THE VIDEO RACE IS ON
THE OTHER LEG OF THE VIDEO RACE
WHITHER THE WIDGET
NOTES FOR REPORTERS
STEPPING INTO THE WAYBACK MACHINE
KIDS SAY EMAIL IS, LIKE, SOOO DEAD
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
THE VIDEO RACE IS ON: And television is still the rabbit of the race, but the tortoise, otherwise known as online video, is going to make a run for it. And, according to research by The Nielsen Company, both may come out winners. The study commissioned by the Cable and Telecommunications Association for Marketing found that traditional home television ratings are minimally, if at all, affected by broadband video viewing over the Internet because broadband viewing was largely incremental NEW viewing rather than substitute viewing. A third of those surveyed (33%) said watching video over broadband Internet actually increased their television viewing time, compared to one out of seven (13%) who said it decreased their traditional television viewing. It may reach what the study authors called a “Tipping Point” when Internet video becomes more easily accessible on home television sets. Another study, this one by comScore, says watching video on the Internet has become “standard practice” for Web users. Its Video Metrix report found that three quarters (74%) of Web users (about 132 Million Americans) watched an average of more than two and a half hours of videos (158 minutes, to be exact) during the month of May.
Need More Proof? Niche online video company Next New Networks, launched by former Nickelodeon president Herb Scannell, says its independent film-themed site, Indy Mogul, generated more than a million video streams in June. Former United Talent Agency exec Brett Weinstein has left the firm to head a Web video startup. Video content site Veoh has expanded its user base to 14.3 Million as of June. Video content site Revver has upped the ante on videos produced and aired on its site by users. TV/ Internet combo Babelgum (the main competitor to Joost, mentioned in previous MfM’s) has struck a deal to offer more than 200 hours of documentary programming for its video service. And Joost continues to line up more sponsors and more video partnerships, it seems, every day.
THE OTHER LEG OF THE VIDEO RACE: Marketing research firm eMarketer says in 2011, the “floodgates” of online video advertising (note the addition of the word – advertising) will open up. In that year, it projects spending on online video advertising will reach $4.3 Billion. However, to put that in perspective, television advertising in 2011 is projected to be $46.3 Billion. (Also, as reported by BusinessWeek.com, the eMarketer report said that online video advertising in 2011 will account for only $1 for each $10 of total Internet advertising. So, does that mean Internet advertising will be $43 Billion in 2011?) To add another layer of perspective, many of you will remember from a previous MfM the unusual fact that newspapers are actually leading the way in online video advertising. Still, the folks at eMarketer insist that the line between television and web video will be “so blurred” that advertisers will begin directing more of their marketing budgets to the online version and that they will “converge.” Another caveat -- BusinessWeek.com cited a study by Burst Media that three quarters of the users (77%) found online ads intrusive. But then again, we’ve heard that about TV ads as well.
Need More Proof? Website NewTeeVee says car advertisers are leading the way in online video advertising, especially in high definition. And we all know how important car advertisers are to business. More than 30 car manufacturers have launched a website that provides test drivers and 360-degree virtual tours of their cars. The website, DriverTV, has been named one of the 50 best websites of 2007 by Time.com.
WHITHER THE WIDGET: Also from the pages of BusinessWeek, a story about widgets, and the prediction that they may be a “web revolution in the making.” Okay, folks, you heard it here first in the June 19th edition of MfM. To remind you, widgets are software modules that you drag and drop on your website, other websites, your personal page of your social network or your blog, and they will link to just about anything. Some people use them for selling products; storing their favorite song of the day, news snippets or video clips. The Business Week article cites, as an example, the NBA’s widgets which have generated more than 100 million views from 175,000 locations. The article claims that there are dozens of widget makers in Silicon Valley, commanding valuations north of $100 Million.
NOTES FOR REPORTERS: It’s almost standard advice from us consultants in broadcast news writing workshops that you have only have six to eight seconds to grab the viewers’ attention. The point was driven home in a writing workshop I attended this weekend (Yes, I not only give writing workshops, I attend them.) Ralph McInerney, author of the Father Dowling Mystery series, told of visiting a publishing house and watching a secretary go through the ‘slush pile’ of manuscripts. She would open up the manila envelope, read the first few lines, and then drop a standard rejection letter into the envelope, put it in the out-going mail box and go on to the next one. And the same thing happened again and again. So, that’s why we tell you to make your lead ‘grabby.’
KIDS SAY EMAIL IS, LIKE, SOOO DEAD: That was the too cute, but funny, headline on a CNet story that may mark a major trend development. Staff Writer Stefanie Olsen says a check of teen entrepreneurs found that many, if not most, of them are using social networks like Facebook or MySpace to communicate with friends and that e-mail is for “professional relationships or communicating with adults.”
TOO IMPORTANT NOT TO MENTION: Despite extensive coverage. The decision by Nielsen/ Net Ratings to change the way it ranks the most popular Websites. Instead of counting unique users, it rates the time an average user spends on a site. Based on the new system, AOL leaped to the front of the pack as the #1 Website, ahead of Google, Yahoo, MySpace, and MSN. Nielsen competitor comScore ranked AOL second, below Yahoo but above Google, based on unique visitors.
STEPPING INTO THE WAYBACK MACHINE: Returning to last year’s MfM’s, the news was minorities in the media with the annual RTNDA/ Ball State University survey showing the level of minority representation in television newsrooms (at 22.2%) was – well ahead of the 13.7% reported for newspapers but well behind the 33.6% minority population in the U.S. as a whole. A survey by public relations firm Manning Selvage and Lee in the summer of last year reported that nearly half of advertising executives said they had paid for broadcast or editorial placement of their products.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: A story carried by the Associated Press reports several people have been struck by lighting while listening to their iPod, or other personal electronic devices such as beepers, Walkman, and laptop computers outdoors during storms. A study released by The Media Audit of radio formats found that listeners to Christian Contemporary are more likely to be affiliated with the Republican Party while Urban Adult Contemporary listeners are more likely to identify themselves as Democrat. News/Talk/Sports was the second highest ranking format among Republicans while Rhythm and Blues/ Urban Jazz had the second highest following among Democrats. According to a Pew Research Center survey, helping with the household chores is almost as important to a happy marriage as good sex. The most important part of a happy marriage is faithfulness (cited by 93%) and that has stayed true every year of the survey. Sexual relations (70%) comes in second. But helping with the household chores moved up dramatically (from 47% in 1990 to 62%). What’s equally interesting is that EVERYBODY -- men and women, younger and older, singles and married -- said the same thing about household chores. The report also cited an earlier University of Maryland report that fathers spent 9.6 hours a week on household chores, double the hours (4.4) cited in 1965, but that is still only about half as much time as mothers (18.1 hours).
And in what may be an ironic twist and an appropriate way to end this Internet vs. TV edition of MfM, the Pew Research Center also reports that many Americans are aware of the Spoof Campaign Videos produced by the various Presidential candidates’ campaigns for the web. But most of them had heard about them or seen them on TV, not on the Internet.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Friday, July 27, 2007
Monday, July 23, 2007
Message From Michael -- July 16, 2007
DON’T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY
THE DEVIL IS IN THE DETAILS
TO BE JOURNALISM OR NOT TO BE JOURNALISM
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
DISCLAIMER: This week’s edition of MfM is a little longer than usual, because there were three significant studies that came out and that I am going to attempt to summarize briefly. Which leads to disclaimer number two, they are so brief that they are subject to some distortion of interpretation.
DON’T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY: And if you remember the line from the old Sam Cook song about teen love, you will remember that Sam also didn’t know much about biology, science, French and algebra. Well, now add to that – News. According to a survey by the Joan Shorenstein on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University, teenagers and young adults are paying less attention to news than their counterparts of two or three decades ago. No news there, but the DEGREE OF DISCONNECT is news – not just newspapers, but national and local television, radio and the Internet. One out of four teens (28%) and one out of four young adults (24%) paid almost no attention to news, whatever the source. And another third of the teens (32%) and another quarter of the young adults (24%) paid little or no attention to three of the mediums and made only ‘moderate’ use of the fourth. Simply put, “daily news is not an integral part of the daily lives of most teens and young adults.” The survey showed that while teenagers and young adults may say they watch, read or listen to the news (because it is the ‘socially desirable response’), in actual fact they ‘skim’ the newspaper, watch TV for a ‘short while,’ listen to news on radio when it ‘happens to come on’ and read news on the Internet when they ‘come across’ it.
HARD NEWS VERSUS SOFT NEWS: The Shorenstein report also found that the difference in familiarity between hard news stories (such as the 400-point plunge in the Dow at the time) and soft news stories (such as Anna Nicole Smith’s death) was “nothing short of extraordinary.” Three out of four (75%) of the respondents OF ALL AGES knew about the typical soft news story while less than half (45%) knew about the typical hard news story. And two thirds (68%) correctly identified the factual elements of a soft news story while less than half again (45%) did so for the hard news story. A “puzzling finding”, according to the survey, was that while other research shows older adults are more likely to discuss public affairs, younger adults were three times more likely to say they had heard about a story from another person – although, in most cases it was a soft news story. The report did note that many hard news stories “have a numbing sameness – another act of Congress or another presidential speech – that can block them from memory even when they get heavy coverage.”
THE NEW MEDIA ROLE: Yes, the Internet is an important source for news for teenagers and young adults, according to the report. But it is a matter of degree. Two out of five teens (41%) and young adults (47%) say they became aware of a story through TV while only one in five (18%) say they became aware of a story through the Internet. Interestingly, one in four teenagers (28%) and one in ten young adults (12%) say they found out about a story through ‘another person.’ The report says Radio is actually the most “underrated news medium” because of its large “inadvertent news audience.”
THE NEW NEWS MATRIX. In the “old days,” there was a correlation between news interest and news consumption regardless of the medium, says the report. Mom and Dad read the morning newspaper at the breakfast table and would watch the evening news. By default the kids acquired a news habit of their own, almost because they had no choice. The report says this “forced feeding” of the news habit came to an end in the 1980’s with the spread of cable television. Now the big question mark is whether the Internet will make news consumption greater because of its 24/7 availability or break down news consumption even more because of that same on-demand feature. The problem, say the researchers, is that online news exposure is less fixed by time, place and routine – elements that have a ritual ability to reinforce news habits. Now news consumption becomes more ‘inadvertent.’ And even though young people may say they are interested in news, their behavior says otherwise. It may be a matter of different medium for different needs. Newspapers for public affairs coverage; Television for entertainment programs; the Internet for gaming and social interaction. The report authors say media use today is largely a solitary affair that only reinforces existing preferences and doesn’t create news ones, like news use. They quote Aristotle who wrote, “We are what we repeatedly do.” The fact that young people don’t repeatedly ‘do news’ is “a basis for pessimism about the future of daily news and young adults.”
You can access the full report at: http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/presspol/carnegie_knight/young_news_web.pdf
THE DEVIL IS IN THE DETAILS: Several recent reports cited a study by Edison Media Research that the Internet is close to beating television as “most essential” medium. In keeping with MfM’s focus on going behind the headlines, we can say -- WRONGO-GONGO. The Internet has beaten Television. At least, for people under the age of 44. Not only that, the Internet beats out television as the “most cool” and “exciting” medium for people under the age of 54 as well. Some consolation for my television brethren, on the flip side of the equation, more people (24%) deemed the Internet the “least essential” medium, compared to television (18%) and radio (18%). No consolation for my newspaper brethren, newspapers were deemed the “least essential” medium by more people (35%) than any other media. All this represents a fairly dramatic change from when the survey was taken five years ago in 2002.
Not surprisingly, the Internet beat out Television by a whopping 15 percentage points (46% to 31%) among the 12-17 crowd when it came to “most essential.” Somewhat surprisingly, the Internet also beat out Television by a substantial 12 percentage points (40% to 28%) among the 35-44 crowd in that arena. The race was much tighter among the 18-24 group (38% to 35%) and the 25-34 group (38% to 33%). It’s only when you get to the 45—plus crowd that Television beats out the Internet but by a mere 6 percentage points, but a substantial 16 percentage points in the 55-plus group and a whop-whopping 34% among the 65-plus.
And when it comes to being “most cool,” the figures for the Internet are even more staggering with the Internet beating Television by 20 percentage points in the 12-17 group; 19 percentage points in the 18-24’s; another 14 points in the 25-34; 17 points in the 35-44 group but a mere one point in the 45-54 group. Once you get to the 55-plus crowd (that Television doesn’t sell), Television beats out the Internet by 12 points and an incredible 35 points in the 65-plus crowd as “most cool.”
WHO’S STALE AND BORING: More consolation for my Television brethren, fewer people (24%) think Television is “stale and boring” in 2007 than thought so in 2002, when it was 36%. No consolation for my Newspaper brethren, more people (35%) now think they have become “stale and boring” than in 2002, when it was 30%. And for those radio readers of MfM, radio dropped 9 percentage points in terms of being “most essential,” increased 4 percentage points in being “least essential”; is flat over the five year period in terms of being “stale and boring”; but dropped dramatically in terms of being “used more.” The Internet (at 34%) beat radio (18%) and barely trailed Television (37%) when people were asked, “Are you using it more lately.”
THE KICKER: But here’s the kicker for you Television folks out there. When asked, “Who would you turn to first in the event of a major breaking news story,” Television dominates with 62% of the respondents picking TV, beating out the Internet (at 18%) by more than a three to one margin. The television figure is down from 2002 when it was 74% and the Internet is up from 2002 when it was a mere 8%. Radio is down, at 10% this year compared to 12% five years ago, and newspapers increased a tad, at 8% this year versus 6% five years ago.
(Okay, let me explain the headline. The Devil is in the Details can be translated a number of ways: you have to watch the details or they will trip you up; things are more difficult to accomplish because of the various details to be taken care of; or, the plan may appear simple but there is a lot of detail work to be done. The flip side of that is “God is in the Details” which some translate as meaning you can find big things in small packages, sort of along the line of ‘less is more’; or that whatever one does should be done thoroughly; details are important.)
You can access the full report at: http://www.edisonresearch.com/home/archives/Q3%20Media%20Perceptions%20-%20large%20slides%20_2_.pdf
TO BE JOURNALISM OR NOT TO BE JOURNALISM: A report by the University of Maryland’s J-Lab “Institute for Interactive Journalism” says four out of five “citizen media” websites consider what they do to be journalism and three out of four have pronounced their efforts a “success.” Of course, success has multiple definitions, including watch-dogging local government, providing news that couldn’t otherwise be had, helping their community to solve problems and nudging local media to improve. The Knight Citizen News Network (kcnn.org) has identified more than 450 “citizen media” sites in the United States. Both groups have adopted the term “citizen media” as their preferred definition of these sites, although both groups use the term interchangeably with “citizen journalism.” The J-Lab group identified several variations of the citizen media model – community cooperatives run by volunteers; trained citizen journalist sites using traditional journalism values and training to non-journalists; professional journalists who are operating for profit and not for profit sites; solo enterprise sites created by individuals, few of whom have journalism training; blog aggregators which act as one-stop community repositories; and legacy media sites launched by newspapers or broadcasters as places where the users dominate the content, as opposed to their own websites where journalists dominate the work. The report cites examples of each, and they run the gamut from people like Jonathon Weber, former editor of The Industry Standard (at newwest.net); former Boston Globe editor and now M-I-T Media Lab editor-in-residence Jack Driscoll (ryereflections.org); to “life and business partners” Christopher Grotke and Lise LePage who run a web design business in Brattleboro, Vermont (ibrattleboro.com)
J-Lab Director Jan Schaffer says her group believes citizen media sites “will become an enduring part of the emerging newscape” and urges legacy media groups to partner and support such sites instead of trying to compete with them. The report says ‘old media’ companies have launched such sites for a variety of reasons – to offset loss of editorial staff, to build community and thereby interest in local news coverage, and, candidly, to preserve or maybe expand market share among consumers and advertisers. Meanwhile, many ‘new media’ companies are struggling to harness citizen and advertising contributions to create profitable online revenue models. In short, both are looking for the right ‘business model.’ As a foot note, one of the larger, multiple citizen media sites, backfence.com, has gone out of business since the J-Lab report was issued.
You can access the full report at: http://www.kcnn.org/research/citizen_media_report/ and even have a hard copy sent to you.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
THE DEVIL IS IN THE DETAILS
TO BE JOURNALISM OR NOT TO BE JOURNALISM
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
DISCLAIMER: This week’s edition of MfM is a little longer than usual, because there were three significant studies that came out and that I am going to attempt to summarize briefly. Which leads to disclaimer number two, they are so brief that they are subject to some distortion of interpretation.
DON’T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY: And if you remember the line from the old Sam Cook song about teen love, you will remember that Sam also didn’t know much about biology, science, French and algebra. Well, now add to that – News. According to a survey by the Joan Shorenstein on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University, teenagers and young adults are paying less attention to news than their counterparts of two or three decades ago. No news there, but the DEGREE OF DISCONNECT is news – not just newspapers, but national and local television, radio and the Internet. One out of four teens (28%) and one out of four young adults (24%) paid almost no attention to news, whatever the source. And another third of the teens (32%) and another quarter of the young adults (24%) paid little or no attention to three of the mediums and made only ‘moderate’ use of the fourth. Simply put, “daily news is not an integral part of the daily lives of most teens and young adults.” The survey showed that while teenagers and young adults may say they watch, read or listen to the news (because it is the ‘socially desirable response’), in actual fact they ‘skim’ the newspaper, watch TV for a ‘short while,’ listen to news on radio when it ‘happens to come on’ and read news on the Internet when they ‘come across’ it.
HARD NEWS VERSUS SOFT NEWS: The Shorenstein report also found that the difference in familiarity between hard news stories (such as the 400-point plunge in the Dow at the time) and soft news stories (such as Anna Nicole Smith’s death) was “nothing short of extraordinary.” Three out of four (75%) of the respondents OF ALL AGES knew about the typical soft news story while less than half (45%) knew about the typical hard news story. And two thirds (68%) correctly identified the factual elements of a soft news story while less than half again (45%) did so for the hard news story. A “puzzling finding”, according to the survey, was that while other research shows older adults are more likely to discuss public affairs, younger adults were three times more likely to say they had heard about a story from another person – although, in most cases it was a soft news story. The report did note that many hard news stories “have a numbing sameness – another act of Congress or another presidential speech – that can block them from memory even when they get heavy coverage.”
THE NEW MEDIA ROLE: Yes, the Internet is an important source for news for teenagers and young adults, according to the report. But it is a matter of degree. Two out of five teens (41%) and young adults (47%) say they became aware of a story through TV while only one in five (18%) say they became aware of a story through the Internet. Interestingly, one in four teenagers (28%) and one in ten young adults (12%) say they found out about a story through ‘another person.’ The report says Radio is actually the most “underrated news medium” because of its large “inadvertent news audience.”
THE NEW NEWS MATRIX. In the “old days,” there was a correlation between news interest and news consumption regardless of the medium, says the report. Mom and Dad read the morning newspaper at the breakfast table and would watch the evening news. By default the kids acquired a news habit of their own, almost because they had no choice. The report says this “forced feeding” of the news habit came to an end in the 1980’s with the spread of cable television. Now the big question mark is whether the Internet will make news consumption greater because of its 24/7 availability or break down news consumption even more because of that same on-demand feature. The problem, say the researchers, is that online news exposure is less fixed by time, place and routine – elements that have a ritual ability to reinforce news habits. Now news consumption becomes more ‘inadvertent.’ And even though young people may say they are interested in news, their behavior says otherwise. It may be a matter of different medium for different needs. Newspapers for public affairs coverage; Television for entertainment programs; the Internet for gaming and social interaction. The report authors say media use today is largely a solitary affair that only reinforces existing preferences and doesn’t create news ones, like news use. They quote Aristotle who wrote, “We are what we repeatedly do.” The fact that young people don’t repeatedly ‘do news’ is “a basis for pessimism about the future of daily news and young adults.”
You can access the full report at: http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/presspol/carnegie_knight/young_news_web.pdf
THE DEVIL IS IN THE DETAILS: Several recent reports cited a study by Edison Media Research that the Internet is close to beating television as “most essential” medium. In keeping with MfM’s focus on going behind the headlines, we can say -- WRONGO-GONGO. The Internet has beaten Television. At least, for people under the age of 44. Not only that, the Internet beats out television as the “most cool” and “exciting” medium for people under the age of 54 as well. Some consolation for my television brethren, on the flip side of the equation, more people (24%) deemed the Internet the “least essential” medium, compared to television (18%) and radio (18%). No consolation for my newspaper brethren, newspapers were deemed the “least essential” medium by more people (35%) than any other media. All this represents a fairly dramatic change from when the survey was taken five years ago in 2002.
Not surprisingly, the Internet beat out Television by a whopping 15 percentage points (46% to 31%) among the 12-17 crowd when it came to “most essential.” Somewhat surprisingly, the Internet also beat out Television by a substantial 12 percentage points (40% to 28%) among the 35-44 crowd in that arena. The race was much tighter among the 18-24 group (38% to 35%) and the 25-34 group (38% to 33%). It’s only when you get to the 45—plus crowd that Television beats out the Internet but by a mere 6 percentage points, but a substantial 16 percentage points in the 55-plus group and a whop-whopping 34% among the 65-plus.
And when it comes to being “most cool,” the figures for the Internet are even more staggering with the Internet beating Television by 20 percentage points in the 12-17 group; 19 percentage points in the 18-24’s; another 14 points in the 25-34; 17 points in the 35-44 group but a mere one point in the 45-54 group. Once you get to the 55-plus crowd (that Television doesn’t sell), Television beats out the Internet by 12 points and an incredible 35 points in the 65-plus crowd as “most cool.”
WHO’S STALE AND BORING: More consolation for my Television brethren, fewer people (24%) think Television is “stale and boring” in 2007 than thought so in 2002, when it was 36%. No consolation for my Newspaper brethren, more people (35%) now think they have become “stale and boring” than in 2002, when it was 30%. And for those radio readers of MfM, radio dropped 9 percentage points in terms of being “most essential,” increased 4 percentage points in being “least essential”; is flat over the five year period in terms of being “stale and boring”; but dropped dramatically in terms of being “used more.” The Internet (at 34%) beat radio (18%) and barely trailed Television (37%) when people were asked, “Are you using it more lately.”
THE KICKER: But here’s the kicker for you Television folks out there. When asked, “Who would you turn to first in the event of a major breaking news story,” Television dominates with 62% of the respondents picking TV, beating out the Internet (at 18%) by more than a three to one margin. The television figure is down from 2002 when it was 74% and the Internet is up from 2002 when it was a mere 8%. Radio is down, at 10% this year compared to 12% five years ago, and newspapers increased a tad, at 8% this year versus 6% five years ago.
(Okay, let me explain the headline. The Devil is in the Details can be translated a number of ways: you have to watch the details or they will trip you up; things are more difficult to accomplish because of the various details to be taken care of; or, the plan may appear simple but there is a lot of detail work to be done. The flip side of that is “God is in the Details” which some translate as meaning you can find big things in small packages, sort of along the line of ‘less is more’; or that whatever one does should be done thoroughly; details are important.)
You can access the full report at: http://www.edisonresearch.com/home/archives/Q3%20Media%20Perceptions%20-%20large%20slides%20_2_.pdf
TO BE JOURNALISM OR NOT TO BE JOURNALISM: A report by the University of Maryland’s J-Lab “Institute for Interactive Journalism” says four out of five “citizen media” websites consider what they do to be journalism and three out of four have pronounced their efforts a “success.” Of course, success has multiple definitions, including watch-dogging local government, providing news that couldn’t otherwise be had, helping their community to solve problems and nudging local media to improve. The Knight Citizen News Network (kcnn.org) has identified more than 450 “citizen media” sites in the United States. Both groups have adopted the term “citizen media” as their preferred definition of these sites, although both groups use the term interchangeably with “citizen journalism.” The J-Lab group identified several variations of the citizen media model – community cooperatives run by volunteers; trained citizen journalist sites using traditional journalism values and training to non-journalists; professional journalists who are operating for profit and not for profit sites; solo enterprise sites created by individuals, few of whom have journalism training; blog aggregators which act as one-stop community repositories; and legacy media sites launched by newspapers or broadcasters as places where the users dominate the content, as opposed to their own websites where journalists dominate the work. The report cites examples of each, and they run the gamut from people like Jonathon Weber, former editor of The Industry Standard (at newwest.net); former Boston Globe editor and now M-I-T Media Lab editor-in-residence Jack Driscoll (ryereflections.org); to “life and business partners” Christopher Grotke and Lise LePage who run a web design business in Brattleboro, Vermont (ibrattleboro.com)
J-Lab Director Jan Schaffer says her group believes citizen media sites “will become an enduring part of the emerging newscape” and urges legacy media groups to partner and support such sites instead of trying to compete with them. The report says ‘old media’ companies have launched such sites for a variety of reasons – to offset loss of editorial staff, to build community and thereby interest in local news coverage, and, candidly, to preserve or maybe expand market share among consumers and advertisers. Meanwhile, many ‘new media’ companies are struggling to harness citizen and advertising contributions to create profitable online revenue models. In short, both are looking for the right ‘business model.’ As a foot note, one of the larger, multiple citizen media sites, backfence.com, has gone out of business since the J-Lab report was issued.
You can access the full report at: http://www.kcnn.org/research/citizen_media_report/ and even have a hard copy sent to you.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Message From Michael -- July 2, 2007
BASHING AMERICA
ROBBING PETER TO PAY PAUL
FACTS TO THINK ABOUT
POLITICIANS AND THE MEDIA
STEPPING INTO THE WAYBACK MACHINE
A MURROW MEA CULPA
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SWEEPS: Guess what? There is a sweeps period. It’s called July. Although most stations don’t pay much attention to it because of the low viewing. But I had to at least mention it.
BASHING AMERICA: Okay, not really. I wouldn’t want to do that, but a review of recently released studies and statistics draws a different picture of America the beautiful’s stance in the world. They show that other parts of the world are growing faster than the United States. Accounting and research consultancy Price Waterhouse Coopers says the U.S. remains the world’s largest but also slowest growing media market in the world, expanding at an estimated 5.3% compound annual growth rate, which is a half to a third of other countries’ growth rate. Leading forecaster Robert J. Coen, senior vice president at Universal McCann, says growth in overseas ad spending would continue to outpace the rate in the United States, as it has done every year for the last four years. He revised downward his projected ad spending for this year for the U.S., but revised upward his forecast for overseas spending because of “robust growth” in countries like Brazil, China and India. A report by the Communication Workers of America found that the U.S. lags far behind most other industrialized nations in terms of Internet speed. The median U.S. download speed is 1.7 megabits per second, compared to speed king Japan’s 61 megabits, South Korea’s 45 megabits, France at 17 megabits and even the Canadians beat us at 7 megabits. The report notes that the Federal Communication Commission defines “high speed” as 200 kilobits per second, a standard adopted more than a decade ago and now not even recognized as broadband in most countries. Mobile phone use is growing faster in other parts of the world than in the U.S., as well. Mobile phone use in Europe has reached the point that it is more than 100% of the actual population, according to U.K. based telecom analysis company The Mobile World. While ‘mobisodes’ (video for mobile phones) are just starting here in the U.S., in the Asia-Pacific region, distribution of TV programming on mobile phones is expected to reach $6.5 Billion in 2011, from the current spending of a mere $16 Million, a compound annual growth rate of 14.7%, compared to 5.5% for the rest of the world.
By the way, if you’re interested, you can find the relative Internet speeds for every state, listed on the website speedmatters.org, as well as a speed test for checking your own Internet connection speed.
NET NEUTRALITY: As a side note to the technology issues, it’s worth noting, even though it’s been in the news, that the Federal Trade Commission urged Congress to be cautious about any move to regular broadband Internet access. Or, put more simply – don’t enact any new laws on net neutrality. And, as blogger Declan McCullagh put it on the CNet blog site, this is coming from “the lifelong bureaucrats… (who) are hardly a bunch of Hayek-quoting, Ron Paul-voting libertarians.”
ROBBING PETER TO PAY PAUL: Internet advertising reached a record $16.9 Billion in the U.S. last year, a 35% increase over the year before, according to figures released by the Interactive Advertising Bureau. Sounds great, right? Wait, there’s more. In the first quarter of this year, Internet advertising revenues reached a new record of $4.9 Billion, a 26% increase over the first quarter of last year. Wait, there’s even more. The folks at Universal McCann predict that Internet advertising will be up 17% this year over last. And one more. The firm, Price Waterhouse Coopers, mentioned earlier, expects Internet advertising and ‘access spending’ to grow worldwide from an estimated $177 Billion last year to $332 Billion in 2011. Now, the other side of the story. Those same folks at Price Waterhouse Coopers predict that in two years, in 2009, spending on Internet advertising and access will pass spending on newspaper publishing. And forecasting guru Robert J. Coen, mentioned earlier, lowered his projections for advertising spending this year, in part because of a slowing in local dollar spending caused by a migration of local classified advertising from the HIGHER priced print ads of newspapers to the LOWER priced online ads of their websites.
SOME FACTS TO THINK ABOUT: Global mobile phone use will top 3.25 Billion in 2007. To put that in perspective, the world population is forecast to hit 6.6 Billion this month. In other worlds, mobile phone use is equivalent to half the world’s population. According to a survey by The Mobile World, mentioned above, more than 1,000 new customers are signing up for mobile phones every minute around the world. The median age of the American television viewing audience is 48. To put this number in perspective, the media age of the U.S. population is 37. According to a report by Magna/ Global, the ABC viewer is 48, the NBC viewer is 49, the CBS viewer 53, Fox is 42 and the CW viewer is 32. Again, for perspective, I checked last year’s figures. ABC was 46, NBC was 49, CBS was 52, Fox was 39 and the WB, (remember, a year ago) was 37 while the UPN was 32.
POLITICIANS AND THE MEDIA: I know you may have already seen this, but it’s interesting that two former politicians jumped on the media’s case recently. Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair told a journalism think tank at Oxford University that technology has turned the media into a “feral beast” in which all that matter is “impact” – rising above the clamor, getting noticed, getting a competitive edge. And that accuracy is “often secondary.” Former U.S. President Bill Clinton called on marketers at a Promax convention to help politicians deliver complex messages without turning them into “two dimensional cartoons.” He says some political candidate’s messages don’t get covered because they don’t fit in with how parties and issues are “pre-branded” by the press.
STEPPING INTO THE WAYBACK MACHINE: A year ago, the name dominating the MfM news was Frank Maggio. He’s the Florida developer who tried to buy Nielsen Media Research and, when that failed, announced he was launching his own TV ratings service. Well, a check up since then shows that he did indeed launch a service called Erin Media, which promises a “new approach to the science of television audience analysis.” And he also writes a blog on Media Post’s TV Board. In the June 12 edition of MfM last year, we listed many of the photo and video sharing websites operating then. You can find the entire list by going to media-consultant.blogspot.com and look up that edition in the 2006 archives. And in keeping with the “bash America” theme above, a report released a year ago by Reporters Without Borders put the U.S. at 44th out of a list of 167 countries in terms of press freedom. Seven countries tied for first (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway and Switzerland). North Korea was last.
A MURROW MEA CULPA: My apologies to my good friends at the University of Missouri for failing to note that KBIA-FM, the National Public Radio affiliate staffed by students and managed by university faculty members, won a Murrow award for investigative reporting – its second Murrow in a row. Pretty embarrassing since I used to teach there.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
ROBBING PETER TO PAY PAUL
FACTS TO THINK ABOUT
POLITICIANS AND THE MEDIA
STEPPING INTO THE WAYBACK MACHINE
A MURROW MEA CULPA
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SWEEPS: Guess what? There is a sweeps period. It’s called July. Although most stations don’t pay much attention to it because of the low viewing. But I had to at least mention it.
BASHING AMERICA: Okay, not really. I wouldn’t want to do that, but a review of recently released studies and statistics draws a different picture of America the beautiful’s stance in the world. They show that other parts of the world are growing faster than the United States. Accounting and research consultancy Price Waterhouse Coopers says the U.S. remains the world’s largest but also slowest growing media market in the world, expanding at an estimated 5.3% compound annual growth rate, which is a half to a third of other countries’ growth rate. Leading forecaster Robert J. Coen, senior vice president at Universal McCann, says growth in overseas ad spending would continue to outpace the rate in the United States, as it has done every year for the last four years. He revised downward his projected ad spending for this year for the U.S., but revised upward his forecast for overseas spending because of “robust growth” in countries like Brazil, China and India. A report by the Communication Workers of America found that the U.S. lags far behind most other industrialized nations in terms of Internet speed. The median U.S. download speed is 1.7 megabits per second, compared to speed king Japan’s 61 megabits, South Korea’s 45 megabits, France at 17 megabits and even the Canadians beat us at 7 megabits. The report notes that the Federal Communication Commission defines “high speed” as 200 kilobits per second, a standard adopted more than a decade ago and now not even recognized as broadband in most countries. Mobile phone use is growing faster in other parts of the world than in the U.S., as well. Mobile phone use in Europe has reached the point that it is more than 100% of the actual population, according to U.K. based telecom analysis company The Mobile World. While ‘mobisodes’ (video for mobile phones) are just starting here in the U.S., in the Asia-Pacific region, distribution of TV programming on mobile phones is expected to reach $6.5 Billion in 2011, from the current spending of a mere $16 Million, a compound annual growth rate of 14.7%, compared to 5.5% for the rest of the world.
By the way, if you’re interested, you can find the relative Internet speeds for every state, listed on the website speedmatters.org, as well as a speed test for checking your own Internet connection speed.
NET NEUTRALITY: As a side note to the technology issues, it’s worth noting, even though it’s been in the news, that the Federal Trade Commission urged Congress to be cautious about any move to regular broadband Internet access. Or, put more simply – don’t enact any new laws on net neutrality. And, as blogger Declan McCullagh put it on the CNet blog site, this is coming from “the lifelong bureaucrats… (who) are hardly a bunch of Hayek-quoting, Ron Paul-voting libertarians.”
ROBBING PETER TO PAY PAUL: Internet advertising reached a record $16.9 Billion in the U.S. last year, a 35% increase over the year before, according to figures released by the Interactive Advertising Bureau. Sounds great, right? Wait, there’s more. In the first quarter of this year, Internet advertising revenues reached a new record of $4.9 Billion, a 26% increase over the first quarter of last year. Wait, there’s even more. The folks at Universal McCann predict that Internet advertising will be up 17% this year over last. And one more. The firm, Price Waterhouse Coopers, mentioned earlier, expects Internet advertising and ‘access spending’ to grow worldwide from an estimated $177 Billion last year to $332 Billion in 2011. Now, the other side of the story. Those same folks at Price Waterhouse Coopers predict that in two years, in 2009, spending on Internet advertising and access will pass spending on newspaper publishing. And forecasting guru Robert J. Coen, mentioned earlier, lowered his projections for advertising spending this year, in part because of a slowing in local dollar spending caused by a migration of local classified advertising from the HIGHER priced print ads of newspapers to the LOWER priced online ads of their websites.
SOME FACTS TO THINK ABOUT: Global mobile phone use will top 3.25 Billion in 2007. To put that in perspective, the world population is forecast to hit 6.6 Billion this month. In other worlds, mobile phone use is equivalent to half the world’s population. According to a survey by The Mobile World, mentioned above, more than 1,000 new customers are signing up for mobile phones every minute around the world. The median age of the American television viewing audience is 48. To put this number in perspective, the media age of the U.S. population is 37. According to a report by Magna/ Global, the ABC viewer is 48, the NBC viewer is 49, the CBS viewer 53, Fox is 42 and the CW viewer is 32. Again, for perspective, I checked last year’s figures. ABC was 46, NBC was 49, CBS was 52, Fox was 39 and the WB, (remember, a year ago) was 37 while the UPN was 32.
POLITICIANS AND THE MEDIA: I know you may have already seen this, but it’s interesting that two former politicians jumped on the media’s case recently. Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair told a journalism think tank at Oxford University that technology has turned the media into a “feral beast” in which all that matter is “impact” – rising above the clamor, getting noticed, getting a competitive edge. And that accuracy is “often secondary.” Former U.S. President Bill Clinton called on marketers at a Promax convention to help politicians deliver complex messages without turning them into “two dimensional cartoons.” He says some political candidate’s messages don’t get covered because they don’t fit in with how parties and issues are “pre-branded” by the press.
STEPPING INTO THE WAYBACK MACHINE: A year ago, the name dominating the MfM news was Frank Maggio. He’s the Florida developer who tried to buy Nielsen Media Research and, when that failed, announced he was launching his own TV ratings service. Well, a check up since then shows that he did indeed launch a service called Erin Media, which promises a “new approach to the science of television audience analysis.” And he also writes a blog on Media Post’s TV Board. In the June 12 edition of MfM last year, we listed many of the photo and video sharing websites operating then. You can find the entire list by going to media-consultant.blogspot.com and look up that edition in the 2006 archives. And in keeping with the “bash America” theme above, a report released a year ago by Reporters Without Borders put the U.S. at 44th out of a list of 167 countries in terms of press freedom. Seven countries tied for first (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway and Switzerland). North Korea was last.
A MURROW MEA CULPA: My apologies to my good friends at the University of Missouri for failing to note that KBIA-FM, the National Public Radio affiliate staffed by students and managed by university faculty members, won a Murrow award for investigative reporting – its second Murrow in a row. Pretty embarrassing since I used to teach there.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Monday, June 25, 2007
Message From Michael -- June 25, 2007
THE JESUS PHONE
INTERNET OVER THE AIR
ONLINE VIEWING GROWTH
NETWORK AND CABLE NEWS DIFFERENCE
TECHNOLOGY INDIFFERENCE
STEPPING INTO THE WAYBACK MACHINE
COCKTAIL CHATTER
MURROW AWARD CONGRATULATIONS
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
THE JESUS PHONE: That’s the somewhat cynical description by media technology site SYS-CON MEDIA of the Apple iPhone because they say it’s being hyped like “it was the Second Coming.” Adding to the hype, Apple has announced it will be able to play YouTube video clips. It’s supposed to be released this Friday, June 29th, after what technology website Engadget.com calls “years of speculation on perhaps the most intensely followed unconfirmed product in Apple’s history.” Technology guru Mike Wendland who writes for the Detroit Free Press admits he is not as enamored of the device as many but he’ll still be standing in one of those long lines waiting to buy one. His concerns are the fact that it is using AT&T’s lower level broadband network, that it won’t allow direct music downloads (you have to go through your computer) and that it doesn’t have an actual keyboard.
Meanwhile, Microsoft has announced its own “second coming” device – surface computing, or as some call it, table technology. It’s a coffee table like computer that allows you to move and redesign pictures by simply touching the surface, or download pictures from your cellphone by simply laying it on the surface, or… well, you name it. I can’t do it justice by writing about it, but it’s worth viewing. Just go to Microsoft.com/surface.
INTERNET OVER THE AIR: As long as we’re on a technology kick, a group of major technology companies are joining forces to convince the federal government to allow high-speed Internet access to be provided over TV airwaves. Microsoft, Google, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Intel and Philips say they have developed a prototype device which would use idle TV channels, known as white space, to beam the Internet out, according to an article in Washingtonpost.com. They say the device will take WiFi to a new level. Meanwhile, as the article says, the major telephone and cable companies are “watching warily from the sidelines.”
Keeping on the technology theme, researchers at MIT have shown that it’s possible to wirelessly power a 60-watt lightbulb. The power was only a short distance away (two meters), but the researchers say the experiment paves the way for wirelessly charging batteries in laptops, mobile phones and music players as well as cutting the electric cords on household appliances.
ONLINE VIEWING GROWTH: Two different reports and different sets of numbers but the same end conclusion. More people are watching more videos online. The Magid Media Futures national online survey found that a majority (52%) of online Americans 12 to 64 are using online video once a week or more. A survey of online users by the Online Publishers Association put the number at 44%. (Oddly, the same number Magid reported for last year.) The numbers are also different when it comes to daily use with Magid reporting 14% watching videos online every day while OPA reports 8% watching online daily. (Again, oddly, almost the same as Magid reported last year.) Both say the prime users are young males. And both say the top content items are news. OPA says nearly half (45%) access news videos weekly while Magid says more than a third watch online video news stories regularly. Both also put weather as a top online video content item, followed by jokes and bloopers. The OPA report says the Internet dominates all other media during the purchase process, leading in terms of initial awareness of a product, learning more about a product, deciding where to buy and, finally, in the actual purchase decision. Of course, this was a survey of online users, but the report says the numbers range from 48% to 57%. The second most influential part of the purchase process – Word of Mouth. The Magid report says nearly half (41%) of Internet homes have wireless networks and predicts that TV sets will be part of home networks in the years ahead.
NETWORK AND CABLE NEWS DIFFERENCE: One of the criticisms we often hear from the public is that all local news “looks the same.” Well, now research from the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press finds the same criticism of network news BUT not so much for cable news. Nearly three-quarters (74%) of those surveyed say network news operations ABC, CBS and NBC are “all pretty much the same.” (Despite ABC’s recent jump in the ratings.) Only a fifth (18%) say there are real differences. But while two-fifths (40%) of the public say cable news operations CNN, Fox and MSNBC are pretty much the same, nearly half (48%) see real differences. Further evidence that people think they’re all the same was the fact that the first word out of their mouths when asked to describe either network, cable or public radio news was the word “good.” OK was the second word used when people were asked to describe their impression of network news. Excellent was the second word used to describe Fox and NPR. The second most common word used to describe CNN was informative. Other words used for the various news organizations were liberal and biased. Consolation for the network news executives is that two-thirds (63%) say they regularly get their news about national and international news from one of the three major network news organizations while cable news operations was regularly viewed by about a third or less (37% for Fox, 35% for CNN and 26% for MSNBC.)
TECHNOLOGY INDIFFERENCE: Another part of the Pew group, the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that nearly half of Americans (45%) say information and communication technology gives them less control over their lives OR makes no difference. And a third (32%) of those with either cell phones or Internet say they need help setting up or using their new electronic gadgets. Reviewing why some people still refuse to join the communication revolution, associate director John B. Horrigan argues that the technology industry needs to improve its design of electronic gadgets and the industry needs to improve its sell of the benefit of such gadgets. Although he notes there are some “contrarians” who just don’t want to adapt or adopt the new devices. As a lesson to all, he quotes a report by the World Economic Forum on “digital ecosystems,” which says that while “not all companies that experimented with new organizational structure have flourished, all companies that failed to experiment have floundered.”
You may remember from a previous MfM that the Pew group provided a quiz to find out what kind of technology type you are – an omnivore, mobile centric or whatever. If you want to find out where you fit, the link is http://wwww.pewinternet.org/quiz.
STEPPING INTO THE WAYBACK MACHINE: Anybody out there remember Peabody and Mr. Sherman? Okay, never mind. In any case, a new feature for the weekly MfM is an occasional look back at what was ‘making the news’ in the MfM this time last year.
This time last year AOL relaunched Netscape.com with readers voting on the hot stories of the day. The site is still up and running but the voting is still low with stories garnering anywhere from three votes to 99 votes but not much more than that. Also this time last year we announced the launch of two new websites designed to broker people’s pictures to the press. The sites, scoopt.com and celljournalist.com are still up and running. The Online Publishers Association reported in June of last year that the Web was the dominant medium during work hours (followed by radio) and the second most used medium at home (after TV), proving, according to association president Pam Horan, that the Web’s “rise to mass media status is now clear and incontrovertible.”
COCKTAIL CHATTER: The invention of barbecue may be a key reason for humans developing larger brains. Scientists say that 1.9 Million years ago the brain of Homo erectus doubled in size. Harvard professor Richard Wrangham says that coincided with the development of cooked meat which allowed more calories to be consumed faster which led to a shrinking of gastrointestinal organs and an increase in brain size, essentially trading “guts for gray matter,” as MIT’s Technology Review puts it. The National Science Foundation has given two professors $150,000 to develop video games that can be used to teach students computer science, according to the website Next Generation which focuses on “interactive entertainment.” A study sponsored by a group called Electronic Arts in the U.K. and conducted by FutureLab, a non-profit education ‘advancement’ organization found that video games could be useful in teaching several other subjects as well. California is the fourth largest wine producer in the world, behind France, Italy and Spain with Australia in sixth place.
MURROW AWARD CONGRATULATIONS: To all the stations that won Murrow awards, but a special Mazel Tov to Belo-owned KVUE-TV in Austin, Texas, and friend Frank Volpicella for winning for Overall Excellence in small market television. Ironically my friends at KEYE-TV, also in Austin, won for news series. Another Mazel Tov goes to Media General-owned WSLS-TV in Roanoke and friend Shane Moreland for winning for best newscast. Media General-owned WTVQ-TV in Lexington, Kentucky and friend Mark Pimentel won for spot news coverage. Another irony is that my friends at Gray communications-owned WKYT-TV, also in Lexington, won for continuing coverage. And a final Mazel Tov to Jeff Hoffman and Raycom media-owned WAFF-TV in Huntsville for winning best website.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
INTERNET OVER THE AIR
ONLINE VIEWING GROWTH
NETWORK AND CABLE NEWS DIFFERENCE
TECHNOLOGY INDIFFERENCE
STEPPING INTO THE WAYBACK MACHINE
COCKTAIL CHATTER
MURROW AWARD CONGRATULATIONS
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
THE JESUS PHONE: That’s the somewhat cynical description by media technology site SYS-CON MEDIA of the Apple iPhone because they say it’s being hyped like “it was the Second Coming.” Adding to the hype, Apple has announced it will be able to play YouTube video clips. It’s supposed to be released this Friday, June 29th, after what technology website Engadget.com calls “years of speculation on perhaps the most intensely followed unconfirmed product in Apple’s history.” Technology guru Mike Wendland who writes for the Detroit Free Press admits he is not as enamored of the device as many but he’ll still be standing in one of those long lines waiting to buy one. His concerns are the fact that it is using AT&T’s lower level broadband network, that it won’t allow direct music downloads (you have to go through your computer) and that it doesn’t have an actual keyboard.
Meanwhile, Microsoft has announced its own “second coming” device – surface computing, or as some call it, table technology. It’s a coffee table like computer that allows you to move and redesign pictures by simply touching the surface, or download pictures from your cellphone by simply laying it on the surface, or… well, you name it. I can’t do it justice by writing about it, but it’s worth viewing. Just go to Microsoft.com/surface.
INTERNET OVER THE AIR: As long as we’re on a technology kick, a group of major technology companies are joining forces to convince the federal government to allow high-speed Internet access to be provided over TV airwaves. Microsoft, Google, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Intel and Philips say they have developed a prototype device which would use idle TV channels, known as white space, to beam the Internet out, according to an article in Washingtonpost.com. They say the device will take WiFi to a new level. Meanwhile, as the article says, the major telephone and cable companies are “watching warily from the sidelines.”
Keeping on the technology theme, researchers at MIT have shown that it’s possible to wirelessly power a 60-watt lightbulb. The power was only a short distance away (two meters), but the researchers say the experiment paves the way for wirelessly charging batteries in laptops, mobile phones and music players as well as cutting the electric cords on household appliances.
ONLINE VIEWING GROWTH: Two different reports and different sets of numbers but the same end conclusion. More people are watching more videos online. The Magid Media Futures national online survey found that a majority (52%) of online Americans 12 to 64 are using online video once a week or more. A survey of online users by the Online Publishers Association put the number at 44%. (Oddly, the same number Magid reported for last year.) The numbers are also different when it comes to daily use with Magid reporting 14% watching videos online every day while OPA reports 8% watching online daily. (Again, oddly, almost the same as Magid reported last year.) Both say the prime users are young males. And both say the top content items are news. OPA says nearly half (45%) access news videos weekly while Magid says more than a third watch online video news stories regularly. Both also put weather as a top online video content item, followed by jokes and bloopers. The OPA report says the Internet dominates all other media during the purchase process, leading in terms of initial awareness of a product, learning more about a product, deciding where to buy and, finally, in the actual purchase decision. Of course, this was a survey of online users, but the report says the numbers range from 48% to 57%. The second most influential part of the purchase process – Word of Mouth. The Magid report says nearly half (41%) of Internet homes have wireless networks and predicts that TV sets will be part of home networks in the years ahead.
NETWORK AND CABLE NEWS DIFFERENCE: One of the criticisms we often hear from the public is that all local news “looks the same.” Well, now research from the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press finds the same criticism of network news BUT not so much for cable news. Nearly three-quarters (74%) of those surveyed say network news operations ABC, CBS and NBC are “all pretty much the same.” (Despite ABC’s recent jump in the ratings.) Only a fifth (18%) say there are real differences. But while two-fifths (40%) of the public say cable news operations CNN, Fox and MSNBC are pretty much the same, nearly half (48%) see real differences. Further evidence that people think they’re all the same was the fact that the first word out of their mouths when asked to describe either network, cable or public radio news was the word “good.” OK was the second word used when people were asked to describe their impression of network news. Excellent was the second word used to describe Fox and NPR. The second most common word used to describe CNN was informative. Other words used for the various news organizations were liberal and biased. Consolation for the network news executives is that two-thirds (63%) say they regularly get their news about national and international news from one of the three major network news organizations while cable news operations was regularly viewed by about a third or less (37% for Fox, 35% for CNN and 26% for MSNBC.)
TECHNOLOGY INDIFFERENCE: Another part of the Pew group, the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that nearly half of Americans (45%) say information and communication technology gives them less control over their lives OR makes no difference. And a third (32%) of those with either cell phones or Internet say they need help setting up or using their new electronic gadgets. Reviewing why some people still refuse to join the communication revolution, associate director John B. Horrigan argues that the technology industry needs to improve its design of electronic gadgets and the industry needs to improve its sell of the benefit of such gadgets. Although he notes there are some “contrarians” who just don’t want to adapt or adopt the new devices. As a lesson to all, he quotes a report by the World Economic Forum on “digital ecosystems,” which says that while “not all companies that experimented with new organizational structure have flourished, all companies that failed to experiment have floundered.”
You may remember from a previous MfM that the Pew group provided a quiz to find out what kind of technology type you are – an omnivore, mobile centric or whatever. If you want to find out where you fit, the link is http://wwww.pewinternet.org/quiz.
STEPPING INTO THE WAYBACK MACHINE: Anybody out there remember Peabody and Mr. Sherman? Okay, never mind. In any case, a new feature for the weekly MfM is an occasional look back at what was ‘making the news’ in the MfM this time last year.
This time last year AOL relaunched Netscape.com with readers voting on the hot stories of the day. The site is still up and running but the voting is still low with stories garnering anywhere from three votes to 99 votes but not much more than that. Also this time last year we announced the launch of two new websites designed to broker people’s pictures to the press. The sites, scoopt.com and celljournalist.com are still up and running. The Online Publishers Association reported in June of last year that the Web was the dominant medium during work hours (followed by radio) and the second most used medium at home (after TV), proving, according to association president Pam Horan, that the Web’s “rise to mass media status is now clear and incontrovertible.”
COCKTAIL CHATTER: The invention of barbecue may be a key reason for humans developing larger brains. Scientists say that 1.9 Million years ago the brain of Homo erectus doubled in size. Harvard professor Richard Wrangham says that coincided with the development of cooked meat which allowed more calories to be consumed faster which led to a shrinking of gastrointestinal organs and an increase in brain size, essentially trading “guts for gray matter,” as MIT’s Technology Review puts it. The National Science Foundation has given two professors $150,000 to develop video games that can be used to teach students computer science, according to the website Next Generation which focuses on “interactive entertainment.” A study sponsored by a group called Electronic Arts in the U.K. and conducted by FutureLab, a non-profit education ‘advancement’ organization found that video games could be useful in teaching several other subjects as well. California is the fourth largest wine producer in the world, behind France, Italy and Spain with Australia in sixth place.
MURROW AWARD CONGRATULATIONS: To all the stations that won Murrow awards, but a special Mazel Tov to Belo-owned KVUE-TV in Austin, Texas, and friend Frank Volpicella for winning for Overall Excellence in small market television. Ironically my friends at KEYE-TV, also in Austin, won for news series. Another Mazel Tov goes to Media General-owned WSLS-TV in Roanoke and friend Shane Moreland for winning for best newscast. Media General-owned WTVQ-TV in Lexington, Kentucky and friend Mark Pimentel won for spot news coverage. Another irony is that my friends at Gray communications-owned WKYT-TV, also in Lexington, won for continuing coverage. And a final Mazel Tov to Jeff Hoffman and Raycom media-owned WAFF-TV in Huntsville for winning best website.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Message From Michael -- June 19, 2007
THE WORLD OF WIDGETS
THE TWO SIDES OF TEXAS TV
THE OTHER SIDE OF TV NEWS
RESOURCES FOR REPORTERS
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
THE WORLD OF WIDGETS: It sounds like the title of a Disney movie, but there is a “widget universe” and a “widget economy” that reaches 177 Million people worldwide or roughly a fifth of the entire worldwide online audience. Digital measurement firm comScore recently announced a new service to track the use of widgets across the web. NBC-Universal announced it is providing widgets for its news and entertainment programs. And Facebook announced it is going to open its doors to third-party widget developers, which will probably mean an explosion in widget use. So, what the heck is a widget? The last time I dealt with them was in my Accounting-101 course in which I had to balance the books of the make-believe Widget Manufacturing Company. Widgets are basically mini-Web applications, or data files, that can be embedded into a site’s HTML code to provide customized content. Or in the Wiki definition, a widget enables a web user to view on demand “capsuled information from predetermined data sources.” Have I lost you yet? They’re like what we used to call macros, that can link to either advertising, pictures, music or any form of content you want to create and do it in an easy, one-touch button. The largest provider in the world (117 Million users) is Slide.com which helps people create widgets for use on their websites or blogs and link to music or slide shows of pictures. Yahoo offers an array of widget creation tools. You can use them to create downloadable interactive tools such as polls, quizzes, the latest news, advertising messages, or whatever you like on your company website or personal website or your mobile phone. And, folks, you heard it here first – they are the wave of the future. So, go get your own widgets.
THE TWO SIDES OF TEXAS TV NEWS: In East Texas (Tyler, to be specific), CBS affiliate KYTX-TV/ CBS19 has debuted their new “anchor” described in various reports as a “buxom blonde, bikini model, diva and former world wresting show hostess.” It is a 30-day gig, arranged by the Fox network to be part of an upcoming reality show titled “Anchor Woman.” The woman, Lauren Jones, told the local newspaper that she always wanted to be an anchor woman and that newscasting is a lot harder than acting. The director of the Fox show says Ms. Jones “wants to be the next Katie Couric.” Okay, what can I say? Probably best to say nothing. Just let you watch. Here is a report she did on an asthma camp: http://www.cbs19.tv/video/newplayer.php?id=2541. Meanwhile, in West Texas (Odessa, to be specific), the TVGuide channel has filmed a behind-the-scenes look at newsgathering at station KOSA-TV. Titled Making News Texas Style, the show displays “the interworkings and personalities involved in producing a local news broadcast.” Again, there is nothing I can say. Better to let you watch, and you can online at: http://www.tvguide.com/tvshows/making-news-texas/288348.
THE OTHER SIDE OF TV NEWS: It seems from my readings that the last week has seen a rising tide of criticisms of journalism. Coincidental to the Texas experiments, you’ve no doubt heard about the controversy surrounding former CBS anchor Dan Rather’s comments about the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric. The controversy centers on whether Rather’s comments about “tarting” up the news was sexist, but that aside, the Columbia Journalism Review notes that Rather’s comments are “timely” but could also have been made 20 years ago when Rather held the anchor chair. And even though it has received plenty of publicity, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the Project for Excellence in Journalism study which reported that Fox News provided dramatically less coverage of the Iraq War (6% of daytime coverage) than either CNN (20%) or MSNBC (18%).
A worldwide poll by Harris Interactive released at the World Association of Newspapers conference found that in four out of seven countries surveyed (U.S., France, Italy and Spain) readers expect online news to overtake TV news as their main source of news in five years. Now, that part you may have heard about. What the poll also showed was that one of the reasons cited by the people for not reading a newspaper was that they’re too biased or narrow in their reporting and that news and newspapers need to improve the quality of their journalism and ensure that all views are fairly represented. A group calling itself the Culture and Media Institute says the media is assaulting moral values. As proof, the group whose motto is “advancing truth and virtue in the public square,” says two thirds (63%) of heavy TV users believe government should be primarily responsible for healthcare and two thirds (64%) believe government should be primarily responsible for retirement.
YET ANOTHER SIDE OF NEWS: The more pragmatic ‘other side’ of news is the so-called citizen journalism movement which is impacting traditional news media in several ways. A bill before the House judiciary committee titled the “Free Flow of Information Act of 2007” would provide a federal shield law for journalists. What’s particularly interesting about the bill, according to lawyer Scott Gant writing in The Washington Post, is that the bill adopts a much broader view of journalists, extending it far beyond employees of established news organizations. Gant who wrote a book titled “We’re All Journalists Now” argues that the sponsors of the bill “rightly view journalism as an endeavor that belongs to all of us.” Former Newsweek Interactive editor Todd Oppenheimer reviewing three recent books about the state of journalism in the San Francisco Chronicle raises similar questions about the impact of the so-called ‘digerati’ and the deluge of news and information online. But he has more concerns than compliments, writing “the media urgently needs teams of people who can manage today’s growing information deluge – people who can assess the material’s worth, synthesize it and turn it into something you and I want to read.”
You can read the full article at: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/06/17/RVG7FQA8LB1.DTL&feed=rss.books.
RESOURCES FOR REPORTERS: Find out about the ‘blue carrot’ supermarket in Tucson, the ‘weird sandwich’ fundraiser for the Congressional candidate in Albuquerque, or the public access show being taped in Memphis. Website http://outside.in compiles stories from newspaper and television websites along with local bloggers and citizen media groups for 60 different cities around the country. Check out if you’re one of them and add it to your assignment list of checks. Or want to know how your Congressman is voting and why? Website maplight.org puts together campaign contributions AND Congressional voting records to paint an often unflattering picture of which wheels get the congressional grease.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Website ABC.com was the top visited entertainment website in May, according to Media Metrix and Nielsen/ NetRatings while NYTimes.com was the most visited newspaper site in May. Comedy Central’s animated satire Lil’ Bush which started out as a mobile phone download made its linear TV debut and drew the most viewers for a premiere on the network in three years. Marketers in England are being asked to remove an ad laid out in a field that can be seen by airline passengers flying into Gatwick Airport. The ad promotes an erotic website and features a silhouette of a naked female pole dancer. It’s 100,000 square feet in size.
Finally, on a completely un-related note to anything, congratulations to former CNN Executive Vice President and former Medill University broadcast chairman Jon Petrovich for being named to head the domestic broadcast operations for the Associated Press.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
THE TWO SIDES OF TEXAS TV
THE OTHER SIDE OF TV NEWS
RESOURCES FOR REPORTERS
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
THE WORLD OF WIDGETS: It sounds like the title of a Disney movie, but there is a “widget universe” and a “widget economy” that reaches 177 Million people worldwide or roughly a fifth of the entire worldwide online audience. Digital measurement firm comScore recently announced a new service to track the use of widgets across the web. NBC-Universal announced it is providing widgets for its news and entertainment programs. And Facebook announced it is going to open its doors to third-party widget developers, which will probably mean an explosion in widget use. So, what the heck is a widget? The last time I dealt with them was in my Accounting-101 course in which I had to balance the books of the make-believe Widget Manufacturing Company. Widgets are basically mini-Web applications, or data files, that can be embedded into a site’s HTML code to provide customized content. Or in the Wiki definition, a widget enables a web user to view on demand “capsuled information from predetermined data sources.” Have I lost you yet? They’re like what we used to call macros, that can link to either advertising, pictures, music or any form of content you want to create and do it in an easy, one-touch button. The largest provider in the world (117 Million users) is Slide.com which helps people create widgets for use on their websites or blogs and link to music or slide shows of pictures. Yahoo offers an array of widget creation tools. You can use them to create downloadable interactive tools such as polls, quizzes, the latest news, advertising messages, or whatever you like on your company website or personal website or your mobile phone. And, folks, you heard it here first – they are the wave of the future. So, go get your own widgets.
THE TWO SIDES OF TEXAS TV NEWS: In East Texas (Tyler, to be specific), CBS affiliate KYTX-TV/ CBS19 has debuted their new “anchor” described in various reports as a “buxom blonde, bikini model, diva and former world wresting show hostess.” It is a 30-day gig, arranged by the Fox network to be part of an upcoming reality show titled “Anchor Woman.” The woman, Lauren Jones, told the local newspaper that she always wanted to be an anchor woman and that newscasting is a lot harder than acting. The director of the Fox show says Ms. Jones “wants to be the next Katie Couric.” Okay, what can I say? Probably best to say nothing. Just let you watch. Here is a report she did on an asthma camp: http://www.cbs19.tv/video/newplayer.php?id=2541. Meanwhile, in West Texas (Odessa, to be specific), the TVGuide channel has filmed a behind-the-scenes look at newsgathering at station KOSA-TV. Titled Making News Texas Style, the show displays “the interworkings and personalities involved in producing a local news broadcast.” Again, there is nothing I can say. Better to let you watch, and you can online at: http://www.tvguide.com/tvshows/making-news-texas/288348.
THE OTHER SIDE OF TV NEWS: It seems from my readings that the last week has seen a rising tide of criticisms of journalism. Coincidental to the Texas experiments, you’ve no doubt heard about the controversy surrounding former CBS anchor Dan Rather’s comments about the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric. The controversy centers on whether Rather’s comments about “tarting” up the news was sexist, but that aside, the Columbia Journalism Review notes that Rather’s comments are “timely” but could also have been made 20 years ago when Rather held the anchor chair. And even though it has received plenty of publicity, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the Project for Excellence in Journalism study which reported that Fox News provided dramatically less coverage of the Iraq War (6% of daytime coverage) than either CNN (20%) or MSNBC (18%).
A worldwide poll by Harris Interactive released at the World Association of Newspapers conference found that in four out of seven countries surveyed (U.S., France, Italy and Spain) readers expect online news to overtake TV news as their main source of news in five years. Now, that part you may have heard about. What the poll also showed was that one of the reasons cited by the people for not reading a newspaper was that they’re too biased or narrow in their reporting and that news and newspapers need to improve the quality of their journalism and ensure that all views are fairly represented. A group calling itself the Culture and Media Institute says the media is assaulting moral values. As proof, the group whose motto is “advancing truth and virtue in the public square,” says two thirds (63%) of heavy TV users believe government should be primarily responsible for healthcare and two thirds (64%) believe government should be primarily responsible for retirement.
YET ANOTHER SIDE OF NEWS: The more pragmatic ‘other side’ of news is the so-called citizen journalism movement which is impacting traditional news media in several ways. A bill before the House judiciary committee titled the “Free Flow of Information Act of 2007” would provide a federal shield law for journalists. What’s particularly interesting about the bill, according to lawyer Scott Gant writing in The Washington Post, is that the bill adopts a much broader view of journalists, extending it far beyond employees of established news organizations. Gant who wrote a book titled “We’re All Journalists Now” argues that the sponsors of the bill “rightly view journalism as an endeavor that belongs to all of us.” Former Newsweek Interactive editor Todd Oppenheimer reviewing three recent books about the state of journalism in the San Francisco Chronicle raises similar questions about the impact of the so-called ‘digerati’ and the deluge of news and information online. But he has more concerns than compliments, writing “the media urgently needs teams of people who can manage today’s growing information deluge – people who can assess the material’s worth, synthesize it and turn it into something you and I want to read.”
You can read the full article at: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/06/17/RVG7FQA8LB1.DTL&feed=rss.books.
RESOURCES FOR REPORTERS: Find out about the ‘blue carrot’ supermarket in Tucson, the ‘weird sandwich’ fundraiser for the Congressional candidate in Albuquerque, or the public access show being taped in Memphis. Website http://outside.in compiles stories from newspaper and television websites along with local bloggers and citizen media groups for 60 different cities around the country. Check out if you’re one of them and add it to your assignment list of checks. Or want to know how your Congressman is voting and why? Website maplight.org puts together campaign contributions AND Congressional voting records to paint an often unflattering picture of which wheels get the congressional grease.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Website ABC.com was the top visited entertainment website in May, according to Media Metrix and Nielsen/ NetRatings while NYTimes.com was the most visited newspaper site in May. Comedy Central’s animated satire Lil’ Bush which started out as a mobile phone download made its linear TV debut and drew the most viewers for a premiere on the network in three years. Marketers in England are being asked to remove an ad laid out in a field that can be seen by airline passengers flying into Gatwick Airport. The ad promotes an erotic website and features a silhouette of a naked female pole dancer. It’s 100,000 square feet in size.
Finally, on a completely un-related note to anything, congratulations to former CNN Executive Vice President and former Medill University broadcast chairman Jon Petrovich for being named to head the domestic broadcast operations for the Associated Press.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Monday, June 11, 2007
Message From Michael -- June 11, 2007
MOTHRA VERSUS GODZILLA
LET THE COMPETITION CONTINUE
NO LONGER A TWO WAY BATTLE
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
MOTHRA VERSUS GODZILLA: It’s the classic film, but did you know that Godzilla also went up against King Kong, and creatures known as Biollante, Destoroyah and King Ghidorah? Sometimes Godzilla was the hero and sometimes the anti-hero. Well, there are a similar series of contests going on, with the definition of who the hero is, depending on your point of view. The Toshiba developed HD-DVD and the Sony developed Blu-Ray are battling over who controls the home video sales market with releases of movies on the competing formats. Microsoft meanwhile has launched Silverlight to try and wrest the content creating crown from Adobe’s Flash multimedia authoring program. And, according to research call center Bridge Ratings, old media Radio may be facing a challenge from new media Cell Phones for news and sports info. Although radio remains the primary source by a two to one margin (65% versus 30%), the percentage of consumers picking radio for news and sports info dropped 11% while the percentage picking cell phones increased 11% in the last two years. But the big showdown pits traditional media Television against new media Broadband video. The odds are similar to the radio versus cell phone battle, but again it’s all a matter of perspective.
A study by ‘marketing research consultancy’ Ipsos Insight says even among consumers who ‘actively stream and download video content,’ three quarters of their video consumption (75%) is through a television set with only 11% being viewed on a PC. On the flip side, communications giant Motorola released a study of European broadband users which shows nearly half (45%) are watching some TV on the Internet. And even though the Ipsos report says Americans still are “entranced” by the increasing variety of content options available on their TV’s, a different study by media agency Publicis says the public is becoming blasé about TV’s offerings, in prime time in particular, with more than a third (38%) saying they’re less satisfied than in past years. The Washington Post reported that 2.5 Million fewer people tuned into the major networks this Spring season compared to last year, although the article says it is uncertain whether the change is a result of fewer TV viewers from Web use or time shifting. Nielsen Media Research released a report saying that the ‘decline’ in TV viewing is attributable to DVR usage and that people are actually watching as much as before. Meanwhile, the major networks have all gotten into the business of delivering program on the Internet. The biggest and latest player may be the British Broadcasting Corporation which unveiled a new streaming video player called iPlayer with its entire schedule soon available.
And even among the broadband video operations, there is a Godzilla like battle going on. Joost which was created by the Scandinavian duo who created Skype and Kazaa is quickly becoming the 600-pound gorilla of the broadband TV market, lining up major networks AND major advertisers. But it is not the only one, by any stretch of the imagination. Babelgum uses the same peer-to-peer technology (in which bits of data are shared among multiple computers instead of being housed on just one server) to distribute TV content. Even more unusual is Democracy Player, an open source TV video player created by a group called Participatory Culture Foundation which wants to build a “new, open mass medium of online television… (because) we think it’s a problem that a small number of corporations control mass media.”
As a side note to all this, a public thank you to Raycom CIO Dave Folsom for getting me an invite to beta test the Joost player. I’ll let you know what my admittedly semi-informed testing shows, after I’ve had a chance to kick the wheels for a while.
As a foot note to the declining viewership, reporter Paul Farhi reports in The Washington Post that the number of people watching Washington’s four leading news stations at 5pm and 6pm fell by about 8% overall from May 2006 to May 2007. But, he says if you go back to May of 1997, the change is even dramatic with a decline of 25% in the late news viewing and 37% in the 6pm viewing.
LET THE COMPETITION CONTINUE: As long as we’re on this battle theme, let’s look at some others. In social networking sites, the 16-hundred pound gorilla is, of course, MySpace with nearly 80% of the market, according to research firm Hitwise, while the 6-hundred pound monkey is Facebook with nearly 12% of the market. The chimpanzees of the social networking sites are Bebo and Imeem which get about one percent, focusing on music and video, and Black Planet which also gets about one percent focusing on the African American community. When it comes to virtual worlds, the 800-pound gorilla is Second Life which we’ve talked about in previous MfM’s. But a Swedish software company may soon make a monkey out of them with plans to build a massive virtual universe for China. The company, MindArk, says the Chinese virtual world will be able to handle 7 Million players at the same time and is aiming at 150 million users who are expected to generate $1 Billion in activity every year. For comparison’s sake, Second Life had 1.3 Million people log into the site in March, an increase of 46% since the beginning of the year, with most those visitors from Europe and only a fifth from North America. And in the war of the sexes, males account for nearly two thirds (63%) of the podcasting audience with only a third (37%) being female.
NO LONGER A TWO-WAY BATTLE: Let’s keep the theme going. Traditionally the battle for website NEWS and information users has been between television stations and newspapers. Regular readers of MfM will remember The Media Audit study of websites in 84 cities. A recent article in Editor and Publisher interprets the report as showing the television websites are getting stronger compared to newspaper websites. Four of the top websites are television sites (WRAL, KUSA, KENS and WVTM) and a fifth is a newspaper-TV combo (San Antonio Express News and KENS). The question, according to Bob Jordan, president of International Demographics, is whether TV stations can maintain that momentum. Now, there appears to be an even bigger question. Can TV and newspapers maintain their position against competition from what are called “pure play” media websites or multimedia websites? (That’s the Google, Yahoo, Digg sites of the world.)
That’s an especially critical question for newspapers, which accounted for more than a third (35.9%) of all local online advertising in 2006, according to research firm Borrell Associates. And the Newspaper Association of America noted that ad expenditures for newspaper websites increased 22.3% to $750 Million in the first quarter of this year compared to last year. TV sites get a meager 7.7% of local online advertising. The folks at Borrell Associates though say the spoilers are the pure play sites that are growing at the expense of local online advertising. Traditional media websites have gotten the “easy money” from existing advertisers, but the growth money will come from nontraditional advertisers, says Borrell. And if that doesn’t complicate the issue enough, another report by Hitwise US News and Media Report shows that the share of traffic leaving the News and Media industry for Multimedia sites doubled (196%) from April 2006 to March 2007. Part of the ‘problem’ is that news websites are increasingly dependent on search engines for traffic. What’s even more disturbing is that the folks at Hitwise say the market share of visits to the top 10 News and Media Websites declined 3.8% year to year, “indicating that news consumption is beginning to fragment.” Just to make sure that I don’t leave all my media friends completely depressed, the Online Publishers Association reports that nearly half (44%) of U.S. online video users watch online clips at least weekly and that three-quarters (73%) do so at least once a month. And the most popular genre for this viewing – news and current events.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: More than 71,000 people have registered to be monitored for health problems associated with the dust created in the aftermath of the 9/11 destruction in New York City, according to the New England Journal of Medicine. One in five people say they bring their laptop computer with them when they go on vacation while four out of five bring their cell phones so they can stay in the electronic loop, according to a poll released by AP-Ipsos. Nearly three quarters of Americans (73%) agree with the statement that “the rich get rich and the poor get poorer,” according to a survey by the Pew Research Group. That’s an 8-point increase since 2002. The same group did a different study which found that two-thirds (65%) of Americans believe corporate profits are too high. A survey by MasterCard found that three quarters of consumers in the Middle East have an Internet connection and half pay for their online purchases with credit cards, reflecting a steady gain in online shopping in the region. An elephant’s trunk has 150,000 muscles and a bird can fly a week without stopping, according to Animal Planet’s new show Fooled by Nature and reported in Cynopsis.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
LET THE COMPETITION CONTINUE
NO LONGER A TWO WAY BATTLE
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
MOTHRA VERSUS GODZILLA: It’s the classic film, but did you know that Godzilla also went up against King Kong, and creatures known as Biollante, Destoroyah and King Ghidorah? Sometimes Godzilla was the hero and sometimes the anti-hero. Well, there are a similar series of contests going on, with the definition of who the hero is, depending on your point of view. The Toshiba developed HD-DVD and the Sony developed Blu-Ray are battling over who controls the home video sales market with releases of movies on the competing formats. Microsoft meanwhile has launched Silverlight to try and wrest the content creating crown from Adobe’s Flash multimedia authoring program. And, according to research call center Bridge Ratings, old media Radio may be facing a challenge from new media Cell Phones for news and sports info. Although radio remains the primary source by a two to one margin (65% versus 30%), the percentage of consumers picking radio for news and sports info dropped 11% while the percentage picking cell phones increased 11% in the last two years. But the big showdown pits traditional media Television against new media Broadband video. The odds are similar to the radio versus cell phone battle, but again it’s all a matter of perspective.
A study by ‘marketing research consultancy’ Ipsos Insight says even among consumers who ‘actively stream and download video content,’ three quarters of their video consumption (75%) is through a television set with only 11% being viewed on a PC. On the flip side, communications giant Motorola released a study of European broadband users which shows nearly half (45%) are watching some TV on the Internet. And even though the Ipsos report says Americans still are “entranced” by the increasing variety of content options available on their TV’s, a different study by media agency Publicis says the public is becoming blasé about TV’s offerings, in prime time in particular, with more than a third (38%) saying they’re less satisfied than in past years. The Washington Post reported that 2.5 Million fewer people tuned into the major networks this Spring season compared to last year, although the article says it is uncertain whether the change is a result of fewer TV viewers from Web use or time shifting. Nielsen Media Research released a report saying that the ‘decline’ in TV viewing is attributable to DVR usage and that people are actually watching as much as before. Meanwhile, the major networks have all gotten into the business of delivering program on the Internet. The biggest and latest player may be the British Broadcasting Corporation which unveiled a new streaming video player called iPlayer with its entire schedule soon available.
And even among the broadband video operations, there is a Godzilla like battle going on. Joost which was created by the Scandinavian duo who created Skype and Kazaa is quickly becoming the 600-pound gorilla of the broadband TV market, lining up major networks AND major advertisers. But it is not the only one, by any stretch of the imagination. Babelgum uses the same peer-to-peer technology (in which bits of data are shared among multiple computers instead of being housed on just one server) to distribute TV content. Even more unusual is Democracy Player, an open source TV video player created by a group called Participatory Culture Foundation which wants to build a “new, open mass medium of online television… (because) we think it’s a problem that a small number of corporations control mass media.”
As a side note to all this, a public thank you to Raycom CIO Dave Folsom for getting me an invite to beta test the Joost player. I’ll let you know what my admittedly semi-informed testing shows, after I’ve had a chance to kick the wheels for a while.
As a foot note to the declining viewership, reporter Paul Farhi reports in The Washington Post that the number of people watching Washington’s four leading news stations at 5pm and 6pm fell by about 8% overall from May 2006 to May 2007. But, he says if you go back to May of 1997, the change is even dramatic with a decline of 25% in the late news viewing and 37% in the 6pm viewing.
LET THE COMPETITION CONTINUE: As long as we’re on this battle theme, let’s look at some others. In social networking sites, the 16-hundred pound gorilla is, of course, MySpace with nearly 80% of the market, according to research firm Hitwise, while the 6-hundred pound monkey is Facebook with nearly 12% of the market. The chimpanzees of the social networking sites are Bebo and Imeem which get about one percent, focusing on music and video, and Black Planet which also gets about one percent focusing on the African American community. When it comes to virtual worlds, the 800-pound gorilla is Second Life which we’ve talked about in previous MfM’s. But a Swedish software company may soon make a monkey out of them with plans to build a massive virtual universe for China. The company, MindArk, says the Chinese virtual world will be able to handle 7 Million players at the same time and is aiming at 150 million users who are expected to generate $1 Billion in activity every year. For comparison’s sake, Second Life had 1.3 Million people log into the site in March, an increase of 46% since the beginning of the year, with most those visitors from Europe and only a fifth from North America. And in the war of the sexes, males account for nearly two thirds (63%) of the podcasting audience with only a third (37%) being female.
NO LONGER A TWO-WAY BATTLE: Let’s keep the theme going. Traditionally the battle for website NEWS and information users has been between television stations and newspapers. Regular readers of MfM will remember The Media Audit study of websites in 84 cities. A recent article in Editor and Publisher interprets the report as showing the television websites are getting stronger compared to newspaper websites. Four of the top websites are television sites (WRAL, KUSA, KENS and WVTM) and a fifth is a newspaper-TV combo (San Antonio Express News and KENS). The question, according to Bob Jordan, president of International Demographics, is whether TV stations can maintain that momentum. Now, there appears to be an even bigger question. Can TV and newspapers maintain their position against competition from what are called “pure play” media websites or multimedia websites? (That’s the Google, Yahoo, Digg sites of the world.)
That’s an especially critical question for newspapers, which accounted for more than a third (35.9%) of all local online advertising in 2006, according to research firm Borrell Associates. And the Newspaper Association of America noted that ad expenditures for newspaper websites increased 22.3% to $750 Million in the first quarter of this year compared to last year. TV sites get a meager 7.7% of local online advertising. The folks at Borrell Associates though say the spoilers are the pure play sites that are growing at the expense of local online advertising. Traditional media websites have gotten the “easy money” from existing advertisers, but the growth money will come from nontraditional advertisers, says Borrell. And if that doesn’t complicate the issue enough, another report by Hitwise US News and Media Report shows that the share of traffic leaving the News and Media industry for Multimedia sites doubled (196%) from April 2006 to March 2007. Part of the ‘problem’ is that news websites are increasingly dependent on search engines for traffic. What’s even more disturbing is that the folks at Hitwise say the market share of visits to the top 10 News and Media Websites declined 3.8% year to year, “indicating that news consumption is beginning to fragment.” Just to make sure that I don’t leave all my media friends completely depressed, the Online Publishers Association reports that nearly half (44%) of U.S. online video users watch online clips at least weekly and that three-quarters (73%) do so at least once a month. And the most popular genre for this viewing – news and current events.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: More than 71,000 people have registered to be monitored for health problems associated with the dust created in the aftermath of the 9/11 destruction in New York City, according to the New England Journal of Medicine. One in five people say they bring their laptop computer with them when they go on vacation while four out of five bring their cell phones so they can stay in the electronic loop, according to a poll released by AP-Ipsos. Nearly three quarters of Americans (73%) agree with the statement that “the rich get rich and the poor get poorer,” according to a survey by the Pew Research Group. That’s an 8-point increase since 2002. The same group did a different study which found that two-thirds (65%) of Americans believe corporate profits are too high. A survey by MasterCard found that three quarters of consumers in the Middle East have an Internet connection and half pay for their online purchases with credit cards, reflecting a steady gain in online shopping in the region. An elephant’s trunk has 150,000 muscles and a bird can fly a week without stopping, according to Animal Planet’s new show Fooled by Nature and reported in Cynopsis.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Message from Michael -- May 28, 2007
CHINA TO OWN AMERICAN MEDIA
THE TRILLION DOLLAR MEDIA MOVE
TV WATCHING INCOME
LIVING IN SPAMALOT
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
CHINA TO OWN AMERICAN MEDIA: No cute headline this time. Just a statement. The Chinese state investment agency has made a $4 Billion investment in one of the top private equity firms in America – The Blackstone Group. You may have heard about that. However, what I haven’t heard reported is the fact that The Blackstone Group owns or has investments in many of the leading media companies in America. Everything from VNU and Nielsen to wireless and broadband providers, cable operators as well as Freedom Communications which owns nine television stations and more than two dozen daily newspapers. And recently Blackstone formed a new group with Cumulus Media called Cumulus Media Partners which owns 345 stations in 67 markets. Of course, the Chinese investment is in the form of “non-voting common units.” (I’m sure some of the smarter MfM readers know exactly what that means. I confess I don’t.) And because the Chinese investment is only 10% of Blackstone, that keeps it off the “radar screen” (as The Washington Post put it) of government scrutiny. Oh, and that $4 Billion. Chump Change. China has $1.2 TRILLION in “foreign exchange reserves.”
Now, I’m not trying to develop some kind of conspiracy theory, but the other partners in the Cumulus group are Thomas H. Lee Partners and Bain Capital Partners. These are the same two private equity groups that are “merging” with broadcast behemoth Clear Channel, owner of more than a thousand radio stations. Which brings me back to what started me on this thread – private equity firms buying media groups. In addition to the radio ‘merger,’ for example, Clear Channel has reached agreement to sell its 56 television stations to private equity firm Providence Equity Partners for $1.2 Billion. And that’s just the beginning. You heard about The New York Times selling its nine TV stations to private equity firm Oak Hill Capital Partners for $575 Million. And US Spanish language media network Univision is being acquired by a private equity consortium of Madison Deaborn Partners, Texas Pacific Group, Saban Capital Group AND Providence Equity Partners (yes, the same one that ‘acquired’ Clear Channel’s TV group) AND Thomas H Lee Partners (yes, the same one involved in the Cumulus purchase). And the private equity firms' interest in ‘old’ media isn’t limited to television either. Even ‘old-fashioned’ Reader’s Digest has ‘agreed to be taken private’ by a private equity consortium led by Ripplewood Holdings. So you’ve heard about those. But how about ProSiebenSat, the largest private German television broadcaster, being acquired for $7.6 Billion by the European private equity firm of Permira and the American private equity firm of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts. (I was working for Miami TV station WTVJ when KKR bought it.) Or how about European media giant Bertelsmann selling part of its assets (Sony Music maybe) to private equity firms and then teaming up with private equity firms to raise more money.
So, if declining audiences, fragmenting audiences, the Internet and information overload, along with multiple sources over multiple platforms are raising economic concerns for traditional media… why are these savvy financial experts buying them? The other point being raised by many observers is what does this mean to the journalism of the future. I know what you’re saying -- I’m getting off my fact-based approach and straying into opinion, but I’m not. I’m just pointing out questions being raised by others in the many publications I read – from The New York Times, The Financial Times, The International Herald Tribune, The Economist and many others. Lastly, as a footnote, there have been several reports speculating that private equity firms may bid on Nexstar Broadcasting and Lin Broadcasting, both of whom were put on the auction block.
THE TRILLION DOLLAR MEDIA MOVE: Part of the reason the private equity firms are snatching up traditional media can be found in a report by media investment banker Veronis Suhler Stevenson which predicts that media spending will surpass $1.236 Trillion by 2010. The report says “growth will see-saw in coming years as traditional media outlets transition business models.” Even more interesting (to me, at least) is the report’s statement that consumers spent 3,543 hours per person per in 2005 but that by 2010, it will grow to 3,620 per person annually – meaning 10 hours a day. The report says the fastest growth in Internet and mobile services is actually coming from the ‘traditional’ media companies. The problem is that online platforms don’t generate the spending that traditional media generates, at least in the short term. Consumers spend less time with online and mobile media than they do with traditional media. For example, they read a few news stories on the Web but entire sections of a printed newspaper. Complicating the financial picture is the fact that consumers are accustomed to getting content for free on the Web and are reluctant to pay. Add to that, the report says, user generated content (such as blogs and podcasts) which are also free and the decline of many media formats such as VHS, PC games and CD’s.
As a footnote to the hours spent with media, another report by Media-Screen which bills itself as a market research and consulting firm for “the digital lifestyle” says BROADBAND online users spend nearly half of their spare time (48%) online on a typical weekday. According to the study, that amounts to an hour and 40 minutes daily. Nearly half (49%) of the broadband population (45 Million people) regularly visit sites decided to a personal hobby or interest. And the authors say sending e-mail and visiting web sites for personal reasons are more popular than television.
TV WATCHING INCOME: Only one program, Desperate Housewives, ranked in the top 20 in terms of ‘upscale’ income viewers in every part of the U.S. MAGNA Global, one of the world’s largest media services firm, did an analysis of Nielsen data to find out which programs drew the highest income viewers and in which areas of the country – Northeast, Southeast, Southwest, East Central, West Central and Pacific. Only Desperate Housewives scored in all six Nielsen regions. The other top 10 programs in terms of ‘upscale’ viewers was The Office (NBC), Andy Barker, P.I. (NBC), Grey’s Anatomy (ABC), Two and a Half Men (CBS), Sixty Minutes (CBS), Boston Legal (ABC) Friday Night Lights (NBC) and What About Brian (ABC). On the cable side of the equation, the Magna analysis showed the top five cable networks are Fox News, HGTV, NFL Network, ESPN and ESPN2.
The highest income prime time viewers are in the Northeast where the ‘average medium income’ is $68,000 and lowest income prime time viewers are in the Southwest where the ‘average medium income’ is $48,000. Steve Sternberg, Magna’s Executive Vice President for Audience Analysis, says the analysis isn’t completely on target because Nielsen only reports total household income, not individual income. To put those figures into some kind of perspective, I looked up national figures. According to the Federal Reserve’s survey of consumer finance, the average family income in 2004 (the last time surveyed) was $70,700. And, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the ‘real median income’ for an American household in 2005 was $46,326.
LIVING IN SPAMALOT: Despite an increase in Spam, American Internet users are less bothered about it, according to a study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project. In 2003, when Pew first asked people about the affect of spam on their Internet life, one in four (25%) said spam was a big problem. In the latest survey just released, that number had dropped to less than one in five (18%). Part of the reason for that, according to the authors, may be that the amount of pornographic spam (which people find to be the most offensive) has dropped. Three years ago, nearly 3 out of 4 people (71%) reported receiving porn spam. In the last survey the number had dropped to half (52%). However, phishing spam (email designed to trick people into revealing financial information) is the same with one in three (36%) receiving this kind of spam. As a side note to this, I found it interesting that the survey showed more email users (88%) have a personal email account compared to those with a work account (49%).
COCKTAIL CHATTER: The big story in Europe is the disappearance of a three-year-old British girl named Madeline McCann while on vacation with her family in Portugal. To give you an idea of the extent of coverage, do a search for her name and you get 127,000-plus hits. Nearly a quarter of American adults (23%) say they mostly (14%) or completely (9%) agree that American lives are worth more than the lives of people in other countries, according to the most recent Pew Social Values Survey. A :30-second spot in the American Idol finale went for $1.3 Million – the same as last year, despite some ratings attrition. By way of comparison, a :30-second spot in the SuperBowl went for twice that -- $2.6 Million. But, of course, that’s a once a year event. The latest ‘sensation’ in online video is Justin.tv which is a 24/7 “lifecast” of some guy with a camera on his head. Literally, nothing happens for hours on end. But it has become so popular, that backers are offering to help other people start up their own “lifecast.” And despite all the focus on digital entertainment, the latest ‘sensation’ among male ‘tweens (boys aged 10 to 12) is The Dangerous Book for Boys which the Wall Street Journal calls a “retro-style adventure manual.”
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
THE TRILLION DOLLAR MEDIA MOVE
TV WATCHING INCOME
LIVING IN SPAMALOT
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
CHINA TO OWN AMERICAN MEDIA: No cute headline this time. Just a statement. The Chinese state investment agency has made a $4 Billion investment in one of the top private equity firms in America – The Blackstone Group. You may have heard about that. However, what I haven’t heard reported is the fact that The Blackstone Group owns or has investments in many of the leading media companies in America. Everything from VNU and Nielsen to wireless and broadband providers, cable operators as well as Freedom Communications which owns nine television stations and more than two dozen daily newspapers. And recently Blackstone formed a new group with Cumulus Media called Cumulus Media Partners which owns 345 stations in 67 markets. Of course, the Chinese investment is in the form of “non-voting common units.” (I’m sure some of the smarter MfM readers know exactly what that means. I confess I don’t.) And because the Chinese investment is only 10% of Blackstone, that keeps it off the “radar screen” (as The Washington Post put it) of government scrutiny. Oh, and that $4 Billion. Chump Change. China has $1.2 TRILLION in “foreign exchange reserves.”
Now, I’m not trying to develop some kind of conspiracy theory, but the other partners in the Cumulus group are Thomas H. Lee Partners and Bain Capital Partners. These are the same two private equity groups that are “merging” with broadcast behemoth Clear Channel, owner of more than a thousand radio stations. Which brings me back to what started me on this thread – private equity firms buying media groups. In addition to the radio ‘merger,’ for example, Clear Channel has reached agreement to sell its 56 television stations to private equity firm Providence Equity Partners for $1.2 Billion. And that’s just the beginning. You heard about The New York Times selling its nine TV stations to private equity firm Oak Hill Capital Partners for $575 Million. And US Spanish language media network Univision is being acquired by a private equity consortium of Madison Deaborn Partners, Texas Pacific Group, Saban Capital Group AND Providence Equity Partners (yes, the same one that ‘acquired’ Clear Channel’s TV group) AND Thomas H Lee Partners (yes, the same one involved in the Cumulus purchase). And the private equity firms' interest in ‘old’ media isn’t limited to television either. Even ‘old-fashioned’ Reader’s Digest has ‘agreed to be taken private’ by a private equity consortium led by Ripplewood Holdings. So you’ve heard about those. But how about ProSiebenSat, the largest private German television broadcaster, being acquired for $7.6 Billion by the European private equity firm of Permira and the American private equity firm of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts. (I was working for Miami TV station WTVJ when KKR bought it.) Or how about European media giant Bertelsmann selling part of its assets (Sony Music maybe) to private equity firms and then teaming up with private equity firms to raise more money.
So, if declining audiences, fragmenting audiences, the Internet and information overload, along with multiple sources over multiple platforms are raising economic concerns for traditional media… why are these savvy financial experts buying them? The other point being raised by many observers is what does this mean to the journalism of the future. I know what you’re saying -- I’m getting off my fact-based approach and straying into opinion, but I’m not. I’m just pointing out questions being raised by others in the many publications I read – from The New York Times, The Financial Times, The International Herald Tribune, The Economist and many others. Lastly, as a footnote, there have been several reports speculating that private equity firms may bid on Nexstar Broadcasting and Lin Broadcasting, both of whom were put on the auction block.
THE TRILLION DOLLAR MEDIA MOVE: Part of the reason the private equity firms are snatching up traditional media can be found in a report by media investment banker Veronis Suhler Stevenson which predicts that media spending will surpass $1.236 Trillion by 2010. The report says “growth will see-saw in coming years as traditional media outlets transition business models.” Even more interesting (to me, at least) is the report’s statement that consumers spent 3,543 hours per person per in 2005 but that by 2010, it will grow to 3,620 per person annually – meaning 10 hours a day. The report says the fastest growth in Internet and mobile services is actually coming from the ‘traditional’ media companies. The problem is that online platforms don’t generate the spending that traditional media generates, at least in the short term. Consumers spend less time with online and mobile media than they do with traditional media. For example, they read a few news stories on the Web but entire sections of a printed newspaper. Complicating the financial picture is the fact that consumers are accustomed to getting content for free on the Web and are reluctant to pay. Add to that, the report says, user generated content (such as blogs and podcasts) which are also free and the decline of many media formats such as VHS, PC games and CD’s.
As a footnote to the hours spent with media, another report by Media-Screen which bills itself as a market research and consulting firm for “the digital lifestyle” says BROADBAND online users spend nearly half of their spare time (48%) online on a typical weekday. According to the study, that amounts to an hour and 40 minutes daily. Nearly half (49%) of the broadband population (45 Million people) regularly visit sites decided to a personal hobby or interest. And the authors say sending e-mail and visiting web sites for personal reasons are more popular than television.
TV WATCHING INCOME: Only one program, Desperate Housewives, ranked in the top 20 in terms of ‘upscale’ income viewers in every part of the U.S. MAGNA Global, one of the world’s largest media services firm, did an analysis of Nielsen data to find out which programs drew the highest income viewers and in which areas of the country – Northeast, Southeast, Southwest, East Central, West Central and Pacific. Only Desperate Housewives scored in all six Nielsen regions. The other top 10 programs in terms of ‘upscale’ viewers was The Office (NBC), Andy Barker, P.I. (NBC), Grey’s Anatomy (ABC), Two and a Half Men (CBS), Sixty Minutes (CBS), Boston Legal (ABC) Friday Night Lights (NBC) and What About Brian (ABC). On the cable side of the equation, the Magna analysis showed the top five cable networks are Fox News, HGTV, NFL Network, ESPN and ESPN2.
The highest income prime time viewers are in the Northeast where the ‘average medium income’ is $68,000 and lowest income prime time viewers are in the Southwest where the ‘average medium income’ is $48,000. Steve Sternberg, Magna’s Executive Vice President for Audience Analysis, says the analysis isn’t completely on target because Nielsen only reports total household income, not individual income. To put those figures into some kind of perspective, I looked up national figures. According to the Federal Reserve’s survey of consumer finance, the average family income in 2004 (the last time surveyed) was $70,700. And, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the ‘real median income’ for an American household in 2005 was $46,326.
LIVING IN SPAMALOT: Despite an increase in Spam, American Internet users are less bothered about it, according to a study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project. In 2003, when Pew first asked people about the affect of spam on their Internet life, one in four (25%) said spam was a big problem. In the latest survey just released, that number had dropped to less than one in five (18%). Part of the reason for that, according to the authors, may be that the amount of pornographic spam (which people find to be the most offensive) has dropped. Three years ago, nearly 3 out of 4 people (71%) reported receiving porn spam. In the last survey the number had dropped to half (52%). However, phishing spam (email designed to trick people into revealing financial information) is the same with one in three (36%) receiving this kind of spam. As a side note to this, I found it interesting that the survey showed more email users (88%) have a personal email account compared to those with a work account (49%).
COCKTAIL CHATTER: The big story in Europe is the disappearance of a three-year-old British girl named Madeline McCann while on vacation with her family in Portugal. To give you an idea of the extent of coverage, do a search for her name and you get 127,000-plus hits. Nearly a quarter of American adults (23%) say they mostly (14%) or completely (9%) agree that American lives are worth more than the lives of people in other countries, according to the most recent Pew Social Values Survey. A :30-second spot in the American Idol finale went for $1.3 Million – the same as last year, despite some ratings attrition. By way of comparison, a :30-second spot in the SuperBowl went for twice that -- $2.6 Million. But, of course, that’s a once a year event. The latest ‘sensation’ in online video is Justin.tv which is a 24/7 “lifecast” of some guy with a camera on his head. Literally, nothing happens for hours on end. But it has become so popular, that backers are offering to help other people start up their own “lifecast.” And despite all the focus on digital entertainment, the latest ‘sensation’ among male ‘tweens (boys aged 10 to 12) is The Dangerous Book for Boys which the Wall Street Journal calls a “retro-style adventure manual.”
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Message From Michael -- May 21, 2007
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License.
SWEEPS AND WEBSITES
UPFRONT
TELEVISION’S FUTURE – A CQ REPORT
A MECHANICAL LOOK AT TELEVISION
OUTSOURCING JOURNALISM
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SWEEPS: Theoretically you should be receiving this about 8:00 a.m. Monday morning. That means you have exactly 88 hours left in the May sweeps. Here is an interesting sidebar to the ratings race. According to Nielsen/ Net Ratings the leading network site (in April, so it’s a little old) was Fox with 8.5 Million unique visitors, up 39% from last year. Close behind was ABC with 8.3 Million, up 75% from last year and still close behind was NBC with 8.2 Million unique visitors, up 14% from last year. Trailing in definite last place was CBS with 4.5 Million unique visitors, up only 13% from last year.
UPFRONT: Just as I couldn’t produce this week’s MfM without mentioning sweeps, I couldn’t not mention (yes, I know, a double negative) the Network Upfront presentations for the Fall programming schedule. No comment. Just a mention. Newsletters like Cynopsis and The Programming Insider give better reports.
TELEVISION’S FUTURE – A CQ REPORT: A recently released special report by leading political journalism publication Congressional Quarterly raises the question – Will TV remain the dominant mass medium? Unfortunately, it never actually answers the question, although it provides a nice summary of the various issues. That’s not to say it doesn’t make some interesting points such as audience fragmentation. Then again, you already know about that. But how about the idea that fragmentation has disintegrated the concept of a common culture created by television with its mass audience. Everybody watched I Love Lucy and The Ed Sullivan Show or listened to Top 40 or read the Book-of-the-Month Club selection. No more. What the report does best though is provide some insightful, thought-provoking quotes which are worth repeating. And so I’m going to do just that:
“We’re gonna surround consumers with media. We’re not gonna let them cut us off and move away from our brand.” -- John Skipper, ESPN’s executive vice president for content, making the point that ESPN is no longer a television company, but instead is a ‘sports media company.’
“We’re in a moment in time when media power operates top down from corporate boardrooms and bottom up from teenagers’ bedrooms.” -- Henry Jenkins, director of the comparative media studies program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
“The Internet has behaved like a serial killer. First, the print media suffered, and then the music industry suffered. Perhaps television is next.” -- Daniel Franklin, executive editor of The Economist.
“The barrier to entry – the once-formidable cost of shooting and editing footage – has almost disappeared. But what’s still in short supply, and always will rise to the top, is good ideas.” -- Jeffrey Cole, director of the University of Southern California’s Center for the Digital Future, talking about online video and user generated content.
“In 1991 when a bystander videotaped the beating of Rodney King in Los Angeles, the incident was almost unbelievable – not the violence but the recording of it. (But now) the distinction between amateur and professional photojournalists (is) wearing away.” -- James Poniewozik, media critic for Time magazine, talking about cell phone videos.
“The TV is actually growing to other devices… because of the programming.” -- Chris Pizzuro, vice president of digital and new media advertising sales and marketing for Turner Entertainment, making the point that computers and iPods are becoming, in effect, TV sets.
“Advertising is suffering because of the sheer amount of it, the lack of innovation within traditional advertising formats and the power that media fragmentation and technology give to consumers to tune out the noise.” -- Tom Himpe, author of Advertising is Dead: Long Live Advertising.
“It’s a case of the rich getting richer. If people are passionate about your programming, they will watch it and find ways of watching it.” -- Mark Loughney, vice president of sales and strategy research for ABC-TV.
“When we see that big box in the living room, we think of channels. There’s no reason for television to be divided by that, other than convention.” -- Andrew Kantor, technology reporter for the Roanoke Times and columnist for USAToday.com.
“The changes of the next five years will dwarf the changes of the last 50.” -- Jeff Zucker, chief executive of NBC Universal’s television group.
“It’s great to be given the keys to the Library of Congress, but if there’s no card catalog, it’s not much use.” -- Todd Herman, new media strategist for Microsoft, talking about the need for search engines.
“It is now possible – even common – to go about your day in America and consume only what you wish to see and hear.” -- Brian Williams, Anchor, NBC News.
“Ultimately the biggest story of the 21st Century will be the fracturing of the 20th Century audience.” -- Robert J. Thompson, founding director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television, Syracuse University.
“The common culture of my youth is gone for good… splintered beyond repair by the emergence of the Web-based technologies that so maximized and facilitated culture choice as to make the broad-based offerings of the old mass media look bland and unchallenging by comparison.” -- Terry Treachout, media critic.
“If I had to describe the future of TV in one word, it would be -- ‘more’.” -- Mike Bloxham, director of research at Ball State University’s Center for Media Design.
A MECHANICAL LOOK AT TELEVISION: Okay, if the exalted Congressional Quarterly won’t tell us about the future of television, who will? Popular Mechanics will. You remember Popular Mechanics. The magazine that showed your Dad how to put together a tube TV in the 50’s. The magazine’s Senior Technology Editor Glenn Derene makes the point that 70% of Americans go online according to the latest research while Televisions are in 98% of American homes. Anywhere from 15% to 30% of the U.S. population still does not use computers even though they’ve been around for 30 years. Televisions were in 70% of the U.S. homes within 10 years of being introduced and DVD players were in 82% of households within 9 years of introduction. And in case you think he’s being a technological Neanderthal, Derene makes no bones about the fact that PC’s are “far more useful” than TV’s. Instead he argues that PC’s have always been an “awkward consumer electronics” device while TV’s have been easier to understand and use. Of course he notes that will change as people grow up with the more complex computer and, ironically, as TV’s are made more complicated.
And as a side note to this, HDNet founder Mark Cuban and YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley argued before a Congressional subcommittee looking at new technology that online TV is not a threat to traditional TV. They see it as a complementary service, rather than a primary one. And as a side note to the side note, a study by Forrester Research shows that half of European broadband users (who have been earlier adopters than U.S. users) are watching at least some television on their computers.
OUTSOURCING JOURNALISM: All right, I try to avoid reporting on stories that have already been headlined elsewhere, but this is so weird that it’s worth repeating. A ‘news’ operation in California (I was going to say – where else – but that’s too sarcastic) is outsourcing coverage of its local city council meeting to two journalists in India. As I get it, the city council airs its meetings on the local cable channel. That channel is being sent by the folks at Pasadenanow.com over broadband pipes to India where two ‘journalists’ watch it and report on it. I should note that the two journalists were selected from an online ad, and they are both graduates of the UC-Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. BTW, the editor and publisher of the Pasadena Now website used to run a clothing business with manufacturing help from Vietnam and India.
STTYWYAK: It’s time to revive an old MfM feature – Studies That Tell You What You Already Know. (BTW -- Pronounced Stee-Wee-Ak.) The latest is a report by eROI that nearly nine out of 10 email marketers (87%) say relevant content within the e-mail message is --- shock of shocks – “very important.” That stunning news is only matched by the fact that eight out of 10 marketers (81%) say deliverability is “very important.”
On the flip side of the relevance coin, a study by market research and consulting firm Focalyst found that – contrary to popular marketing opinion – older people, most notably Baby Boomers, are not as brand loyal as thought. Less than a quarter were loyal to a particular brand of television (22%) or computers (24%) or clothing (27%). The report which notes that adults over age 42 account for $3 Trillion in consumer spending annually ARE loyal when companies give customized service or more personalized attention.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: An enviromental website called zerofootprint.net has designed an online system that allows you to calculate your “carbon footprint” – as in how much carbon you personally generate. More than 12.8 Million new websites have been added to the net in the last five months, according to Netcraft LTD., an increase from 7.5 million in the same period last year. More than half of Americans (59%) say religion’s influence on life is waning, according to a Pew Research poll. And more than half (55%) of global executives say they use, or plan to use, blogs as a business tool, according to research firm Melcrum.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
SWEEPS AND WEBSITES
UPFRONT
TELEVISION’S FUTURE – A CQ REPORT
A MECHANICAL LOOK AT TELEVISION
OUTSOURCING JOURNALISM
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SWEEPS: Theoretically you should be receiving this about 8:00 a.m. Monday morning. That means you have exactly 88 hours left in the May sweeps. Here is an interesting sidebar to the ratings race. According to Nielsen/ Net Ratings the leading network site (in April, so it’s a little old) was Fox with 8.5 Million unique visitors, up 39% from last year. Close behind was ABC with 8.3 Million, up 75% from last year and still close behind was NBC with 8.2 Million unique visitors, up 14% from last year. Trailing in definite last place was CBS with 4.5 Million unique visitors, up only 13% from last year.
UPFRONT: Just as I couldn’t produce this week’s MfM without mentioning sweeps, I couldn’t not mention (yes, I know, a double negative) the Network Upfront presentations for the Fall programming schedule. No comment. Just a mention. Newsletters like Cynopsis and The Programming Insider give better reports.
TELEVISION’S FUTURE – A CQ REPORT: A recently released special report by leading political journalism publication Congressional Quarterly raises the question – Will TV remain the dominant mass medium? Unfortunately, it never actually answers the question, although it provides a nice summary of the various issues. That’s not to say it doesn’t make some interesting points such as audience fragmentation. Then again, you already know about that. But how about the idea that fragmentation has disintegrated the concept of a common culture created by television with its mass audience. Everybody watched I Love Lucy and The Ed Sullivan Show or listened to Top 40 or read the Book-of-the-Month Club selection. No more. What the report does best though is provide some insightful, thought-provoking quotes which are worth repeating. And so I’m going to do just that:
“We’re gonna surround consumers with media. We’re not gonna let them cut us off and move away from our brand.” -- John Skipper, ESPN’s executive vice president for content, making the point that ESPN is no longer a television company, but instead is a ‘sports media company.’
“We’re in a moment in time when media power operates top down from corporate boardrooms and bottom up from teenagers’ bedrooms.” -- Henry Jenkins, director of the comparative media studies program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
“The Internet has behaved like a serial killer. First, the print media suffered, and then the music industry suffered. Perhaps television is next.” -- Daniel Franklin, executive editor of The Economist.
“The barrier to entry – the once-formidable cost of shooting and editing footage – has almost disappeared. But what’s still in short supply, and always will rise to the top, is good ideas.” -- Jeffrey Cole, director of the University of Southern California’s Center for the Digital Future, talking about online video and user generated content.
“In 1991 when a bystander videotaped the beating of Rodney King in Los Angeles, the incident was almost unbelievable – not the violence but the recording of it. (But now) the distinction between amateur and professional photojournalists (is) wearing away.” -- James Poniewozik, media critic for Time magazine, talking about cell phone videos.
“The TV is actually growing to other devices… because of the programming.” -- Chris Pizzuro, vice president of digital and new media advertising sales and marketing for Turner Entertainment, making the point that computers and iPods are becoming, in effect, TV sets.
“Advertising is suffering because of the sheer amount of it, the lack of innovation within traditional advertising formats and the power that media fragmentation and technology give to consumers to tune out the noise.” -- Tom Himpe, author of Advertising is Dead: Long Live Advertising.
“It’s a case of the rich getting richer. If people are passionate about your programming, they will watch it and find ways of watching it.” -- Mark Loughney, vice president of sales and strategy research for ABC-TV.
“When we see that big box in the living room, we think of channels. There’s no reason for television to be divided by that, other than convention.” -- Andrew Kantor, technology reporter for the Roanoke Times and columnist for USAToday.com.
“The changes of the next five years will dwarf the changes of the last 50.” -- Jeff Zucker, chief executive of NBC Universal’s television group.
“It’s great to be given the keys to the Library of Congress, but if there’s no card catalog, it’s not much use.” -- Todd Herman, new media strategist for Microsoft, talking about the need for search engines.
“It is now possible – even common – to go about your day in America and consume only what you wish to see and hear.” -- Brian Williams, Anchor, NBC News.
“Ultimately the biggest story of the 21st Century will be the fracturing of the 20th Century audience.” -- Robert J. Thompson, founding director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television, Syracuse University.
“The common culture of my youth is gone for good… splintered beyond repair by the emergence of the Web-based technologies that so maximized and facilitated culture choice as to make the broad-based offerings of the old mass media look bland and unchallenging by comparison.” -- Terry Treachout, media critic.
“If I had to describe the future of TV in one word, it would be -- ‘more’.” -- Mike Bloxham, director of research at Ball State University’s Center for Media Design.
A MECHANICAL LOOK AT TELEVISION: Okay, if the exalted Congressional Quarterly won’t tell us about the future of television, who will? Popular Mechanics will. You remember Popular Mechanics. The magazine that showed your Dad how to put together a tube TV in the 50’s. The magazine’s Senior Technology Editor Glenn Derene makes the point that 70% of Americans go online according to the latest research while Televisions are in 98% of American homes. Anywhere from 15% to 30% of the U.S. population still does not use computers even though they’ve been around for 30 years. Televisions were in 70% of the U.S. homes within 10 years of being introduced and DVD players were in 82% of households within 9 years of introduction. And in case you think he’s being a technological Neanderthal, Derene makes no bones about the fact that PC’s are “far more useful” than TV’s. Instead he argues that PC’s have always been an “awkward consumer electronics” device while TV’s have been easier to understand and use. Of course he notes that will change as people grow up with the more complex computer and, ironically, as TV’s are made more complicated.
And as a side note to this, HDNet founder Mark Cuban and YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley argued before a Congressional subcommittee looking at new technology that online TV is not a threat to traditional TV. They see it as a complementary service, rather than a primary one. And as a side note to the side note, a study by Forrester Research shows that half of European broadband users (who have been earlier adopters than U.S. users) are watching at least some television on their computers.
OUTSOURCING JOURNALISM: All right, I try to avoid reporting on stories that have already been headlined elsewhere, but this is so weird that it’s worth repeating. A ‘news’ operation in California (I was going to say – where else – but that’s too sarcastic) is outsourcing coverage of its local city council meeting to two journalists in India. As I get it, the city council airs its meetings on the local cable channel. That channel is being sent by the folks at Pasadenanow.com over broadband pipes to India where two ‘journalists’ watch it and report on it. I should note that the two journalists were selected from an online ad, and they are both graduates of the UC-Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. BTW, the editor and publisher of the Pasadena Now website used to run a clothing business with manufacturing help from Vietnam and India.
STTYWYAK: It’s time to revive an old MfM feature – Studies That Tell You What You Already Know. (BTW -- Pronounced Stee-Wee-Ak.) The latest is a report by eROI that nearly nine out of 10 email marketers (87%) say relevant content within the e-mail message is --- shock of shocks – “very important.” That stunning news is only matched by the fact that eight out of 10 marketers (81%) say deliverability is “very important.”
On the flip side of the relevance coin, a study by market research and consulting firm Focalyst found that – contrary to popular marketing opinion – older people, most notably Baby Boomers, are not as brand loyal as thought. Less than a quarter were loyal to a particular brand of television (22%) or computers (24%) or clothing (27%). The report which notes that adults over age 42 account for $3 Trillion in consumer spending annually ARE loyal when companies give customized service or more personalized attention.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: An enviromental website called zerofootprint.net has designed an online system that allows you to calculate your “carbon footprint” – as in how much carbon you personally generate. More than 12.8 Million new websites have been added to the net in the last five months, according to Netcraft LTD., an increase from 7.5 million in the same period last year. More than half of Americans (59%) say religion’s influence on life is waning, according to a Pew Research poll. And more than half (55%) of global executives say they use, or plan to use, blogs as a business tool, according to research firm Melcrum.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Message From Michael -- May 14, 2007
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Public Domain License.
SWEEPS
THE PRESIDENT AND LOCAL TV
THE TWO SIDES OF THE TECHNOLOGY COIN
DROWNING IN DIGITAL VIDEO
DELIVER ON YOUR PROMISES
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SWEEPS: The countdown begins. Coming into the final week of sweeps. For those of you in diary markets, a reminder that your friends at Nielsen often over-sample the last two weeks to compensate for low returns in the first two weeks. And be prepared for the American Idol steamroller in the last two days of the book. Tuesday, May 22nd, will be the last performance show and Wednesday, May 23rd, will be the last results show. The other networks have pretty well given up trying to run anything against Fox those nights. That doesn’t mean you should, but you have to give those viewers a strong reason to come back to your late news.
THE PRESIDENT AND LOCAL TV: So, did you or your local television carry President Bush’s announcement that he was vetoing the Iraq War funding bill. I was curious after three out of the four news stations here in Atlanta carried the announcement. (Meredith-owned CBS affiliate WGCL-TV, did not.) You may recall the President took to the airwaves at the odd time of about 6:10 p.m. EST/ 5:10 p.m. CST—during local news time. So, I did a random check of more than two dozen stations around the country – different size markets, different groups and different time zones. Only a quarter (6) of the stations carried the announcement live. Three stations had stories about the impending announcement in their early newscast but not the actual live announcement. Another three stations had nothing, period, about the announcement in either their early evening or late newscasts. One station had a background package in its early evening newscast but nothing about the actual announcement in their late newscast. Only two stations led with the veto announcement in the late newscast. Six stations carried the story in their first block of news, but most carried it in the second block. Three stations carried the story in the second quarter hour. And most stations did it as a voice over-soundbite.
A couple of interesting side notes. The average length of the first block of all the newscasts was 10 minutes, with a low of 6 minutes and a high of 15 minutes. The median time was also about 10 minutes. About a quarter of the stations had image spots in their newscasts and a little more than a quarter had topicals for their special reports in their own newscasts.
THE TWO SIDES OF THE TECHNOLOGY COIN: A study by the Pew Internet and the American Life project shows (at least in my view) that there are more people who don’t care that much about information and communication technology (ICT) than there are people deeply involved in the technology. The research group identified ten groups of people based on a survey of 4,000 people and their technological attitudes, actions and assets. The ‘elite tech users’ consisted of four groups and accounted for nearly a third (31%) of the population. But there were four groups who fell into the ‘few tech assets’ category and they comprised nearly half (49%) of the population. The ‘middle of the road’ tech users accounted for 20%. On the high end were the so-called ‘omnivores’ who have lots of information gadgets and services which they use “voraciously” to take part in the Web 2.0 world. These are the you-tubing, myspacing, blogging, user-generating group, I guess. That’s only 8% of the population. On the low end are the ones ‘off the network’ who don’t have cell phones or Internet. These are mostly older people who are “content” with old media. That was double though the high end group, accounting for 15% of the population.
The next-to-the-top group are the ‘connectors’ who have feature-packed cell phones, go online frequently and have a high level of satisfaction with all the technology. That was only 7% though. On the flip side of that, just one up from the bottom of the scale, was the ‘indifferents’ group who had cell phones and online access, but used them only intermittently and with some annoyance. This group accounted for 11%. The other high end users were the ‘lackluster veterans’ (8%) and the ‘productivity enhancers’ (also 8%). The other low end users were the ‘light but satisfied’ (15%) and the ‘inexperienced experimenters” (8%). In the middle were the ‘mobile centrics’ and the ‘connected but hassled’, both at 10%.
Wondering which group you fall in? The good folks at Pew have provided the questionnaire online so you can test yourself and find out. Go to http://www.pewinternet.org/quiz/ and discover your ‘typology.’ I was a ‘connector’ – no surprise, no surprise.
DROWNING IN DIGITAL VIDEO: More than 60% of Internet traffic comes in the form of digital video, according to Cambridge, England, firm CacheLogic which sells Internet services. And a Carnegie Melon University computer scientist says he thinks that figure will reach 98% in a few short years. You think your downloading is slow now? Wait till then. However, scientist Hui Zhang says the solution may be peer-to-peer (P2P) networking. Most P2P technology is associated with places like Gnutella, Kazaa and BitTorrent known for pirating copyrighted material. But Zhang says he is close to figuring out a way to legitimize the P2P approach, which shares data by breaking up big blocks into little blocks that are stored on multiple computers so no one computer or broadband pipe becomes clogged. He calls his system “chunkyspread.”
Zhang’s proposal is one of ten emerging technologies cited by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Technology Review publication. Others include a ‘mobile augmented reality application’ being developed by the Finnish based Nokia Research Center. It basically puts a GPS sensor, a compass and what is called ‘accelerometers’ into cell phones so that you can point your cell phone camera at a building, for example, and it will tell you not only where you are but what businesses, restaurants and other attractions are nearby. Or, how about having that already small digital camera of yours become even smaller and faster. Two electrical and computer professors at Rice University have developed a camera that ‘reimagines’ digital imaging. Instead of, for example, a four megapixel digital camera using four million image sensors to catch a picture, their camera uses a single image sensor that reconstructs the image using a novel algorithm. Researchers at Harvard University have created light focusing antennas that could lead to DVD’s that hold hundreds of movies. They have figured out a way around what’s called the ‘diffraction limit’ in the law of physics which, as its name implies, limits the light beams used to record DVD images. So, it seems that while Zhang is figuring out how to cope with the growing digital video flood, these other scientists are figuring out how to add to the flood waters.
DELIVER ON YOUR PROMISES: A study by a professor at the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business appears to prove a marketing maxim, but with a twist. The maxim ‘promise what you can deliver and deliver what you promise’ is a warning against over-hyping. In a study in the Journal of Consumer Research, assistant professor Vanessa Patrick found that people notice it when they feel worse than they expected, but they don’t notice it when they feel better than they expected. She and her team have even coined a term for it – affective misforecasting. In brief, the team showed different sets of volunteers a film clip and a music clip. Some were told the clips got a five star rating and some were told the clips got a one star rating, although the clips were actually somewhere in the middle. The people told that the clips had a five-star rating noted that they were not as good as expected, but the people told the clips had only a one-star rating did not note that the clips were better than expected. Aside from warning about the dangers of over-selling, the study authors say business can help themselves by helping consumers take notice of when they feel better than expected. For example, grocery stores printing messages on their receipts telling consumers how much they saved.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Even though it was created by Americans, nearly two-thirds (61%) of the people who are ‘active residents’ of virtual world Second Life are European. (A personal anecdote – when I explored the Second Life world on a recent visit, I was the only American. Everybody I ran into was from Europe or Asia.) There are now more cell phones than people in the 142 million population Russia, according to research firm eMarketer. Nearly a quarter (23%) of the American public believe “AIDS might be God’s punishment for immoral sexual behavior,” according to a survey by the Pew Research Center. That is actually down from when the question was first asked in 1987 when just under half (43%) agreed with that statement. The Miami Herald reports that Floridians can now be buried with their pets, thanks to a law sponsored by a state representative who wanted to be buried with the ashes of his Labrador retriever who died ten years ago. The total cost of all civil lawsuits (torts) in the U.S. in 2005 was $261 Billion, which averages out to $880 per person, according to a study by management consulting firm Towers-Perrin Tillinghast.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
SWEEPS
THE PRESIDENT AND LOCAL TV
THE TWO SIDES OF THE TECHNOLOGY COIN
DROWNING IN DIGITAL VIDEO
DELIVER ON YOUR PROMISES
COCKTAIL CHATTER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SWEEPS: The countdown begins. Coming into the final week of sweeps. For those of you in diary markets, a reminder that your friends at Nielsen often over-sample the last two weeks to compensate for low returns in the first two weeks. And be prepared for the American Idol steamroller in the last two days of the book. Tuesday, May 22nd, will be the last performance show and Wednesday, May 23rd, will be the last results show. The other networks have pretty well given up trying to run anything against Fox those nights. That doesn’t mean you should, but you have to give those viewers a strong reason to come back to your late news.
THE PRESIDENT AND LOCAL TV: So, did you or your local television carry President Bush’s announcement that he was vetoing the Iraq War funding bill. I was curious after three out of the four news stations here in Atlanta carried the announcement. (Meredith-owned CBS affiliate WGCL-TV, did not.) You may recall the President took to the airwaves at the odd time of about 6:10 p.m. EST/ 5:10 p.m. CST—during local news time. So, I did a random check of more than two dozen stations around the country – different size markets, different groups and different time zones. Only a quarter (6) of the stations carried the announcement live. Three stations had stories about the impending announcement in their early newscast but not the actual live announcement. Another three stations had nothing, period, about the announcement in either their early evening or late newscasts. One station had a background package in its early evening newscast but nothing about the actual announcement in their late newscast. Only two stations led with the veto announcement in the late newscast. Six stations carried the story in their first block of news, but most carried it in the second block. Three stations carried the story in the second quarter hour. And most stations did it as a voice over-soundbite.
A couple of interesting side notes. The average length of the first block of all the newscasts was 10 minutes, with a low of 6 minutes and a high of 15 minutes. The median time was also about 10 minutes. About a quarter of the stations had image spots in their newscasts and a little more than a quarter had topicals for their special reports in their own newscasts.
THE TWO SIDES OF THE TECHNOLOGY COIN: A study by the Pew Internet and the American Life project shows (at least in my view) that there are more people who don’t care that much about information and communication technology (ICT) than there are people deeply involved in the technology. The research group identified ten groups of people based on a survey of 4,000 people and their technological attitudes, actions and assets. The ‘elite tech users’ consisted of four groups and accounted for nearly a third (31%) of the population. But there were four groups who fell into the ‘few tech assets’ category and they comprised nearly half (49%) of the population. The ‘middle of the road’ tech users accounted for 20%. On the high end were the so-called ‘omnivores’ who have lots of information gadgets and services which they use “voraciously” to take part in the Web 2.0 world. These are the you-tubing, myspacing, blogging, user-generating group, I guess. That’s only 8% of the population. On the low end are the ones ‘off the network’ who don’t have cell phones or Internet. These are mostly older people who are “content” with old media. That was double though the high end group, accounting for 15% of the population.
The next-to-the-top group are the ‘connectors’ who have feature-packed cell phones, go online frequently and have a high level of satisfaction with all the technology. That was only 7% though. On the flip side of that, just one up from the bottom of the scale, was the ‘indifferents’ group who had cell phones and online access, but used them only intermittently and with some annoyance. This group accounted for 11%. The other high end users were the ‘lackluster veterans’ (8%) and the ‘productivity enhancers’ (also 8%). The other low end users were the ‘light but satisfied’ (15%) and the ‘inexperienced experimenters” (8%). In the middle were the ‘mobile centrics’ and the ‘connected but hassled’, both at 10%.
Wondering which group you fall in? The good folks at Pew have provided the questionnaire online so you can test yourself and find out. Go to http://www.pewinternet.org/quiz/ and discover your ‘typology.’ I was a ‘connector’ – no surprise, no surprise.
DROWNING IN DIGITAL VIDEO: More than 60% of Internet traffic comes in the form of digital video, according to Cambridge, England, firm CacheLogic which sells Internet services. And a Carnegie Melon University computer scientist says he thinks that figure will reach 98% in a few short years. You think your downloading is slow now? Wait till then. However, scientist Hui Zhang says the solution may be peer-to-peer (P2P) networking. Most P2P technology is associated with places like Gnutella, Kazaa and BitTorrent known for pirating copyrighted material. But Zhang says he is close to figuring out a way to legitimize the P2P approach, which shares data by breaking up big blocks into little blocks that are stored on multiple computers so no one computer or broadband pipe becomes clogged. He calls his system “chunkyspread.”
Zhang’s proposal is one of ten emerging technologies cited by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Technology Review publication. Others include a ‘mobile augmented reality application’ being developed by the Finnish based Nokia Research Center. It basically puts a GPS sensor, a compass and what is called ‘accelerometers’ into cell phones so that you can point your cell phone camera at a building, for example, and it will tell you not only where you are but what businesses, restaurants and other attractions are nearby. Or, how about having that already small digital camera of yours become even smaller and faster. Two electrical and computer professors at Rice University have developed a camera that ‘reimagines’ digital imaging. Instead of, for example, a four megapixel digital camera using four million image sensors to catch a picture, their camera uses a single image sensor that reconstructs the image using a novel algorithm. Researchers at Harvard University have created light focusing antennas that could lead to DVD’s that hold hundreds of movies. They have figured out a way around what’s called the ‘diffraction limit’ in the law of physics which, as its name implies, limits the light beams used to record DVD images. So, it seems that while Zhang is figuring out how to cope with the growing digital video flood, these other scientists are figuring out how to add to the flood waters.
DELIVER ON YOUR PROMISES: A study by a professor at the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business appears to prove a marketing maxim, but with a twist. The maxim ‘promise what you can deliver and deliver what you promise’ is a warning against over-hyping. In a study in the Journal of Consumer Research, assistant professor Vanessa Patrick found that people notice it when they feel worse than they expected, but they don’t notice it when they feel better than they expected. She and her team have even coined a term for it – affective misforecasting. In brief, the team showed different sets of volunteers a film clip and a music clip. Some were told the clips got a five star rating and some were told the clips got a one star rating, although the clips were actually somewhere in the middle. The people told that the clips had a five-star rating noted that they were not as good as expected, but the people told the clips had only a one-star rating did not note that the clips were better than expected. Aside from warning about the dangers of over-selling, the study authors say business can help themselves by helping consumers take notice of when they feel better than expected. For example, grocery stores printing messages on their receipts telling consumers how much they saved.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Even though it was created by Americans, nearly two-thirds (61%) of the people who are ‘active residents’ of virtual world Second Life are European. (A personal anecdote – when I explored the Second Life world on a recent visit, I was the only American. Everybody I ran into was from Europe or Asia.) There are now more cell phones than people in the 142 million population Russia, according to research firm eMarketer. Nearly a quarter (23%) of the American public believe “AIDS might be God’s punishment for immoral sexual behavior,” according to a survey by the Pew Research Center. That is actually down from when the question was first asked in 1987 when just under half (43%) agreed with that statement. The Miami Herald reports that Floridians can now be buried with their pets, thanks to a law sponsored by a state representative who wanted to be buried with the ashes of his Labrador retriever who died ten years ago. The total cost of all civil lawsuits (torts) in the U.S. in 2005 was $261 Billion, which averages out to $880 per person, according to a study by management consulting firm Towers-Perrin Tillinghast.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
Monday, May 07, 2007
Message From Michael --May 7, 2007
THE NEVER ENDING FRIENDING
THE OSCARS OF THE INTERNET
COMPUTERS VERSUS TELEVISION
MEGALITHIC MONSTERS
TRENDS OF NOTE – CD’S AND FARSI
COCKTAIL CHATTER -- BEER
We encourage people to pass on copies of Message from Michael. But if you would like to get your own copy, you can subscribe by sending an e-mail to newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
THE NEVER ENDING FRIENDING: More than 70% of Americans aged 15 to 34 actively use online social networks, according to a study released at the News Corp’s Fox Interactive Media conference. (BTW, the conference is called The Never Ending Friending.) Now, we’ve dealt with the Social Networking phenomenon in previous MfM’s but the phenomenon, as this study shows, is growing at a phenomenal rate. You know about social networking sites built around music and user generated videos, but how about charitable causes, special interests, and your pet. There is a social networking site called dogster.com, but now a company called Snif (Social Networking In Fur) Labs has created special tags that dogs wear on their collar and which transmits and receives information from other dogs in the SNIF network that their owners can share online when they get home. The point is that social networking is become all pervasive. Radio giant Clear Channel is getting into the social networking business with a dozen station-branded social networks acting as a mini-MySpace for their local community. Technology company Onesite.com has developed the protocol. Television station WCAU-TV has launched DigPhilly.com, a social networking site featuring current events, nightlife, music, restaurant reviews for the Philadelphia area. Lost Remote’s Cory Bergman calls it “a great example of a TV station branching out into new audiences and local niches.”
A semi-related survey by Forrester Research of mainstream marketing agencies found that more and more are turning to social media to get their message across. Another study, this time by Jupiter Research, found that small businesses are turning to social media as a way to market. I won’t say anything about the fact that I recommended this to media operations in a previous MfM.
Anyway, back to the original study…The research showed that U.S. social networkers chose interacting on such sites as their favorite activity, whether online or offline. That was ahead of television viewing but on par with cell phone usage. Of those, more than two-thirds (69%) say they use social networks to connect with people who are already their friends and nearly half (41%) say they use it to connect with family members. And before you dismiss them as people without a life, nearly half (48%) say they are “having more fun in life in general” with more than half (52%) saying they feel more in tune with what’s happening socially in their lives due to social networking sites because (57%) said they’ve found more people with similar interests.
Back to some more unusual social networking examples… website PathConnect which labels itself as “social networking for the ambitious lifestyle” is backing websites with a social agenda, such as MTDN.com (Make The Difference Network) founded in part by Jessica Biel who starts in the WB’s 7th Heaven. Check out ElHood.com which is described in an Associated Press article as a sort of bi-lingual MySpace with a focus on Latin music. It is the latest example of social networking sites linking Hispanic youth across the U.S., Latin America and Spain. Lastly, my favorite is twitter.com which makes no bones about the fact that it is a cross between a social networking site and instant messaging program which focuses simply on what people are “doing right now.” And that ‘doing right now’ can be anything from listening to a favorite song, going to softball practice, to visiting the local Starbucks. Yes, it sounds inane, but it has become such a phenomenon (I’m sorry… there I go, using that word again) that people talk about “twittering.”
THE OSCARS OF THE INTERNET: Most often called The Webby Awards. Forget about David Bowie getting the Lifetime Achievement Award. Forget about eBay getting the other Lifetime Achievement Award. Forget about Steve Chen and Chad Hurley getting the Webby Person of the Year award. Instead, learn about Jonathon Yuen who won awards for animation, for best visual design and for best personal website (you really should visit his site -- jonathonyuen.com). Or how about the MGM Grand in Las Vegas for its incredible site which won for corporate communications. Or how about the unusual Clearification.com which uses webisodes and interactivity with a different approach to win the IT Hardware/Software category. Or how about website thatguy.com which won in the Health category with its interactive website about guys who drink too much. In short, if you want to see the future of broadband technology and creative gestalt, visit http://www.webbyawards.com.
COMPUTERS VERSUS TELEVISION: Or, more accurately, computers AND television. We’ve talked about broadband video provider Joost in previous MfM’s. It’s now inked deals with, it seems, half the universe – content providers like Sony, Turner Broadcasting Systems, the National Hockey League, CBS, Sports Illustrated and advertisers like Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, Nike, General Motors and Visa. Since several people have asked me about video providers besides Joost, here’s a partial list of sites that I have found: Brightcove, Splashcast, Blip.tv, Blinkx.tv, Revver, Flickr (which also won several Webby awards), Metacafe, MeTV, Nogoodtv, along with Microsoft’s new cross platform media player Silverlight, as well as Jumpcut which provides online editing tools and which is sponsoring an unusual online video contest called Filmyourissue.com, awarding prizes for short films.
MEGALITHIC MONSTERS: By now, you’ve no doubt heard about Rupert Murdoch’s bid for Dow Jones, publishers of the Wall Street Journal. I would like to claim prescience, considering my previous MfM. I think his desire to own a name brand and his ‘love’ – definitely in quotes, of newspapers played into it, but analysts say the reality is he is just working on synergies – a name brand Wall Street Journal to launch his television business channel, and a brand with a heavy investment in digital. The WSJ.com site is one of only two newspaper websites able to sustain a subscription-based, money-making online presence. The other is the Financial Times of London. Overlooked in the hoopla is the bid by Canadian newspaper giant Thomson for financial and news reporting agency Reuters and the take-over or partnership between Microsoft and Yahoo – all deals with enormous implications. A very interesting website that provides insight into these deals is newsvisual.com, which shows, graphically, the 6-degrees of connectivity (not separation) between major corporations and major players.
NEWS OF NOTE: If you listen to music on the Internet, (and, according to reports, 29 Million Americans do) here is a phrase you will be hearing more about – Net Radio Royalties. The Copyright Royalty Board has proposed a “per performance” fee for each time a song is webcast, payable to a subsidiary of the Recording Industry Association of America. Up to now, the board had given a special rate to small webcasters and public radio outlets streaming on the Internet. The Rocky Mountain News argues that the new rate structure would force many of the more “vibrant” entities to go dark because their royalty costs would actually exceed their revenue. The board has delayed imposition of the fees until June, after the public outcry.
TRENDS OF NOTE: The proportion of Americans who have purchased a CD in the past six months has dropped 15% since 2002, according to a study by Ipsos/ Tempo. The study indicates that Americans will still purchase CD’s by their favorite artists, but when it comes to sampling new and unfamiliar music, they’ll go the download route instead of buying CD’s.
The Farsi language has joined the list of top 10 languages being used by bloggers, behind the surprising (to me, at least) #1 – Japanese – which accounts for 37% of all blogs, followed by English (36%), Chinese (8%), Italian and Spanish (at 3% each), Russian, French and Portuguese (2%) and finally German and Farsi (1%), according to blog researcher Technorati. As a side note, the company says new blogs are being created at the rate of 1.4 new blogs per second, adding up to more than 70 Million blogs being tracked by the firm.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Sweeps killer American Idol set a record for call-ins with more than 70 Million toll-free and AT&T sms votes during its charity telecasts. An average of 6.1% of Americans drink beer on a frequent basis – meaning six or more times in a two-week period, according to The Media Audit which regularly surveys 87 U.S. markets. The biggest beer drinkers are in Melbourne, Florida where 10.2% of adults consumer beer on a frequent basis, followed by Wilmington, North Carolina with 10.1%. And even though it’s the home of Anheuser Busch, St. Louis came in 9th with 8.6% just ahead of Columbia, South Carolina with 8.4%. Okay, I promise, one last Warren Buffett mention: two books he recommends are Poor Charlie’s Almanack written by Buffett business partner Charlie Munger and Where are the Customers’ Yachts written by Fred Schwed… in 1940!
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
THE OSCARS OF THE INTERNET
COMPUTERS VERSUS TELEVISION
MEGALITHIC MONSTERS
TRENDS OF NOTE – CD’S AND FARSI
COCKTAIL CHATTER -- BEER
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THE NEVER ENDING FRIENDING: More than 70% of Americans aged 15 to 34 actively use online social networks, according to a study released at the News Corp’s Fox Interactive Media conference. (BTW, the conference is called The Never Ending Friending.) Now, we’ve dealt with the Social Networking phenomenon in previous MfM’s but the phenomenon, as this study shows, is growing at a phenomenal rate. You know about social networking sites built around music and user generated videos, but how about charitable causes, special interests, and your pet. There is a social networking site called dogster.com, but now a company called Snif (Social Networking In Fur) Labs has created special tags that dogs wear on their collar and which transmits and receives information from other dogs in the SNIF network that their owners can share online when they get home. The point is that social networking is become all pervasive. Radio giant Clear Channel is getting into the social networking business with a dozen station-branded social networks acting as a mini-MySpace for their local community. Technology company Onesite.com has developed the protocol. Television station WCAU-TV has launched DigPhilly.com, a social networking site featuring current events, nightlife, music, restaurant reviews for the Philadelphia area. Lost Remote’s Cory Bergman calls it “a great example of a TV station branching out into new audiences and local niches.”
A semi-related survey by Forrester Research of mainstream marketing agencies found that more and more are turning to social media to get their message across. Another study, this time by Jupiter Research, found that small businesses are turning to social media as a way to market. I won’t say anything about the fact that I recommended this to media operations in a previous MfM.
Anyway, back to the original study…The research showed that U.S. social networkers chose interacting on such sites as their favorite activity, whether online or offline. That was ahead of television viewing but on par with cell phone usage. Of those, more than two-thirds (69%) say they use social networks to connect with people who are already their friends and nearly half (41%) say they use it to connect with family members. And before you dismiss them as people without a life, nearly half (48%) say they are “having more fun in life in general” with more than half (52%) saying they feel more in tune with what’s happening socially in their lives due to social networking sites because (57%) said they’ve found more people with similar interests.
Back to some more unusual social networking examples… website PathConnect which labels itself as “social networking for the ambitious lifestyle” is backing websites with a social agenda, such as MTDN.com (Make The Difference Network) founded in part by Jessica Biel who starts in the WB’s 7th Heaven. Check out ElHood.com which is described in an Associated Press article as a sort of bi-lingual MySpace with a focus on Latin music. It is the latest example of social networking sites linking Hispanic youth across the U.S., Latin America and Spain. Lastly, my favorite is twitter.com which makes no bones about the fact that it is a cross between a social networking site and instant messaging program which focuses simply on what people are “doing right now.” And that ‘doing right now’ can be anything from listening to a favorite song, going to softball practice, to visiting the local Starbucks. Yes, it sounds inane, but it has become such a phenomenon (I’m sorry… there I go, using that word again) that people talk about “twittering.”
THE OSCARS OF THE INTERNET: Most often called The Webby Awards. Forget about David Bowie getting the Lifetime Achievement Award. Forget about eBay getting the other Lifetime Achievement Award. Forget about Steve Chen and Chad Hurley getting the Webby Person of the Year award. Instead, learn about Jonathon Yuen who won awards for animation, for best visual design and for best personal website (you really should visit his site -- jonathonyuen.com). Or how about the MGM Grand in Las Vegas for its incredible site which won for corporate communications. Or how about the unusual Clearification.com which uses webisodes and interactivity with a different approach to win the IT Hardware/Software category. Or how about website thatguy.com which won in the Health category with its interactive website about guys who drink too much. In short, if you want to see the future of broadband technology and creative gestalt, visit http://www.webbyawards.com.
COMPUTERS VERSUS TELEVISION: Or, more accurately, computers AND television. We’ve talked about broadband video provider Joost in previous MfM’s. It’s now inked deals with, it seems, half the universe – content providers like Sony, Turner Broadcasting Systems, the National Hockey League, CBS, Sports Illustrated and advertisers like Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, Nike, General Motors and Visa. Since several people have asked me about video providers besides Joost, here’s a partial list of sites that I have found: Brightcove, Splashcast, Blip.tv, Blinkx.tv, Revver, Flickr (which also won several Webby awards), Metacafe, MeTV, Nogoodtv, along with Microsoft’s new cross platform media player Silverlight, as well as Jumpcut which provides online editing tools and which is sponsoring an unusual online video contest called Filmyourissue.com, awarding prizes for short films.
MEGALITHIC MONSTERS: By now, you’ve no doubt heard about Rupert Murdoch’s bid for Dow Jones, publishers of the Wall Street Journal. I would like to claim prescience, considering my previous MfM. I think his desire to own a name brand and his ‘love’ – definitely in quotes, of newspapers played into it, but analysts say the reality is he is just working on synergies – a name brand Wall Street Journal to launch his television business channel, and a brand with a heavy investment in digital. The WSJ.com site is one of only two newspaper websites able to sustain a subscription-based, money-making online presence. The other is the Financial Times of London. Overlooked in the hoopla is the bid by Canadian newspaper giant Thomson for financial and news reporting agency Reuters and the take-over or partnership between Microsoft and Yahoo – all deals with enormous implications. A very interesting website that provides insight into these deals is newsvisual.com, which shows, graphically, the 6-degrees of connectivity (not separation) between major corporations and major players.
NEWS OF NOTE: If you listen to music on the Internet, (and, according to reports, 29 Million Americans do) here is a phrase you will be hearing more about – Net Radio Royalties. The Copyright Royalty Board has proposed a “per performance” fee for each time a song is webcast, payable to a subsidiary of the Recording Industry Association of America. Up to now, the board had given a special rate to small webcasters and public radio outlets streaming on the Internet. The Rocky Mountain News argues that the new rate structure would force many of the more “vibrant” entities to go dark because their royalty costs would actually exceed their revenue. The board has delayed imposition of the fees until June, after the public outcry.
TRENDS OF NOTE: The proportion of Americans who have purchased a CD in the past six months has dropped 15% since 2002, according to a study by Ipsos/ Tempo. The study indicates that Americans will still purchase CD’s by their favorite artists, but when it comes to sampling new and unfamiliar music, they’ll go the download route instead of buying CD’s.
The Farsi language has joined the list of top 10 languages being used by bloggers, behind the surprising (to me, at least) #1 – Japanese – which accounts for 37% of all blogs, followed by English (36%), Chinese (8%), Italian and Spanish (at 3% each), Russian, French and Portuguese (2%) and finally German and Farsi (1%), according to blog researcher Technorati. As a side note, the company says new blogs are being created at the rate of 1.4 new blogs per second, adding up to more than 70 Million blogs being tracked by the firm.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Sweeps killer American Idol set a record for call-ins with more than 70 Million toll-free and AT&T sms votes during its charity telecasts. An average of 6.1% of Americans drink beer on a frequent basis – meaning six or more times in a two-week period, according to The Media Audit which regularly surveys 87 U.S. markets. The biggest beer drinkers are in Melbourne, Florida where 10.2% of adults consumer beer on a frequent basis, followed by Wilmington, North Carolina with 10.1%. And even though it’s the home of Anheuser Busch, St. Louis came in 9th with 8.6% just ahead of Columbia, South Carolina with 8.4%. Okay, I promise, one last Warren Buffett mention: two books he recommends are Poor Charlie’s Almanack written by Buffett business partner Charlie Munger and Where are the Customers’ Yachts written by Fred Schwed… in 1940!
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail newsconsultant@aol.com with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com. You can reach me directly at Michael@MediaConsultant.tv.
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