives YouTube.
All in all, a good panel.
My question:
It could be argued that print media companies (newspapers and magazines) underestimated the real threat and opportunity of digital, and when they realized how large digital media could be, it was too late and they got defensive. This explains why they are in trouble now. But the fact is that had they embraced digital, they would have chased high-growth opportunities that yielded low absolute revenues at the expense of their core offline business. So the question is: is TV willing to risk cannibalizing their $250B from offline - of which $75B is advertising alone - to position themselves for the smaller but high-growth online business?
Any takers? I would asked this question, but after putting the first panel speakers on the spot, I figured I should avoid being tagged the doomsday scenario questioner…
Related:
- Understanding TV executives envy and angst
- will digital revenues ever be incremental?
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