A SNAPSHOT OF BLOGGERS AND JOURNALISTS
DON’T CONFUSE ME WITH FACTS
CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW
DAMNING WITH FAINT PRAISE
THEY’RE THE BIGGEST AND THE BEST
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
A SNAPSHOT OF BLOGGERS AND JOURNALISTS: More than half of the bloggers (53.2%) who took part in a recent PR Week/ PR Newswire survey say they do NOT consider themselves journalists even though a nearly equal percentage (50.6%) had worked for a traditional publication. Of course the number of actual bloggers surveyed was small (79). But even so, with many traditional media Websites beginning to resemble blogs or newsletters, the COO of PR Newswire argues that “the definition of who is a journalist is blurring.” Most of those surveyed (1,152) were ‘traditional journalists.’ Of them, only a fifth (21%) say they write a blog for their traditional outlet. In what one analyst called a surprising streak of optimism, three out of five (63.5%) of the magazine and print journalists surveyed say their publication will continue indefinitely. It probably says something that less than one in ten (9.3%) of those surveyed are in TV news. Most (41.3%) worked for either newspapers or magazines (29.5%). The others either worked for Online Websites or were bloggers or were employed at radio stations (5.4%). A quarter of those surveyed (25.5%) say they have a profile on MySpace, slightly more (29%) on Facebook and even more (32.3%) are on LinkedIn. It also probably says something (and again I’m not sure what) that nearly three quarters (70.1%) say they “measure the success of their work” by the feedback they get from colleagues while half (50%) say it comes from readers online while less than half (41.8%) cite links from other media and slightly fewer (38.1%) cite having their story on the most read or most e-mailed list. The PR survey also confirms an observation about the increasing emphasis on the business side of journalism from the previous two weeks’ MfM’s on the State of the News Media report, with more than nine in 10 (91.4%) of those surveyed saying it is ‘extremely’ or ‘very’ important that their work make their operations financially successful ‘by creating appealing content.’
Trends of Note: Website Gawker uses a ‘pay-for-page-views’ approach to compensation with bloggers and journalists. The report says despite the immediate measurability of story interest because of Internet postings, a third of those surveyed (30.1%) say it is unlikely that sites will adopt the Gawker Website model although a fifth (18.4%) say they can see that happening. Meanwhile the report notes the move by Politicker.com which is developing a Web-only news organization to cover this year’s Presidential election. The website has already launched operations in 10 states so far and is planning to have websites for all 50 states with ‘reporters’ covering those states each day.
DON’T CONFUSE ME WITH FACTS: My mind is made up. An analysis of news consumption by a professor at the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University Of Georgia seems to confirm that cynical saying. But there is a twist to it. Barry Hollander says that “changes in the mass media resemble that seen in day-to-day conversations.” People want to talk with people like themselves. Hollander’s analysis goes several steps further in looking at data that conservatives tend to watch so-called conservative newscasts (aka Republicans and Fox News) and liberals tend to watch liberal news media (Democrats and CNN). Hollander says ‘partisans’ – people who strongly identify with one political party or the other – watch more news than non-partisans and have actually increased their news consumption. But he says there has been a “slow, steady shift” by those same partisans (both Republicans and Democrats) toward news that confirms their beliefs and away from news that challenges those beliefs. Meanwhile, people with fewer partisan ties have ‘migrated’ to entertainment programming, with “growing evidence that the high-choice media environment has drained significant numbers of casual consumers from news to more entertainment-oriented fare.” Hollander quotes earlier studies warning that advertisers and media companies will create ‘the electronic equivalent of gated communities.’ Hollander says the hopes that mass media would provide a counter-weight to people’s growing homogenization of viewpoints “appear dim.”
CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?: If you live in West Palm Beach, the answer is a resounding YES, according to Nielsen Media Research. It named West Palm as the best place for voice network service in the country, followed by San Antonio, Dallas-Fort Worth, Atlanta, Chicago, Jacksonville, Minneapolis, Houston, Miami and Orlando. Oddly enough (as always, to me at least) none of those cities scored in the top ten when it came to what is commonly called Wi-Fi accessibility. The fastest 3G Data city in the U.S., according to Nielsen, is St. Louis, followed by Salt Lake City, Phoenix, San Diego, Indianapolis, Providence, Seattle, Los Angeles, Washington and Greensboro-Winston-Salem. In the top ten voice networks, only 0.3% of all calls in these cities were dropped. And at 807 kilobits per second, St. Louis’s average download speed was 17% higher than the 9th ranked Washington, DC. Nielsen says it collected the data using a fleet of 25 vans logging more than a million miles, placing over 4 Million calls and setting up more than 1.25 Million data sessions.
DAMNING WITH FAINT PRAISE: That’s the phrase that comes to mind when one reads the February ratings analysis by the Katz Television Group. According to them, local TV lost less of its late news audience following the writers’ strike than their network partners lost in the prime-time half hour leading up to the late news. As reported by Michelle Greppi in TVWeek, local newscasts showed “an unexpected durability.” The report quotes Bill Carroll, VP and director of Programming for Katz, as saying that the relevance of network lead-in is “less impactful” than it was 10 years ago on local news as people increasingly watch programs and not stations. Carroll is quoted as saying he believes stations can make up the strike-related losses. I should note the previous week’s MfM’s on the State of the News Media which showed a general decline in network and local TV news over the past several years, although interestingly enough the February ratings comparison (2006 to 2007) was more often flat than down, compared to the other rating periods.
THEY’RE THE BIGGEST AND THE BEST: In American television, according to that same ratings analysis by the Katz Television Group. The #1 rated 5 a.m. newscast in America is KPLC/ Lake Charles, Louisiana with an 8.7 Rating/ 67 share in Households. The #1 rated 6 a.m. newscast in America is WBKO/ Bowling Green, Kentucky with a 21.7 rating and a 71 share. The #1 rated 5pm newscast in the country is KAIT/ Jonesboro, Arkansas, with a 28.6 rating and a 57 Share. The #1 rated 6pm newscast is WAGM/ Presque Isle, Maine, with a 36.7 rating and a 62 share. And the #1 rated late news (11pm and 10pm) is WTAP/ Parkersburg, West Virginia which had a 19.1 rating and a 59 share. As a reminder to my non-broadcast brethren, rating represents the percentage of ALL television sets in the market tuned to the station while share represents the percent of ALL television sets actually ON that are tuned to the station. Also, as a caveat, I should note that many of the stations that score high are in one-station markets. And as a further caveat, I should note these are numbers based on total households and NOT on the specific demographics which advertisers are so interested in… although there is often a correlation between the two.
Considering last week’s MfM about the State of the News Media in which it was noted that several stations are shifting their newscasts to other time periods, it is interesting to note just how many of those stations there are, according to the Katz numbers. There are 70 stations with a 4 p.m. newscast. There are 42 stations with a 7 p.m. newscast. And there are 25 stations with a 4:30 p.m. newscast. Remember, there are more than 500 stations ranked by Katz with a 6pm and just under 500 5pm newscasts. I would note that the #1 4pm newscast in America, KWES/ Odessa Midland, scored a 7.8/25 which would have ranked it somewhere around 100 in the 5pm list. And the #1 7pm newscast in America, WLUC/ Marquette, scored a 16.4/30 (barely beating out WIS/ Columbia at 16.3/30); and in the 6pm rankings, that would have put it at about the 80 spot. Of course, there are all kinds of caveats, but the numbers provide some interesting fodder for those looking at the time slots.
CONGRATULATIONS: Now, if I were a ‘smart’ consultant, I would note all of my client stations that scored at the top of the list… and, promptly, take credit for it. Modesty, and honesty, forbids. However, I would extend congratulations to WAFB and Nick Simonette, Vicki Zimmerman, Andre Zamarlik; WDAM and Jim Cameron, Randy Swan, Miranda Beard and Pam McGovern; WTVM and Lee Brantley, Anne Holmes and Brian Correll; KFVS and Mike Smythe, Mark Little and Paul Keener; KPLC and Jim Serra, Scott Flannigan, Tim Bourgeois, and Robin Daugereau; KTRE and Artie Bedard, Tina Alexander Sellers, Jim Moore and Mike Wiggins; and WECT and Raeford Brown, David Toma and the late Karl Davis, whom I still remember fondly. All of them scored very high on the Katz list and well above their market size for different newscasts. And as to those former clients who scored well… Well, Congratulations, too.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
Monday, April 07, 2008
Message From Michael -- State of News Media - 2nd Edition - March 31, 2008
THE STATE OF THE NEWS MEDIA – 2ND EDITION
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
FOREWORD: There was so much information in the State of the News Media report by the Project for Excellence in Journalism that, as promised last week, I had to do more. After all, boiling 180,000 words into 1,500 or so last week and 2,000 or so this week still means my summary is only 1.5% of the total. So no doubt distortions abound, but here goes.
THE HEADLINES: (Or, the basic points). Despite declines in ratings, Local TV news remains “one of the few sources of news that continues to be popular.” Despite drops in circulation, “print pages… still provided information that was harder to find elsewhere.” Despite the growth of Online news, “there are increasing concerns about the Web’s ability to meet the news industry’s financial challenges.” Despite audience drop-offs in 2006, Cable TV experienced growth again in 2007 but instead of spikes from major events as in the past, the growth has been in prime time programming “built around a cast of hosts.” The Network evening newscast numbers fell yet again with the ‘decline accelerating’ and the Network morning ‘news’ also fell for the third year in a row with a ‘general decline’ in network offerings. Newspapers are not dead because “print readership is not falling as fast as print circulation” thanks in part to new measurement tools; but with a demographic decline in print use newspapers will continue migrating to the younger-skewing Online product. News remains an important part of Radio with an impressive following (93.3% of all those over the age of 12 in the U.S.) although it has been falling slightly.
THE FACTOIDS: (Or, things I found interesting). Of all the news media categories, the Internet has the greatest amount of, and focus on, International News. This may have been obvious to the many people smarter than me, but the reason is the global reach of Internet operations like Google, Yahoo and AOL. But it also appears to apply to Online news-sites affiliated with established news networks, like MSNBC, ABCNews.com and CBSNews.com. The report, as noted before, re-emphasizes the importance of newspapers as primary news gatherers for all media and cites, in particular, how newspapers were focusing on the economy months before other news organizations jumped on the bandwagon. The other two issues that were strengths of newspapers were their focus on health care policy and the greater geographic range of coverage involving foreign affairs not involving the U.S. In the Cable news arena, it was probably obvious (again, to everybody but me) but still struck me as insightful that the hosts were a strong, if not primary factor, in setting the news agenda, to the point that there were significant differences in news selection even when it was the same Cable news operations. The report makes the observation that Network news are the last place in television news where the correspondent is a key participant in the newscast “which is build around their written, vetted and produced story packages where words and pictures are carefully matched” as opposed to most other television news which have moved toward “more extemporaneous news delivery.”
THE IMMEDIATE POSSIBILITIES: (Or, trends and what’s happening now). In Local TV, the report notes many stations are opting for different times for their early evening news such as 4pm and 7pm in large part because people either are not home, eating dinner or opting not to watch during the traditional dinner hour. In fact the report says there is a general drop off in people watching any TV (local or network), not just news. The study analysis says the same drop-off occurring between 5pm and 7pm is also occurring at 4pm and 7pm while the morning news audience is at least holding on to its audience. The report recommends Local TV capitalize on its strengths of “content and reach” as it battles with new technology. On the radio side, the report says “the audience for what was once called radio is rising and fragmenting.” It uses the phrase ‘what was once called radio’ because of the different delivery technologies. In the Online news world, the report cites the growth in Online video use following the growth in Broadband accessibility although it notes there are conflicting studies about just how much growth there is. Interestingly enough, the report cites a Dow Jones study that more venture capital money is being invested into online video ventures, maybe because (citing other studies) ‘everyone, with the exception of young adults’ is interested in Online video. All the studies also agree that news beats out comedy, movies, music and sports. In Newspapers, not surprisingly, the report just re-emphasized the trend to a print-online combination which, the report noted, reaches three-quarters of adults “one way or the other.” It also noted though that many newspapers are trimming down the geographic distribution of their print product into ‘distant areas.’ It should be noted that the Big Dailies’ free newspapers that were hailed in previous reports as a future trend are dying off.
THE LONG-TERM POSSIBILITIES: (Or, ideas weird and wonderful). It starts with a big “IF”, but the report says the survival of the network news divisions may depend on them “liberating themselves from the broadcast television platform on which they were founded and even perhaps from the networks themselves.” Instead, the report says the Network news divisions may be better able to survive as “video newsgathering organizations” who supply their products on demand on many platforms, not just broadcast television. The reason for the “if” is the premise that the problems of network news may be attributable to the decline in the overall audience of broadcast network television rather than there being anything ‘wrong’ with the actual newscasts themselves. On the Radio side of the equation, the report has some similar equivocations before offering the idea of Cell Phone Radio as the New Frontier and potential future audio format in addition to AM/FM, HD Radio, Satellite Radio, Podcasting and even wireless Internet radio. The report says it is hard to ignore the fact that we have become a “cell phone nation” with four out of five people subscribed to some type of wireless service and a third expressing interest in cell radio (of course that leaves two-thirds not interested). The report, of course, focuses on the migration of the Newspaper product to the Internet, but it also raises the idea of a hybrid platform version with a three or four day print edition for weekends when people have more time and interest in reading newspapers and the advertising inserts, coupled with an Online edition during the work week when people have less time and, to some extent, less interest. On the Internet, the report talks about “disaggregation” with Widgets (mentioned in previous MfM’s) using embedded coding bringing in live content from third-party sites. The reasoning is that Websites need to get away from the “walled garden” mentality of creating restrictive Websites that are so site-centric that they don’t recognize the ‘side door’ ways people get to their site (primarily links and search). In Local television, the report notes the “fair amount” of movement toward multi-media and cites as a trend to watch, stations assembling Website newscasts “to offer the latest developments online.”
THE QUOTES: In the Online news world, the study authors say the three keywords describing the climate are – assimilation, acquisition and partnership – as major media players scramble to capture some of the growing audience for news sites. In a similar style of Three’s, the report says Radio is, “at its core, a medium of three P’s – personality, persuasion and polarization” with news events “run through an ideological filter used to create a narrative about good guys and bad guys.” What may be my favorite quote of the report was on newspapers which the study authors say, “are still far from dead, but the language of the obituary is creeping in.” In Cable TV, “more than any other medium we have studied, the definition of news depends on the outlet.” (And in case you’re wondering, it was MSNBC for politics, Fox for crime and CNN for foreign policy.) And in the category of ‘do-you-think?’ the report says Local TV, challenged by cable, satellite and mobile devices, “is beginning to take the Internet more seriously.”
THE ODDITIES: (Or, the huh?, of the report). In all of the media categories there is a content analysis sub-section… except for Local TV which had no content analysis. When I queried the folks at PEJ, a content analyst for the group said it was because it was “a very difficult sector to monitor… (that) is costly and logistically challenging” although he notes they did do one in 2000 and other members of the PEJ staff have written a book, “We Interrupt This Newscast” which looks at local news. Equally puzzling (to me at least) it seems (again, to me at least) that the report spends more time talking about HD Radio than it does on HDTV. In a similar vein, the report spends an inordinate amount of ink on Katie Couric, with very little comment about the other network anchors. Interestingly the report notes that Couric, who was noted for her signature interviews, is actually doing half the number of on-set interviews as her rivals, now that CBS has revised the program. The report says its study of network TV was the most comprehensive to date, but as an observation (disclaimer – personal opinion) the network TV section had a lot of just ‘gossip’ reporting about personalities, it seemed to me. The report notes that the traditional 22-minute news-hole on the half-hour evening news has shrunk to 18.9 minutes on NBC, 18.7 minutes on CBS and 18.1 minutes on ABC. The report says there are two distinct parts of the Cable TV News Day – daytime focused on crime and celebrity and night-time focused on controversial topics that “suits the particular audience that tunes in to each channel.” And, again in the category of things I didn’t think of, but other people smarter than me probably did… the report cites as one of the reasons for the decline in newspaper circulation the federal Do Not Call legislation which has tripled the cost of phone solicitation for newspaper subscriptions.
THE DISCLAIMER: My Message normally comes out on Monday mornings, but this is late because a) I wanted to get a response from PEJ about the Local TV content analysis and, more to the point, b) there is an awful lot of information to assimilate… and I’m still assimilating it.
CONGRATULATIONS: Only tangentially related to state of the news media report, the Peabody Awards were announced this week – another excuse for my report being late. Congratulations to my friends at WSLS in Roanoke for their coverage of the Virginia Tech tragedy as well as the folks at WFAA in Dallas which won a Peabody for their FOUR investigative pieces looking at everything from the U.S. import-export bank to the police department that “got too cozy” with the TV sexual predator sting operation. Congratulations also to WTAE in Pittsburgh for its fight for open records and KNXV in Phoenix for its investigation into security lapses at the airport. In all there were 35 recipients of the awards administered by the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
FOREWORD: There was so much information in the State of the News Media report by the Project for Excellence in Journalism that, as promised last week, I had to do more. After all, boiling 180,000 words into 1,500 or so last week and 2,000 or so this week still means my summary is only 1.5% of the total. So no doubt distortions abound, but here goes.
THE HEADLINES: (Or, the basic points). Despite declines in ratings, Local TV news remains “one of the few sources of news that continues to be popular.” Despite drops in circulation, “print pages… still provided information that was harder to find elsewhere.” Despite the growth of Online news, “there are increasing concerns about the Web’s ability to meet the news industry’s financial challenges.” Despite audience drop-offs in 2006, Cable TV experienced growth again in 2007 but instead of spikes from major events as in the past, the growth has been in prime time programming “built around a cast of hosts.” The Network evening newscast numbers fell yet again with the ‘decline accelerating’ and the Network morning ‘news’ also fell for the third year in a row with a ‘general decline’ in network offerings. Newspapers are not dead because “print readership is not falling as fast as print circulation” thanks in part to new measurement tools; but with a demographic decline in print use newspapers will continue migrating to the younger-skewing Online product. News remains an important part of Radio with an impressive following (93.3% of all those over the age of 12 in the U.S.) although it has been falling slightly.
THE FACTOIDS: (Or, things I found interesting). Of all the news media categories, the Internet has the greatest amount of, and focus on, International News. This may have been obvious to the many people smarter than me, but the reason is the global reach of Internet operations like Google, Yahoo and AOL. But it also appears to apply to Online news-sites affiliated with established news networks, like MSNBC, ABCNews.com and CBSNews.com. The report, as noted before, re-emphasizes the importance of newspapers as primary news gatherers for all media and cites, in particular, how newspapers were focusing on the economy months before other news organizations jumped on the bandwagon. The other two issues that were strengths of newspapers were their focus on health care policy and the greater geographic range of coverage involving foreign affairs not involving the U.S. In the Cable news arena, it was probably obvious (again, to everybody but me) but still struck me as insightful that the hosts were a strong, if not primary factor, in setting the news agenda, to the point that there were significant differences in news selection even when it was the same Cable news operations. The report makes the observation that Network news are the last place in television news where the correspondent is a key participant in the newscast “which is build around their written, vetted and produced story packages where words and pictures are carefully matched” as opposed to most other television news which have moved toward “more extemporaneous news delivery.”
THE IMMEDIATE POSSIBILITIES: (Or, trends and what’s happening now). In Local TV, the report notes many stations are opting for different times for their early evening news such as 4pm and 7pm in large part because people either are not home, eating dinner or opting not to watch during the traditional dinner hour. In fact the report says there is a general drop off in people watching any TV (local or network), not just news. The study analysis says the same drop-off occurring between 5pm and 7pm is also occurring at 4pm and 7pm while the morning news audience is at least holding on to its audience. The report recommends Local TV capitalize on its strengths of “content and reach” as it battles with new technology. On the radio side, the report says “the audience for what was once called radio is rising and fragmenting.” It uses the phrase ‘what was once called radio’ because of the different delivery technologies. In the Online news world, the report cites the growth in Online video use following the growth in Broadband accessibility although it notes there are conflicting studies about just how much growth there is. Interestingly enough, the report cites a Dow Jones study that more venture capital money is being invested into online video ventures, maybe because (citing other studies) ‘everyone, with the exception of young adults’ is interested in Online video. All the studies also agree that news beats out comedy, movies, music and sports. In Newspapers, not surprisingly, the report just re-emphasized the trend to a print-online combination which, the report noted, reaches three-quarters of adults “one way or the other.” It also noted though that many newspapers are trimming down the geographic distribution of their print product into ‘distant areas.’ It should be noted that the Big Dailies’ free newspapers that were hailed in previous reports as a future trend are dying off.
THE LONG-TERM POSSIBILITIES: (Or, ideas weird and wonderful). It starts with a big “IF”, but the report says the survival of the network news divisions may depend on them “liberating themselves from the broadcast television platform on which they were founded and even perhaps from the networks themselves.” Instead, the report says the Network news divisions may be better able to survive as “video newsgathering organizations” who supply their products on demand on many platforms, not just broadcast television. The reason for the “if” is the premise that the problems of network news may be attributable to the decline in the overall audience of broadcast network television rather than there being anything ‘wrong’ with the actual newscasts themselves. On the Radio side of the equation, the report has some similar equivocations before offering the idea of Cell Phone Radio as the New Frontier and potential future audio format in addition to AM/FM, HD Radio, Satellite Radio, Podcasting and even wireless Internet radio. The report says it is hard to ignore the fact that we have become a “cell phone nation” with four out of five people subscribed to some type of wireless service and a third expressing interest in cell radio (of course that leaves two-thirds not interested). The report, of course, focuses on the migration of the Newspaper product to the Internet, but it also raises the idea of a hybrid platform version with a three or four day print edition for weekends when people have more time and interest in reading newspapers and the advertising inserts, coupled with an Online edition during the work week when people have less time and, to some extent, less interest. On the Internet, the report talks about “disaggregation” with Widgets (mentioned in previous MfM’s) using embedded coding bringing in live content from third-party sites. The reasoning is that Websites need to get away from the “walled garden” mentality of creating restrictive Websites that are so site-centric that they don’t recognize the ‘side door’ ways people get to their site (primarily links and search). In Local television, the report notes the “fair amount” of movement toward multi-media and cites as a trend to watch, stations assembling Website newscasts “to offer the latest developments online.”
THE QUOTES: In the Online news world, the study authors say the three keywords describing the climate are – assimilation, acquisition and partnership – as major media players scramble to capture some of the growing audience for news sites. In a similar style of Three’s, the report says Radio is, “at its core, a medium of three P’s – personality, persuasion and polarization” with news events “run through an ideological filter used to create a narrative about good guys and bad guys.” What may be my favorite quote of the report was on newspapers which the study authors say, “are still far from dead, but the language of the obituary is creeping in.” In Cable TV, “more than any other medium we have studied, the definition of news depends on the outlet.” (And in case you’re wondering, it was MSNBC for politics, Fox for crime and CNN for foreign policy.) And in the category of ‘do-you-think?’ the report says Local TV, challenged by cable, satellite and mobile devices, “is beginning to take the Internet more seriously.”
THE ODDITIES: (Or, the huh?, of the report). In all of the media categories there is a content analysis sub-section… except for Local TV which had no content analysis. When I queried the folks at PEJ, a content analyst for the group said it was because it was “a very difficult sector to monitor… (that) is costly and logistically challenging” although he notes they did do one in 2000 and other members of the PEJ staff have written a book, “We Interrupt This Newscast” which looks at local news. Equally puzzling (to me at least) it seems (again, to me at least) that the report spends more time talking about HD Radio than it does on HDTV. In a similar vein, the report spends an inordinate amount of ink on Katie Couric, with very little comment about the other network anchors. Interestingly the report notes that Couric, who was noted for her signature interviews, is actually doing half the number of on-set interviews as her rivals, now that CBS has revised the program. The report says its study of network TV was the most comprehensive to date, but as an observation (disclaimer – personal opinion) the network TV section had a lot of just ‘gossip’ reporting about personalities, it seemed to me. The report notes that the traditional 22-minute news-hole on the half-hour evening news has shrunk to 18.9 minutes on NBC, 18.7 minutes on CBS and 18.1 minutes on ABC. The report says there are two distinct parts of the Cable TV News Day – daytime focused on crime and celebrity and night-time focused on controversial topics that “suits the particular audience that tunes in to each channel.” And, again in the category of things I didn’t think of, but other people smarter than me probably did… the report cites as one of the reasons for the decline in newspaper circulation the federal Do Not Call legislation which has tripled the cost of phone solicitation for newspaper subscriptions.
THE DISCLAIMER: My Message normally comes out on Monday mornings, but this is late because a) I wanted to get a response from PEJ about the Local TV content analysis and, more to the point, b) there is an awful lot of information to assimilate… and I’m still assimilating it.
CONGRATULATIONS: Only tangentially related to state of the news media report, the Peabody Awards were announced this week – another excuse for my report being late. Congratulations to my friends at WSLS in Roanoke for their coverage of the Virginia Tech tragedy as well as the folks at WFAA in Dallas which won a Peabody for their FOUR investigative pieces looking at everything from the U.S. import-export bank to the police department that “got too cozy” with the TV sexual predator sting operation. Congratulations also to WTAE in Pittsburgh for its fight for open records and KNXV in Phoenix for its investigation into security lapses at the airport. In all there were 35 recipients of the awards administered by the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
Message From Michael -- State of News Media - March 24, 2008
STATE OF THE NEWS MEDIA – A SPECIAL REPORT
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
THE FACT THAT SAYS IT ALL: For the first time, the Project for Excellence in Journalism has included a special “state of advertising” report in its annual examination of the state of the news media. The crisis in journalism, according to this report, may be what it calls the “decoupling” of news and advertising. Even in its survey of journalists, included as part of the overall report, the study found that journalist are less concerned about credibility and public cynicism and more concerned about basic economic survival. Or as the report authors so succinctly put it, “the problems are about money.” In the special section on advertising, the authors make the point that it is less clear whether in this new digital/Internet world that advertisers even need news and entertainment media to act as a vehicle for their message as they explore multiple ways to reach the consumer.
SEARCHING FOR GODOT: And, along the way, the authors found John Wannamaker, the Philadelphia retailer famous for his quote: “Half of the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is, I don’t know which half.” The study authors say that maxim still remains true for most advertising in 2007. And when you consider some advertisers, like Proctor & Gamble, spend upwards of $6 Billion, that is a lot of money to waste. However, in the Online marketplace, the study says, search advertising is “the cleanest marketplace for buying and selling ad space” and as such is probably the closest advertisers will come to overcoming the maxim and the closest to, as the authors say, making Wannamaker happy. It is the ability to pinpoint their ads and measure their effectiveness through keyword use and click-through rates. (My advertising brethren reading this will be amused to know that nowhere could I find any reference to Search Engine Marketing or Search Engine Optimization in the report. Which may say something about news people’s understanding of advertising.) The report says digital technology brings the advertising industry closer to its Holy Grail of knowing whether and which ad expenditures are working.
It should be noted that the report still sees TV as the “most persuasive” of the advertising mediums, where, the report says, “mediocre commercial can still sell a lot of product” and as a result, old buying habits still prevail. Radio, according to the report, may be the “most enduring” form of news but radio itself may be an also-ran, in part because of its antiquated media measurement system. The report says the long-term numbers “give a sense that the end of newspapers as pre-packaged parcels delivered to our doorsteps may not be far off” as newspapers lead the way into the digital world. Magazines also have some of the print drawbacks, but with the report predicting that magazines will “live in a variety of media, with brands being the threat that pulls the different content platforms together.” It should also be noted that with Internet spending accounting for only $8.4 Billion of the $108 Billion in total ad spending during the first three quarters of 2007, its influence is greater than the actual dollars spent, and it is still true that the amount of money that goes to Online advertising in no way matches consumer consumption of the Online product.
The report also notes that while the number of people getting news online is growing, and news website have enjoyed double-digit growth, that growth is falling behind other areas, and most critically, is the fact that news has not made a mark in the most critical area – search.
TRUCKERS AND FISHERMEN: In the ‘good old days,’ says Charlie Rutman, CEO of North American operations at ad agency MPG, the agencies were basically in the trucking business, taking ads and commercials and simply delivering them. Or as MediaPost columnist Jack Feuer put it, in the old mass media world, everybody fished in the same three oceans (the broadcast networks) with nobody sure where the fish were or what they were biting. The difference between the fat fisherman and the starving fisherman was who had the shiniest lure – the best creative. According to the report, that is no longer so true. Now the emphasis is on what are called ‘media specialists,’ people who figure out the intricacies of what media, or combination of media, to buy, where to run the ad, how to place the ad. An example of this changing dynamic was given by Greg Smith, CEO of the digital arm of WPP Group’s Ogilvy Worldwide: in traditional media, five people might be responsible for spending $100 Million in the limited advertising universe of network and cable television; in digital media, those same five people might be responsible for a budget of only $1 Million, involving 1,000 ad placements, buying 5,000 keywords on search engines and tracking and changing the campaign based on the data that come back.
THE TWO SIDES OF THE JOURNALISTIC COIN: On the one hand, according to the survey of journalists conducted as part of the report, journalists are having to serve more masters, whether it’s a print and online product or an on-air and online product or a combination of all three. Actually most still work only or mostly on the original product, but with ‘national’ journalists more than three times as likely as local journalists to devote half or more of their time in the multimedia arena. On the other hand, the survey did not find evidence that journalists resent splitting their time, with half of those doing such work seeing it as a good thing. The study authors speculate that part of that may be the belief that the technology is putting journalists more in touch with their audiences. In 1999 when the survey was first conducted, more than half (57%) of national journalists surveyed agreed that journalists were out of touch with their audience. In the latest survey that number has dropped to dramatically less than half (41%), at least on a national level. The authors speculate that it is less true of local journalists who are more likely to be recognized, and hear from, their neighbors at their local supermarkets than their national counterparts.
Another example of two sides of the journalist coin comes in the differing perceptions of the Web’s value between print and broadcast journalists. Nearly three quarters (72%) of national TV and radio journalists say their leaders are doing a good or excellent job transitioning to the web while only a little more than half (59%) of national print journalists felt this way. Print journalists are also more skeptical about the impact of the Internet with both national journalists (44%) and local journalists (55%) believing it will weaken journalist values. In TV and radio, it was the other way around with the largest groups (49% of national journalists and 40% of local journalists) saying the Internet will strengthen journalism in the end.
PROCESSING VERSUS REPORTING: In what may be analogous to a two-headed coin, the study continues to document the growing trend of aggregating news, rather than gathering news. Fewer people are doing more and, the report says, the era of reporters operating in multimedia ‘has finally arrived.’ The report says news is evolving from being a product to being a service and the authors argue that “service, more than storytelling, may prove a key to unlocking new economics.” The report says the prospect of user-generated content being a core part of the next era of journalism is more limited than originally thought, although citizen input sites are still important sources for new ideas, sources and comments. Interestingly, the report says that such so-called ‘citizen journalist’ sites, rather than rejecting the ‘gatekeeper’ function of traditional journalism, appear to be just recreating it in other places and are often as closed, or more closed, to user-generated content than traditional news organizations.
There is hope for traditional media in the fact that many people will still go to Online sites of established, trusted brands for news. And despite all these new sources, he report says the agenda of the American news media continues to narrow, instead of broadening. And many times, what the mainstream media consider to be important and newsworthy differs markedly from what the general public considers important. That issue is further heightened by the fact that the media also showed a marked ‘short attention span,’ says the report.
KEYWORDS: In keeping with the message of the State of the News Media report, if I were to adopt the digital savvy approach of identifying keywords in a document, I would probably pick the following three: Scattered. Fragmented. Splintering. I probably wouldn’t buy those keywords for search purposes though because they wouldn’t necessarily connect to my targeted audience.
DISCLAIMER: This summary is only 16-hundred words long, for a document that runs to 180,000 words. So there are some inevitable omissions and even possibly some distortions, though I hope not. In any case this is only a preliminary summary. There is more to come. And you never know, maybe some smart consulting group, university or think-tank will host an open forum discussion of the implications of the report.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
THE FACT THAT SAYS IT ALL: For the first time, the Project for Excellence in Journalism has included a special “state of advertising” report in its annual examination of the state of the news media. The crisis in journalism, according to this report, may be what it calls the “decoupling” of news and advertising. Even in its survey of journalists, included as part of the overall report, the study found that journalist are less concerned about credibility and public cynicism and more concerned about basic economic survival. Or as the report authors so succinctly put it, “the problems are about money.” In the special section on advertising, the authors make the point that it is less clear whether in this new digital/Internet world that advertisers even need news and entertainment media to act as a vehicle for their message as they explore multiple ways to reach the consumer.
SEARCHING FOR GODOT: And, along the way, the authors found John Wannamaker, the Philadelphia retailer famous for his quote: “Half of the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is, I don’t know which half.” The study authors say that maxim still remains true for most advertising in 2007. And when you consider some advertisers, like Proctor & Gamble, spend upwards of $6 Billion, that is a lot of money to waste. However, in the Online marketplace, the study says, search advertising is “the cleanest marketplace for buying and selling ad space” and as such is probably the closest advertisers will come to overcoming the maxim and the closest to, as the authors say, making Wannamaker happy. It is the ability to pinpoint their ads and measure their effectiveness through keyword use and click-through rates. (My advertising brethren reading this will be amused to know that nowhere could I find any reference to Search Engine Marketing or Search Engine Optimization in the report. Which may say something about news people’s understanding of advertising.) The report says digital technology brings the advertising industry closer to its Holy Grail of knowing whether and which ad expenditures are working.
It should be noted that the report still sees TV as the “most persuasive” of the advertising mediums, where, the report says, “mediocre commercial can still sell a lot of product” and as a result, old buying habits still prevail. Radio, according to the report, may be the “most enduring” form of news but radio itself may be an also-ran, in part because of its antiquated media measurement system. The report says the long-term numbers “give a sense that the end of newspapers as pre-packaged parcels delivered to our doorsteps may not be far off” as newspapers lead the way into the digital world. Magazines also have some of the print drawbacks, but with the report predicting that magazines will “live in a variety of media, with brands being the threat that pulls the different content platforms together.” It should also be noted that with Internet spending accounting for only $8.4 Billion of the $108 Billion in total ad spending during the first three quarters of 2007, its influence is greater than the actual dollars spent, and it is still true that the amount of money that goes to Online advertising in no way matches consumer consumption of the Online product.
The report also notes that while the number of people getting news online is growing, and news website have enjoyed double-digit growth, that growth is falling behind other areas, and most critically, is the fact that news has not made a mark in the most critical area – search.
TRUCKERS AND FISHERMEN: In the ‘good old days,’ says Charlie Rutman, CEO of North American operations at ad agency MPG, the agencies were basically in the trucking business, taking ads and commercials and simply delivering them. Or as MediaPost columnist Jack Feuer put it, in the old mass media world, everybody fished in the same three oceans (the broadcast networks) with nobody sure where the fish were or what they were biting. The difference between the fat fisherman and the starving fisherman was who had the shiniest lure – the best creative. According to the report, that is no longer so true. Now the emphasis is on what are called ‘media specialists,’ people who figure out the intricacies of what media, or combination of media, to buy, where to run the ad, how to place the ad. An example of this changing dynamic was given by Greg Smith, CEO of the digital arm of WPP Group’s Ogilvy Worldwide: in traditional media, five people might be responsible for spending $100 Million in the limited advertising universe of network and cable television; in digital media, those same five people might be responsible for a budget of only $1 Million, involving 1,000 ad placements, buying 5,000 keywords on search engines and tracking and changing the campaign based on the data that come back.
THE TWO SIDES OF THE JOURNALISTIC COIN: On the one hand, according to the survey of journalists conducted as part of the report, journalists are having to serve more masters, whether it’s a print and online product or an on-air and online product or a combination of all three. Actually most still work only or mostly on the original product, but with ‘national’ journalists more than three times as likely as local journalists to devote half or more of their time in the multimedia arena. On the other hand, the survey did not find evidence that journalists resent splitting their time, with half of those doing such work seeing it as a good thing. The study authors speculate that part of that may be the belief that the technology is putting journalists more in touch with their audiences. In 1999 when the survey was first conducted, more than half (57%) of national journalists surveyed agreed that journalists were out of touch with their audience. In the latest survey that number has dropped to dramatically less than half (41%), at least on a national level. The authors speculate that it is less true of local journalists who are more likely to be recognized, and hear from, their neighbors at their local supermarkets than their national counterparts.
Another example of two sides of the journalist coin comes in the differing perceptions of the Web’s value between print and broadcast journalists. Nearly three quarters (72%) of national TV and radio journalists say their leaders are doing a good or excellent job transitioning to the web while only a little more than half (59%) of national print journalists felt this way. Print journalists are also more skeptical about the impact of the Internet with both national journalists (44%) and local journalists (55%) believing it will weaken journalist values. In TV and radio, it was the other way around with the largest groups (49% of national journalists and 40% of local journalists) saying the Internet will strengthen journalism in the end.
PROCESSING VERSUS REPORTING: In what may be analogous to a two-headed coin, the study continues to document the growing trend of aggregating news, rather than gathering news. Fewer people are doing more and, the report says, the era of reporters operating in multimedia ‘has finally arrived.’ The report says news is evolving from being a product to being a service and the authors argue that “service, more than storytelling, may prove a key to unlocking new economics.” The report says the prospect of user-generated content being a core part of the next era of journalism is more limited than originally thought, although citizen input sites are still important sources for new ideas, sources and comments. Interestingly, the report says that such so-called ‘citizen journalist’ sites, rather than rejecting the ‘gatekeeper’ function of traditional journalism, appear to be just recreating it in other places and are often as closed, or more closed, to user-generated content than traditional news organizations.
There is hope for traditional media in the fact that many people will still go to Online sites of established, trusted brands for news. And despite all these new sources, he report says the agenda of the American news media continues to narrow, instead of broadening. And many times, what the mainstream media consider to be important and newsworthy differs markedly from what the general public considers important. That issue is further heightened by the fact that the media also showed a marked ‘short attention span,’ says the report.
KEYWORDS: In keeping with the message of the State of the News Media report, if I were to adopt the digital savvy approach of identifying keywords in a document, I would probably pick the following three: Scattered. Fragmented. Splintering. I probably wouldn’t buy those keywords for search purposes though because they wouldn’t necessarily connect to my targeted audience.
DISCLAIMER: This summary is only 16-hundred words long, for a document that runs to 180,000 words. So there are some inevitable omissions and even possibly some distortions, though I hope not. In any case this is only a preliminary summary. There is more to come. And you never know, maybe some smart consulting group, university or think-tank will host an open forum discussion of the implications of the report.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Message From Michael -- March 3, 2008
SWEEPS
GENIE GETS OUT OF THE BOTTLE
REPORTS OF MY DEATH ARE GREATLY EXAGERRATED
I BELIEVE IN UNARMED TRUTH AND UNCONDITIONAL LOVE
I’M GONNA WAIT TILL THE MIDNIGHT HOUR
APOLLO KNOCKED OUT
FACTOID OF THE WEEK
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SWEEPS: Okay, all you news directors and marketing managers, it’s over. All right, just for three months. You know what that means. Get ready for May.
GENIE GETS OUT OF THE BOTTLE: That’s how a federal judge described his own decision allowing an international whistleblower site which says it provides “an uncensorable system for untraceable mass document leaking and public analysis” to continue operation The judge’s decision was a reversal of his previous stance shutting down the site after numerous free speech groups protested. The site, wikileaks.org, provides a wiki-like forum for posting information but using ‘advanced cryptographic methods’ to maintain anonymity. The site is registered to an Australian living in Kenya and its advisory board is made up of Chinese dissidents, journalists and mathematicians. The lawsuit was filed by a Swiss bank, which the Wikileaks site contends, runs a Cayman Islands operation for tax evasion and money laundering purposes. The case is being cited as a major test of First Amendment rights in the Internet era. And it’s not over yet. More motions are due this month with another hearing set in May. On the flip side of this, I should note a libel suit filed late last year against ‘citizen journalism’ site iBrattleboro after a comment was posted on the site alleging a sexual affair between a volunteer and a board member at a local medical services organization. The latest posting by the Citizen Media Law Project indicates the lawsuit is still pending.
REPORTS OF MY DEATH ARE GREATLY EXAGERRATED: The two major social networking sites might want to take a page from Mark Twain. Depending on which publication you read (from The Hollywood Reporter to BusinessWeek and others), social networks are either… “hitting a plateau… cooling off… slowing down… waning or even slumping.” How true it is depends on how you look at the numbers supplied by the two leading online research firms. According to comScore, for example, MySpace is showing ‘only’ an 11.6% year-to-year growth in unique visitors and is actually down 10.4% in amount of time spent on the site. The comScore report says Facebook is up 78.6% in terms of visitors (which observers somehow cite as low) and up ‘just’ 1.1% in time spent. According to HitWise, the numbers are reversed although the overall effect is the same. It says the market share of visits for Facebook is down 27% from its peak (of course, that peak happened over the Christmas holidays and the drop is when college kids are back at school) although the time spent on Facebook is up 73% year to year. The BusinessWeek article notes that advertising on social networking sites is growing fast, but at the same time it says the “MySpace Generation” may be getting annoyed with ads and a bit bored with profile pages, and that may account for some of the leveling off. In a similar vein, The Hollywood Reporter quotes the head of research for Hitwise who says part of the reason for the ‘slowdown’ may be “user fatigue” and concern about privacy and advertising issues.
Despite this, Forrester Research predicts that marketers are likely to continue shifting money into social media. The report says word of mouth, blogging and social networking will “withstand tightened budgets.” The website Chief Marketer ran an interview with Shiv Singha, director of global strategic initiatives at Avenue A/ Razorfish who says consumers will continue to spend more time on social networking sites and that social media will continue to influence marketing decisions. A slightly different take comes from Promo Magazine which argues that social media is more important as a way to gain consumer insights rather than drive a viral marketing message. Citing a study by TNS Media Intelligence, the report notes an interesting dichotomy between the early adopters of social media who believe in the former and the late-comers who believe in the latter.
I BELIEVE IN UNARMED TRUTH AND UNCONDITIONAL LOVE: Excuse me appropriating another quote, but when Martin Luther King said this, he probably wasn’t thinking about social networking as we know it today. But a little noted part of the 2008 Digital Future Project by the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication reports that 15% of U.S. Internet users are members of an ‘online community’ and nearly all of them (94%) said the Internet helped inform them about social causes. So, in that vein, let me note the phenomenon known as micro-loans where you lend a small amount of money to a would-be business person in, usually, a third world country. It can be a farmer in Cambodia, a cook in Nicaragua or an embroiderer in Pakistan. You lend them a small amount (often around $25) towards their goal (which usually is a modest amount – rarely over $1,000) and they repay you. The two most famous are Kiva.Org which won a ringing endorsement from former President Bill Clinton and the Grameen Trust founded by Muhammad Yunus who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006. But there are others – Microplace.com which is actually run by eBay and Opportunity International founded by a former Bristol Myers executive and which focuses on women entrepreneurs. The reported default rate is less than one percent.
I’M GONNA WAIT TILL THE MIDNIGHT HOUR: That’s when singer Wilson Pickett was waiting for his love to shine but, according to Nielsen Media, some viewers are waiting till Midnight for their shows to shine. The company’s latest report finds that DVR use has actually increased TV viewing, with a five percent increase in viewing from 11:00 p.m. to Midnight and seven percent of the viewers playing back their recorded programs then. In effect, the traditional ‘prime time’ viewing period of 8:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. is expanding. The report shows most viewers prefer to watch news, sports and movies live, while dramas like House, Heroes and Gray’s Anatomy are time shifted along with, to a lesser degree, talk shows like Oprah, soap operas and reality TV shows.
Meanwhile, on a very much related note, Nielsen Online reports that the ONLINE video ‘prime time’ is 12 Noon to 2:00 p.m. for people who want to watch network TV shows during their lunch hour while ONLINE ‘prime time’ is 11:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. on the weekends for people who want to watch User Generated Content video. And on a related note to the related note, Nielsen also says that three-quarters (73%) of ‘active Web users” watched streaming video in December, a figure that represents 116.7 Million unique viewers.
APOLLO KNOCKED OUT: And it wasn’t Rocky Balboa that did it. No, instead, it was Nielsen and Arbitron that announced they are dropping their Project Apollo joint venture to measure the buying and radio and television habits of people. The reason – very simple. Too few people willing to be part of a survey which had multiple agendas, and too few clients willing to pay for the expensive results. In a similar vein, the New York Times notes that Nielsen has had to scale back on another plan to track Web usage along with TV usage. Again – the same reason. Despite that, Nielsen is pressing ahead with its A2/M2 (Anytime Anywhere Media Measurement) plan, but that has meant the company needs to develop more consumer panels (16) compared to five panels 10 years ago.
FACTOID OF THE WEEK: According to the latest data, people who use the Internet at work are spending one full day out of their work week online. The figure represents a 70% increase since this measurement was started in 2001. Okay, I can’t help it. It seems I’ve always got a second factoid of the week. This week, it’s a report by Forrester Research titled The End of the Music Industry as we know it that predicts that half of all music sold in the U.S. will be digital by the year 2011 and that sales of digitally downloaded music will pass CD sales a year later in 2012.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Gaming company Emotiv is releasing a ‘neuroheadset’ which lets people play a video game using only their thoughts. A demonstration bombed though when wireless interference caused the system to misfire. A solicitation for user-generated content by The Weather Channel for ‘green-ette’ segments building up to Earth Day on April 22nd has drawn thousands of submissions. Two persons have been arrested in Hunan, Cha, for posting ‘scandalous’ naked photos of Hong Kong pop stars on the Internet. An 18-year-old New Zealand computer programmer has been arrested as part of an international cyber crime network which hacked into more than a million computers. For those observant readers who wondered what “Australian clean clothes” in the middle of last week’s Cocktail Chatter segment meant, researchers at Monash University in Victoria, Australia, have found a way for clothes to clean themselves by coating the fibers in titanium dioxide nanocrystals which break down food and dirt in sunlight. In the edit process, I edited out the facts, but now you know.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
GENIE GETS OUT OF THE BOTTLE
REPORTS OF MY DEATH ARE GREATLY EXAGERRATED
I BELIEVE IN UNARMED TRUTH AND UNCONDITIONAL LOVE
I’M GONNA WAIT TILL THE MIDNIGHT HOUR
APOLLO KNOCKED OUT
FACTOID OF THE WEEK
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SWEEPS: Okay, all you news directors and marketing managers, it’s over. All right, just for three months. You know what that means. Get ready for May.
GENIE GETS OUT OF THE BOTTLE: That’s how a federal judge described his own decision allowing an international whistleblower site which says it provides “an uncensorable system for untraceable mass document leaking and public analysis” to continue operation The judge’s decision was a reversal of his previous stance shutting down the site after numerous free speech groups protested. The site, wikileaks.org, provides a wiki-like forum for posting information but using ‘advanced cryptographic methods’ to maintain anonymity. The site is registered to an Australian living in Kenya and its advisory board is made up of Chinese dissidents, journalists and mathematicians. The lawsuit was filed by a Swiss bank, which the Wikileaks site contends, runs a Cayman Islands operation for tax evasion and money laundering purposes. The case is being cited as a major test of First Amendment rights in the Internet era. And it’s not over yet. More motions are due this month with another hearing set in May. On the flip side of this, I should note a libel suit filed late last year against ‘citizen journalism’ site iBrattleboro after a comment was posted on the site alleging a sexual affair between a volunteer and a board member at a local medical services organization. The latest posting by the Citizen Media Law Project indicates the lawsuit is still pending.
REPORTS OF MY DEATH ARE GREATLY EXAGERRATED: The two major social networking sites might want to take a page from Mark Twain. Depending on which publication you read (from The Hollywood Reporter to BusinessWeek and others), social networks are either… “hitting a plateau… cooling off… slowing down… waning or even slumping.” How true it is depends on how you look at the numbers supplied by the two leading online research firms. According to comScore, for example, MySpace is showing ‘only’ an 11.6% year-to-year growth in unique visitors and is actually down 10.4% in amount of time spent on the site. The comScore report says Facebook is up 78.6% in terms of visitors (which observers somehow cite as low) and up ‘just’ 1.1% in time spent. According to HitWise, the numbers are reversed although the overall effect is the same. It says the market share of visits for Facebook is down 27% from its peak (of course, that peak happened over the Christmas holidays and the drop is when college kids are back at school) although the time spent on Facebook is up 73% year to year. The BusinessWeek article notes that advertising on social networking sites is growing fast, but at the same time it says the “MySpace Generation” may be getting annoyed with ads and a bit bored with profile pages, and that may account for some of the leveling off. In a similar vein, The Hollywood Reporter quotes the head of research for Hitwise who says part of the reason for the ‘slowdown’ may be “user fatigue” and concern about privacy and advertising issues.
Despite this, Forrester Research predicts that marketers are likely to continue shifting money into social media. The report says word of mouth, blogging and social networking will “withstand tightened budgets.” The website Chief Marketer ran an interview with Shiv Singha, director of global strategic initiatives at Avenue A/ Razorfish who says consumers will continue to spend more time on social networking sites and that social media will continue to influence marketing decisions. A slightly different take comes from Promo Magazine which argues that social media is more important as a way to gain consumer insights rather than drive a viral marketing message. Citing a study by TNS Media Intelligence, the report notes an interesting dichotomy between the early adopters of social media who believe in the former and the late-comers who believe in the latter.
I BELIEVE IN UNARMED TRUTH AND UNCONDITIONAL LOVE: Excuse me appropriating another quote, but when Martin Luther King said this, he probably wasn’t thinking about social networking as we know it today. But a little noted part of the 2008 Digital Future Project by the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication reports that 15% of U.S. Internet users are members of an ‘online community’ and nearly all of them (94%) said the Internet helped inform them about social causes. So, in that vein, let me note the phenomenon known as micro-loans where you lend a small amount of money to a would-be business person in, usually, a third world country. It can be a farmer in Cambodia, a cook in Nicaragua or an embroiderer in Pakistan. You lend them a small amount (often around $25) towards their goal (which usually is a modest amount – rarely over $1,000) and they repay you. The two most famous are Kiva.Org which won a ringing endorsement from former President Bill Clinton and the Grameen Trust founded by Muhammad Yunus who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006. But there are others – Microplace.com which is actually run by eBay and Opportunity International founded by a former Bristol Myers executive and which focuses on women entrepreneurs. The reported default rate is less than one percent.
I’M GONNA WAIT TILL THE MIDNIGHT HOUR: That’s when singer Wilson Pickett was waiting for his love to shine but, according to Nielsen Media, some viewers are waiting till Midnight for their shows to shine. The company’s latest report finds that DVR use has actually increased TV viewing, with a five percent increase in viewing from 11:00 p.m. to Midnight and seven percent of the viewers playing back their recorded programs then. In effect, the traditional ‘prime time’ viewing period of 8:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. is expanding. The report shows most viewers prefer to watch news, sports and movies live, while dramas like House, Heroes and Gray’s Anatomy are time shifted along with, to a lesser degree, talk shows like Oprah, soap operas and reality TV shows.
Meanwhile, on a very much related note, Nielsen Online reports that the ONLINE video ‘prime time’ is 12 Noon to 2:00 p.m. for people who want to watch network TV shows during their lunch hour while ONLINE ‘prime time’ is 11:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. on the weekends for people who want to watch User Generated Content video. And on a related note to the related note, Nielsen also says that three-quarters (73%) of ‘active Web users” watched streaming video in December, a figure that represents 116.7 Million unique viewers.
APOLLO KNOCKED OUT: And it wasn’t Rocky Balboa that did it. No, instead, it was Nielsen and Arbitron that announced they are dropping their Project Apollo joint venture to measure the buying and radio and television habits of people. The reason – very simple. Too few people willing to be part of a survey which had multiple agendas, and too few clients willing to pay for the expensive results. In a similar vein, the New York Times notes that Nielsen has had to scale back on another plan to track Web usage along with TV usage. Again – the same reason. Despite that, Nielsen is pressing ahead with its A2/M2 (Anytime Anywhere Media Measurement) plan, but that has meant the company needs to develop more consumer panels (16) compared to five panels 10 years ago.
FACTOID OF THE WEEK: According to the latest data, people who use the Internet at work are spending one full day out of their work week online. The figure represents a 70% increase since this measurement was started in 2001. Okay, I can’t help it. It seems I’ve always got a second factoid of the week. This week, it’s a report by Forrester Research titled The End of the Music Industry as we know it that predicts that half of all music sold in the U.S. will be digital by the year 2011 and that sales of digitally downloaded music will pass CD sales a year later in 2012.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Gaming company Emotiv is releasing a ‘neuroheadset’ which lets people play a video game using only their thoughts. A demonstration bombed though when wireless interference caused the system to misfire. A solicitation for user-generated content by The Weather Channel for ‘green-ette’ segments building up to Earth Day on April 22nd has drawn thousands of submissions. Two persons have been arrested in Hunan, Cha, for posting ‘scandalous’ naked photos of Hong Kong pop stars on the Internet. An 18-year-old New Zealand computer programmer has been arrested as part of an international cyber crime network which hacked into more than a million computers. For those observant readers who wondered what “Australian clean clothes” in the middle of last week’s Cocktail Chatter segment meant, researchers at Monash University in Victoria, Australia, have found a way for clothes to clean themselves by coating the fibers in titanium dioxide nanocrystals which break down food and dirt in sunlight. In the edit process, I edited out the facts, but now you know.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Message From Michael -- February 25, 2008
BATTLE ROYAL NUMBER ONE – DTV TRANSITION
BATTLE ROYAL NUMBER TWO – NET NEUTRALITY
I DON’T WANT MY MTV
FACTOID OF THE WEEK -- CLICKERS
COCKTAIL CHATTER – GOOGLE LOGO
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
BATTLE ROYAL NUMBER ONE – DTV TRANSITION: With one year left before the nationwide transition to DTV (February 17, 2009), a report by market research firm Centris claiming that “Millions” of people may be “left in the dark” with the digital transition has caused a furor. In brief their analysis goes like this: there are 40 Million households currently receiving over-the-air analog signals. That represents 117 Million sets that are – in the curious wording of the news release – “unconnected from cable or satellite video networks.” Using the website Antennaweb.org which helps consumers map out the best antenna to use, the folks at Centris found several “gaps” in coverage outside of a 35 mile range. (Antennaweb, by the way, is a joint venture of the Consumer Electronics Association and the National Association of Broadcasters). To make it worse, say the folks at Centris, the antennaweb.org survey is based on outside antenna, but three quarters (75%) of those 40 Million over-the-air households rely on less sensitive set-top antennas instead of outdoor antennas.
The problem with the analysis, according to the Association for Maximum Service Television is that Centris relied on a “paper analysis” of the antennaweb.org data. The MSTV group which was formed in 1956 but which bills itself as “the leading advocate for advanced over-the-air digital television in the United States” for the past decade says the Centris study “mischaracterized” information and says consumers are already receiving good signals 30 miles and beyond. A commentary by Doug Lung on the website TVTechnology.com also says the Centris data is a “misinterpretation” of the FCC data on signal propagation and that the issue of multipath interference is “misleading.” But even he says antennas have been overlooked in the DTV discussions and that outside the strong signal areas (that 35 mile range), antenna selection will be important. One last point: the Centris study makes the point that considering nearly half (45%) of the audience doesn’t even know DTV transition was taking place, any gaps in coverage will only add to the confusion.
BATTLE ROYAL NUMBER TWO – NET NEUTRALITY: Two years after first talking about it, a bill (named in Washington jargon – the Internet Freedom Preservation Act) has been re-introduced into Congress to give the Federal Communications Commission more control over the Internet. And tomorrow, the FCC holds hearings in Boston on Net Neutrality and network management. On one side are the giant telephone and cable companies (AT&T, Time Warner, and Verizon) who argue that the increasing online video usage makes some kind of ‘capacity-based’ pricing system necessary to keep the lines open. On the other side are consumer groups (with names like savetheinternet.com and openinternetcoalition.com) who argue that such a pricing system would set up an equivalent to the cable television pricing in which “choices are limited and the platform is closed.” And before you start thinking the consumer groups are out-gunned, also on their side are such behemoths as eBay, Amazon and Google whose representatives argue they wouldn’t have been able to start-up if the pricing system existed. The new bill was spurred, in part, by cable company Comcast’s admission that it had slowed traffic on its lines. Meanwhile, sitting on the side lines are peer-to-peer file sharing operations such as BitTorrent whose software has been downloaded 160 Million times. The original vote to give the FCC more control was defeated by a 269-152 vote.
I DON’T WANT MY MTV: No, instead, I want I Love Lucy, Battlestar Galactica, The Twilight Zone, MacGyver and F Troop. At least that’s what two of the broadcast networks are betting. In separate announcements, NBC and CBS announced they will begin streaming “classic” TV series on the Internet. CBS is offering the shows through its ‘audience network’ which includes video providers Joost and Veoh while NBC will be offering the shows through its ‘entertainment sites’ including Hulu and sites such as SciFi.com, ChillerTV.com and Sleuthchannel.com. And, of course, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention AOL’s In2TV website which has been operational for some time now. As a side note, a whole new network specializing in classic television series has sprung up and is being carried on many affiliates’ secondary digital channels. The network, a subsidiary of Little Rock, Arkansas, based Equity Media Holdings focuses on shows from the 50’s to the 80’s. And as a foot note to the side note, there is a website TVHistory.TV which recounts the history of television and television sets starting from 1935.
FACTOID OF THE WEEK: Another new feature for MfM. Maybe. Anyway… A study by comScore found that less than one-fifth of the Online population accounts for four-fifths of all the Internet ad clicks. The study commissioned by Starcom and AOL’s Tacoda found that six percent of the online population were clicking on ads four and five times a month, accounting for half (50%) of ALL clicks. Another ten percent of the Online population click two or three times and thus account for 30% of ALL clicks. For those non-math majors among you, that’s 16% of the online population accounting for 80% of the clicks; or looking at it from the other side, three quarters (74%) of the online population account for only 20% of the online clicks.
All right, one more. BrandWeek reports that if you think the number of coupons stuffed into your Sunday newspaper has grown… you’re right. Spending on FSI’s (Free Standing Inserts) has more than doubled from $413 Million in 2006 to $904 Million in 2007, according to Nielsen Monitor Plus.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Would-be fashion photographers can practice their skills through a website, directdaniella.com, co-created by Taco Bell and Sports Illustrated which allows them to take snapshots and even direct poses of Brazilian beauty and SI Swimsuit model Daniella Sarahyba using their web browser. Aside from Fidel Castro stepping down, the other big news coming out of Cuba is that the Chinese state television network has launched three channels in the island nation, as a reciprocal to the Cuban television shows airing in China. The typeface in the Google logo is Adobe Garamond. Definitely a factoid you can drop at that next cocktail party. Actually, the whole issue of the logo design was the subject of a Wired article profiling the graphic artist Ruth Kedar who met the two founders at Stanford University. Kedar who admits she never imagined the logo would be as ubiquitous as it is, said she brought some ‘playfulness’ to the design by “bringing primary colors and two dimensionality to the O’s… to visually imply that something goes on ad infinitum.”
And lastly for those of you who stayed up and watched the Academy Awards, well, I don’t have anything to say, except that I missed most of the movies. But you have until March 28th to submit for the new category of broadband television in the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences 60th Primetime Emmy awards. In its announcement, the academy says, “the future of television is awaiting you.”
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
BATTLE ROYAL NUMBER TWO – NET NEUTRALITY
I DON’T WANT MY MTV
FACTOID OF THE WEEK -- CLICKERS
COCKTAIL CHATTER – GOOGLE LOGO
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
BATTLE ROYAL NUMBER ONE – DTV TRANSITION: With one year left before the nationwide transition to DTV (February 17, 2009), a report by market research firm Centris claiming that “Millions” of people may be “left in the dark” with the digital transition has caused a furor. In brief their analysis goes like this: there are 40 Million households currently receiving over-the-air analog signals. That represents 117 Million sets that are – in the curious wording of the news release – “unconnected from cable or satellite video networks.” Using the website Antennaweb.org which helps consumers map out the best antenna to use, the folks at Centris found several “gaps” in coverage outside of a 35 mile range. (Antennaweb, by the way, is a joint venture of the Consumer Electronics Association and the National Association of Broadcasters). To make it worse, say the folks at Centris, the antennaweb.org survey is based on outside antenna, but three quarters (75%) of those 40 Million over-the-air households rely on less sensitive set-top antennas instead of outdoor antennas.
The problem with the analysis, according to the Association for Maximum Service Television is that Centris relied on a “paper analysis” of the antennaweb.org data. The MSTV group which was formed in 1956 but which bills itself as “the leading advocate for advanced over-the-air digital television in the United States” for the past decade says the Centris study “mischaracterized” information and says consumers are already receiving good signals 30 miles and beyond. A commentary by Doug Lung on the website TVTechnology.com also says the Centris data is a “misinterpretation” of the FCC data on signal propagation and that the issue of multipath interference is “misleading.” But even he says antennas have been overlooked in the DTV discussions and that outside the strong signal areas (that 35 mile range), antenna selection will be important. One last point: the Centris study makes the point that considering nearly half (45%) of the audience doesn’t even know DTV transition was taking place, any gaps in coverage will only add to the confusion.
BATTLE ROYAL NUMBER TWO – NET NEUTRALITY: Two years after first talking about it, a bill (named in Washington jargon – the Internet Freedom Preservation Act) has been re-introduced into Congress to give the Federal Communications Commission more control over the Internet. And tomorrow, the FCC holds hearings in Boston on Net Neutrality and network management. On one side are the giant telephone and cable companies (AT&T, Time Warner, and Verizon) who argue that the increasing online video usage makes some kind of ‘capacity-based’ pricing system necessary to keep the lines open. On the other side are consumer groups (with names like savetheinternet.com and openinternetcoalition.com) who argue that such a pricing system would set up an equivalent to the cable television pricing in which “choices are limited and the platform is closed.” And before you start thinking the consumer groups are out-gunned, also on their side are such behemoths as eBay, Amazon and Google whose representatives argue they wouldn’t have been able to start-up if the pricing system existed. The new bill was spurred, in part, by cable company Comcast’s admission that it had slowed traffic on its lines. Meanwhile, sitting on the side lines are peer-to-peer file sharing operations such as BitTorrent whose software has been downloaded 160 Million times. The original vote to give the FCC more control was defeated by a 269-152 vote.
I DON’T WANT MY MTV: No, instead, I want I Love Lucy, Battlestar Galactica, The Twilight Zone, MacGyver and F Troop. At least that’s what two of the broadcast networks are betting. In separate announcements, NBC and CBS announced they will begin streaming “classic” TV series on the Internet. CBS is offering the shows through its ‘audience network’ which includes video providers Joost and Veoh while NBC will be offering the shows through its ‘entertainment sites’ including Hulu and sites such as SciFi.com, ChillerTV.com and Sleuthchannel.com. And, of course, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention AOL’s In2TV website which has been operational for some time now. As a side note, a whole new network specializing in classic television series has sprung up and is being carried on many affiliates’ secondary digital channels. The network, a subsidiary of Little Rock, Arkansas, based Equity Media Holdings focuses on shows from the 50’s to the 80’s. And as a foot note to the side note, there is a website TVHistory.TV which recounts the history of television and television sets starting from 1935.
FACTOID OF THE WEEK: Another new feature for MfM. Maybe. Anyway… A study by comScore found that less than one-fifth of the Online population accounts for four-fifths of all the Internet ad clicks. The study commissioned by Starcom and AOL’s Tacoda found that six percent of the online population were clicking on ads four and five times a month, accounting for half (50%) of ALL clicks. Another ten percent of the Online population click two or three times and thus account for 30% of ALL clicks. For those non-math majors among you, that’s 16% of the online population accounting for 80% of the clicks; or looking at it from the other side, three quarters (74%) of the online population account for only 20% of the online clicks.
All right, one more. BrandWeek reports that if you think the number of coupons stuffed into your Sunday newspaper has grown… you’re right. Spending on FSI’s (Free Standing Inserts) has more than doubled from $413 Million in 2006 to $904 Million in 2007, according to Nielsen Monitor Plus.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Would-be fashion photographers can practice their skills through a website, directdaniella.com, co-created by Taco Bell and Sports Illustrated which allows them to take snapshots and even direct poses of Brazilian beauty and SI Swimsuit model Daniella Sarahyba using their web browser. Aside from Fidel Castro stepping down, the other big news coming out of Cuba is that the Chinese state television network has launched three channels in the island nation, as a reciprocal to the Cuban television shows airing in China. The typeface in the Google logo is Adobe Garamond. Definitely a factoid you can drop at that next cocktail party. Actually, the whole issue of the logo design was the subject of a Wired article profiling the graphic artist Ruth Kedar who met the two founders at Stanford University. Kedar who admits she never imagined the logo would be as ubiquitous as it is, said she brought some ‘playfulness’ to the design by “bringing primary colors and two dimensionality to the O’s… to visually imply that something goes on ad infinitum.”
And lastly for those of you who stayed up and watched the Academy Awards, well, I don’t have anything to say, except that I missed most of the movies. But you have until March 28th to submit for the new category of broadband television in the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences 60th Primetime Emmy awards. In its announcement, the academy says, “the future of television is awaiting you.”
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Message From Michael -- February 18, 2008
I SPY WITH MY LITTLE EYE
THE SMART TV SHOWS OF ALL TIME
SOMETHING HAPPENS SOME PLACE TO SOMEONE
WHO DO YOU BELIEVE
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
I SPY WITH MY LITTLE EYE: Billions and Billions of videos. Two separate reports attest to the growing popularity of online video usage. Although the now resolved writers’ strike might have contributed to it, comScore Video Metrix reports that the number of online videos viewed passed the 10 Billion mark in December. A separate study by the Solutions Research Group found that the number of Americans who have watched one of their favorite TV shows on the Internet has nearly doubled in the past year. That’s 43% of the online population, or 80 Million Americans, compared to 25% a year ago. When you consider all videos online, comScore says three-quarters (76.7%) of all U.S. Internet users have viewed videos online. Of course, Google’s YouTube site accounted for most of those viewings – a third (32.6%), more than 3.3 Billion videos. Nobody else even comes close. Fox Interactive came in second with 358 Thousand videos and 3.5% of the market, followed by Yahoo (340 Thousand and 3.4%), Viacom (237 Thousand and 2.3%) and Microsoft (180 Thousand and 1.8%).
Even more astounding (at least to me, but I’m easily astounded), one in five Online Americans say they watch TV on the Web on a weekly basis – which the Solutions Research Group notes is well ahead of the 14% watching cable’s video-on-demand offerings. The hot shows on the Internet included Heroes, Grey’s Anatomy, Dancing with the Stars, Ugly Betty, Chuck, CSI, House, Kitchen Nightmares, Smallville and Gossip Girl. And as long as I’m being astounded, comScore says online viewers watched an average of 3.4 hours of online video during the month – a 34% increase since the beginning of 2007. The average online video duration was 2.8 minutes but then again the ‘average’ online video viewer ‘consumed’ 72 videos.
As a footnote, I should point out an article by Mike Shields in MediaWeek that major broadcasters, NBC Universal and Viacom, continue to resist placing their content on YouTube. Of course, NBC does have hulu.com as well as its own site. YouTube points out in the article that it has deals with 18 groups, including Hearst Corp., Tribune Broadcasting, Oprah’s Harpo, Reuters and even PBS. And, no, I don’t understand why Viacom resists making a deal with YouTube while CBS doesn’t.
THE SMARTEST TV SHOWS OF ALL TIME: As long as I’m on a TV kick, website fancast.com, which allows people to develop their own TV viewing guide of favorite shows both on line and on air, has created a ‘smart’ TV list, based on an interview with the chairman of Mensa International, the organization for people whose IQ is in the top 2% of the population. Chairman Jim Werdell’s obviously personal list includes M-A-S-H, Cosmos (with Carl Sagan), CSI, House, West Wing, Boston Legal, All in the Family, Frasier, Mad About You and Jeopardy which he says tests intelligence as well as knowledge. Werdell cites most of the shows for their smart ‘repartee.’ You can read more at http://thebiz.fancast.com/2008/02/exclusive_mensa_chair_picks_th.html.
SOMETHING HAPPENS SOME PLACE TO SOMEONE: With that heavy duty definition of news, CNN has launched its iReports.com “user powered news” website. The site says there were 89,894 iReports filed worldwide, of which 915 made it on to CNN. The site bills itself as Unedited, Unfiltered, and one is tempted to say un-interesting, but I won’t; after all it is a beta site. Let me just say the lead story, billed as Breaking News, this morning was a video of an argument between a ketchup bottle and a mustard bottle. The second story on the home page, actually made it to CNN, is a video version book report on Lord of the Flies done a la Wolf Blitzer’s Situation Room. Just out of curiosity, I checked out the morning line-up on Current TV which relies heavily but not solely on user generated reports. The lead was an edited version of John McCain talking about Iraq and set to a sort of rap beat and which actually was from YouTube. Of course, the second story was about a man getting a Pug… as in dog. As a side note, MTV has launched a political version of user generated news titled Choose or Lose with a “street team” of ‘reporters’ in all 50 states and D.C.
WHO DO YOU BELIEVE: If you’re like most people, you believe your friends and relatives and your peer group. Two separate surveys came to the same conclusion when looking at online products and services and, by extension, all products and services. Two-thirds of those surveyed say consumer generated reviews and ratings were the most important thing for them in making decisions. A Forrester Research survey of 5,000 online consumers found that not only did two thirds (64%) want to see user ratings and reviews on Websites, nearly the same number (59%)wanted product or price comparison testimonials and half (49%) wanted customer testimonials. A similar survey by Jupiter Research and Bazaarvoice found even more (70%) rated online product ratings and reviews the most helpful when researching products which two thirds (65%) of them did online even when they purchased offline. But here is where it gets interesting (well, to me, anyway) “trust in online reviews was found to be at its greatest when readers heard both sides of the story.” More than half (56%) say they wanted to know both the pros and cons of a product’s ‘attributes.’
Okay, the part my television brethren won’t like – online customer reviews are FIVE times more influential (53%) than TV ads (11%) in the case of online users thinking about spending money, according to the Jupiter survey which focused on U.K. consumers. Somewhat oddly, according to the Forrester survey, only one in five (23%) want the ability to upload or view their own content and only slightly more than that (29%) wanted quizzes or questionnaires. Not surprisingly Gen Yers (18 to 27) responded more positively toward entertaining games, quizzes, questionnaires and sharing content, followed by the Gen Xers (28 to 41).
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Organic milk is taking the place of high octane energy drinks and fruit flavored bottled water as the ‘cutting-edge’ beverage with double digit sales growth, in part because of the smaller price difference with regular milk but mainly because of its perceived health benefits, according to the website, Progressive Grocer. Mexico City has started a women-only bus service in the city because of the problem of women being groped and verbally abused on the public transportation. According to trend watching newsletter, Springwise, similar services have been started in Egypt, India, Brazil, Taiwan, the Philippines and Japan along with taxis in the U.K., Russia, India, Dubai and Iran. An employment website called TheLadders aimed exclusively at high earners looking for jobs paying $100,000-plus, has been started by a former executive from hotjobs.com.
A FINAL NOTE OF CLARIFICATION: Last week’s MfM reported on the amount of ‘non-programming content’, including ads, aired on cable and broadcast networks as compiled by the Kaiser Family Foundation. One key point was left out: the analysis was based on the programming on the network affiliates, not just the networks alone. For each network, programming for the ten networks was sampled on local stations in seven different markets across the country, TO allow for regional differences and to create a composite week’s worth of programming. Thanks to sharp-eyed reader Devoe Slisher, of Fox59 and TheCW4 in Indianapolis for catching that.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
THE SMART TV SHOWS OF ALL TIME
SOMETHING HAPPENS SOME PLACE TO SOMEONE
WHO DO YOU BELIEVE
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
I SPY WITH MY LITTLE EYE: Billions and Billions of videos. Two separate reports attest to the growing popularity of online video usage. Although the now resolved writers’ strike might have contributed to it, comScore Video Metrix reports that the number of online videos viewed passed the 10 Billion mark in December. A separate study by the Solutions Research Group found that the number of Americans who have watched one of their favorite TV shows on the Internet has nearly doubled in the past year. That’s 43% of the online population, or 80 Million Americans, compared to 25% a year ago. When you consider all videos online, comScore says three-quarters (76.7%) of all U.S. Internet users have viewed videos online. Of course, Google’s YouTube site accounted for most of those viewings – a third (32.6%), more than 3.3 Billion videos. Nobody else even comes close. Fox Interactive came in second with 358 Thousand videos and 3.5% of the market, followed by Yahoo (340 Thousand and 3.4%), Viacom (237 Thousand and 2.3%) and Microsoft (180 Thousand and 1.8%).
Even more astounding (at least to me, but I’m easily astounded), one in five Online Americans say they watch TV on the Web on a weekly basis – which the Solutions Research Group notes is well ahead of the 14% watching cable’s video-on-demand offerings. The hot shows on the Internet included Heroes, Grey’s Anatomy, Dancing with the Stars, Ugly Betty, Chuck, CSI, House, Kitchen Nightmares, Smallville and Gossip Girl. And as long as I’m being astounded, comScore says online viewers watched an average of 3.4 hours of online video during the month – a 34% increase since the beginning of 2007. The average online video duration was 2.8 minutes but then again the ‘average’ online video viewer ‘consumed’ 72 videos.
As a footnote, I should point out an article by Mike Shields in MediaWeek that major broadcasters, NBC Universal and Viacom, continue to resist placing their content on YouTube. Of course, NBC does have hulu.com as well as its own site. YouTube points out in the article that it has deals with 18 groups, including Hearst Corp., Tribune Broadcasting, Oprah’s Harpo, Reuters and even PBS. And, no, I don’t understand why Viacom resists making a deal with YouTube while CBS doesn’t.
THE SMARTEST TV SHOWS OF ALL TIME: As long as I’m on a TV kick, website fancast.com, which allows people to develop their own TV viewing guide of favorite shows both on line and on air, has created a ‘smart’ TV list, based on an interview with the chairman of Mensa International, the organization for people whose IQ is in the top 2% of the population. Chairman Jim Werdell’s obviously personal list includes M-A-S-H, Cosmos (with Carl Sagan), CSI, House, West Wing, Boston Legal, All in the Family, Frasier, Mad About You and Jeopardy which he says tests intelligence as well as knowledge. Werdell cites most of the shows for their smart ‘repartee.’ You can read more at http://thebiz.fancast.com/2008/02/exclusive_mensa_chair_picks_th.html.
SOMETHING HAPPENS SOME PLACE TO SOMEONE: With that heavy duty definition of news, CNN has launched its iReports.com “user powered news” website. The site says there were 89,894 iReports filed worldwide, of which 915 made it on to CNN. The site bills itself as Unedited, Unfiltered, and one is tempted to say un-interesting, but I won’t; after all it is a beta site. Let me just say the lead story, billed as Breaking News, this morning was a video of an argument between a ketchup bottle and a mustard bottle. The second story on the home page, actually made it to CNN, is a video version book report on Lord of the Flies done a la Wolf Blitzer’s Situation Room. Just out of curiosity, I checked out the morning line-up on Current TV which relies heavily but not solely on user generated reports. The lead was an edited version of John McCain talking about Iraq and set to a sort of rap beat and which actually was from YouTube. Of course, the second story was about a man getting a Pug… as in dog. As a side note, MTV has launched a political version of user generated news titled Choose or Lose with a “street team” of ‘reporters’ in all 50 states and D.C.
WHO DO YOU BELIEVE: If you’re like most people, you believe your friends and relatives and your peer group. Two separate surveys came to the same conclusion when looking at online products and services and, by extension, all products and services. Two-thirds of those surveyed say consumer generated reviews and ratings were the most important thing for them in making decisions. A Forrester Research survey of 5,000 online consumers found that not only did two thirds (64%) want to see user ratings and reviews on Websites, nearly the same number (59%)wanted product or price comparison testimonials and half (49%) wanted customer testimonials. A similar survey by Jupiter Research and Bazaarvoice found even more (70%) rated online product ratings and reviews the most helpful when researching products which two thirds (65%) of them did online even when they purchased offline. But here is where it gets interesting (well, to me, anyway) “trust in online reviews was found to be at its greatest when readers heard both sides of the story.” More than half (56%) say they wanted to know both the pros and cons of a product’s ‘attributes.’
Okay, the part my television brethren won’t like – online customer reviews are FIVE times more influential (53%) than TV ads (11%) in the case of online users thinking about spending money, according to the Jupiter survey which focused on U.K. consumers. Somewhat oddly, according to the Forrester survey, only one in five (23%) want the ability to upload or view their own content and only slightly more than that (29%) wanted quizzes or questionnaires. Not surprisingly Gen Yers (18 to 27) responded more positively toward entertaining games, quizzes, questionnaires and sharing content, followed by the Gen Xers (28 to 41).
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Organic milk is taking the place of high octane energy drinks and fruit flavored bottled water as the ‘cutting-edge’ beverage with double digit sales growth, in part because of the smaller price difference with regular milk but mainly because of its perceived health benefits, according to the website, Progressive Grocer. Mexico City has started a women-only bus service in the city because of the problem of women being groped and verbally abused on the public transportation. According to trend watching newsletter, Springwise, similar services have been started in Egypt, India, Brazil, Taiwan, the Philippines and Japan along with taxis in the U.K., Russia, India, Dubai and Iran. An employment website called TheLadders aimed exclusively at high earners looking for jobs paying $100,000-plus, has been started by a former executive from hotjobs.com.
A FINAL NOTE OF CLARIFICATION: Last week’s MfM reported on the amount of ‘non-programming content’, including ads, aired on cable and broadcast networks as compiled by the Kaiser Family Foundation. One key point was left out: the analysis was based on the programming on the network affiliates, not just the networks alone. For each network, programming for the ten networks was sampled on local stations in seven different markets across the country, TO allow for regional differences and to create a composite week’s worth of programming. Thanks to sharp-eyed reader Devoe Slisher, of Fox59 and TheCW4 in Indianapolis for catching that.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
Message From Michael -- February 11, 2008
GOOGLE VERSUS MICROSOFT – REVERBERATIONS AND RECRIMINATIONS
BROADCAST NETWORKS VERSUS CABLE NETWORKS
TRANSITION AND CONFUSION IN TELEVISION
THE U.S. VERSUS THE U.S.S.R. AGAIN
THE $500 BILLION BROADBAND PENETRATION
NEWS OF THE WEB WEIRD
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
GOOGLE VERSUS MICROSOFT – REVERBERATIONS AND RECRIMINATIONS: Not surprisingly, Google officials are warning a Microsoft takeover of Yahoo! would destroy Internet openness and innovation. Even less surprising, Microsoft officials say it would increase competition rather than reduce it. All that said, more figures have been released by Hitwise, comScore and Nielsen showing where the three behemoths stand. According to Hitwise, the market share of U.S. visits for Microsoft and Yahoo combined would be 15.6% of all Internet visits, with Google at 7.7% based on the week ended January 26th. However, Google accounts for 66% of all U.S. search volume while Yahoo and MSN Search combined would total 28%, according to December figures.
But, and here is where I don’t understand why Yahoo would be considered vulnerable, Yahoo has 71.4% of the U.S. market in portal front pages (MSN has 15.43%); Yahoo has 54.63% of Email services in the U.S. while Windows has 25.54% and Gmail has 5.51%; Yahoo News accounts for 7.38% of the market share in the news and media category for its Yahoo News, while MSNBC has 3.84%; Yahoo Finance has 29.15% of the business information category with MSN Money accounting for 10.14% of the U.S. market share; Yahoo Shopping has 8.68% of the rewards and directories categories followed by MSN shopping with 1.16%; Yahoo hotjobs accounts for 11.18% of the employment category; Yahoo Movies accounts for 8.33% of the movies category and so on and so on. Add to that the fact that Yahoo is far and away the leader in share of display ads with 18.8% of the market compared to Microsoft’s 6.7% and Google’s 1%, and I don’t get it.
In the end, if the two merge, Nielsen Online VP Ken Cassar says the combined entity would be visited by 86% of all U.S. Internet users, account for 15% of all time spent online and represent 59% of all online display ad impressions sold – the most significant revenue generator for most online publishers.
And for a different perspective altogether, Raycom Media CIO Dave Folsom reminded me of the flash online movie Epic2014 created for the Museum of Media History. An updated version of this prescient or pessimistic (depending on your perspective) look in the future, Epic2015, can be seen at http://epic.makingithappen.co.uk.
BROADCAST NETWORKS VERSUS CABLE NETWORKS: The four major Broadcast networks average a full minute more of advertising per hour than the leading cable networks, according to a study by the Kaiser Family Foundation. The main purpose of the study was to look at the amount of Public Service Announcements carried by the networks. As has been reported, the study found that less than one half of one percent of all air-time went to PSA’s (about 17 seconds an hour), roughly the same as it was five years before. And most of that (46%) was show in the hours from Midnight to 8:00 a.m. But also buried in the report was an analysis of non-programming content (ads, promos, psa’s, infomercials and ‘filler.) The time spent on ads has gone up an average of 24 seconds on the major broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC) in the five years from 2000 to 2005, but a whopping 50 seconds on the cable networks measured (CNN, ESPN, MTV, Nick and TNT). Still there is a full minute more of advertising per hour on the broadcast networks (13:36) compared to the cable networks (12.30). Both groups have reduced the amount of time spent on promos in that time period, but they are both about the same -- 2:17 an hour on broadcast networks compared to 2:14 seconds on the cable networks.
ABC averages the most time on ads (14:05), just slightly more than NBC (14:01), but significantly more than CBS (13:21) and Fox (12:56). ABC also spent the least amount of time on promos (2:01), followed again by NBC (2:16) which in turn is closely followed by CBS (2:17) but with Fox spending the ‘most’ time (2:37). Fox had the highest amount of ‘non-programming content’, much of that infomercials (5:36) which was more than three times any of the other broadcast networks. The five cable networks measured had no infomercial time, according to the study. Interestingly, the network with the least amount of advertising was Univision with an average of 7:15 per hour, and even more interesting Univision had the highest promo time of any network (5:05).
TRANSITION AND CONFUSION IN TELEVISION: Those are the two words used to describe the state of television in a report summarizing a panel discussion held by the Peabody Awards. The report likens the ‘new’ news environment to a “giant media echo chamber” in which viewers only see and hear what they want to see and hear. Viewers may get more information and ‘varying perspectives’ through fiction and documentary work than in traditional news presentations. Add to that a process the report calls “viralization” in which we don’t have to go get the news, it comes to us, often from other viewers. Gone are the days when television contributed to a shared sense of national community. Despite all that, the report says quality television still exists. But if television is going to contribute to public culture, industry leaders, policy makers and citizen groups must work toward the creation of “media commons” to make sure differing groups can exchange ideas and understand each other, rather than “retreat into gated communities for the like-minded.”
THE U.S. VERSUS THE U.S.S.R: The two former Cold War enemies are again competing on the world stage, but it’s not so much about Vladimir Putin and George W. Bush, as it is about Information and Communications Technology. Both scored #1 but in different areas for different reasons. Even more surprising is that countries that you hear so much about in terms of ICT (such as India and Korea) scored poorly. A professor at the London Business School along with global economic consulting firm LECG have created a “Connectivity Scorecard” which looks not just at the infrastructure and technology in each country but “how usefully connected” the consumers, businesses and governments in those countries are and what that means to economic growth. The study makes the point that it is widely accepted that modern economies are information economies but in reality ALL economies are information economies now, and that “optimizing connectivity usage is the best source of future economic growth.”
America scored first out of 16 “innovation driven” economies (what we would call developed countries) while Russia scored first out of 9 “efficiency and resource driven” economies (commonly called emerging or developing countries.) But even in first place, the U.S. only scored 6.97 out of 10, followed by Sweden (6.83), Japan (6.8), Canada (6.5), Finland (6.1), the U.K. (6.1), Australia (5.93), Germany (5.52), France (5.07), and Korea coming in at tenth (4.78) In the other group, Russia scored 6.11 out of 10, followed by Malaysia (5.82), Mexico (4.37), Brazil (4.28), South Africa (4.11), China (3.42), Phillipines (2.38), India (1.68) and Nigeria (1.01). The report says Korea needs to figure out why its businesses spend so little on enterprise telephony and IP applications, that India has to improve performance on basic literacy and access measures, and the U.S. needs to improve general broadband penetration and affordability.
THE $500 BILLION BROADBAND PENETRATION: The “connectivity scorecard” cites previous studies that improving broadband penetration in the U.S. could have an economic impact of upwards of $500 Billion. However, the LECG report’s call for improving broadband penetration in the U.S. runs counter to another report by the National Telecommunication and Information Administration which says broadband penetration has improved dramatically, growing 1,100 percent in the past eight years. The report by the agency, which is part of the U.S. Commerce Department credits the improvements to the the Bush administration’s policy of “taking the government out of decisions more appropriately left to the marketplace… clearing away regulatory obstacles… tax relief… seed-funding… (and its) pro-investment… deregulatory policies.” It should be noted that critics charge that the administrations’ definition of broadband as 220 Kilobytes per Second is only four times dial-up speed and barely fast enough to allow streaming video. It should also be noted that the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development ranks the U.S. 15th in broadband penetration, but U.S. officials say that does not take into account the large rural areas in America and the number of WiFi hotspots in the U.S.
NEWS OF THE WEB WEIRD: This may become a new MfM feature – a look at weird and sometimes wonderful websites that tell you something about where the Internet is going. For example, four guys in Scotland have created a site which allows you to bet on news stories. And even though the creators are in Edinburgh, the stories are focused on U.S. news. You sign up at the site, hubdub.com, and you get $1,000 in play money that can only be used on the site. Then you can bet on everything from the mundane (who will be elected President) to money matters (will the Dow Jones average fall below 12,000 today) to minutiae (who will be voted off Episode 2 Survivor 16) to the macabre (will more than 50 people be killed by a single suicide bomber in Pakistan). Meanwhile, website haveyougotthenerve.tv is looking for 3,000 ‘executive producers’ who will plunk down 60 English pounds to become part of an experiment in crowdsourcing, in which they are all part of a TV production company creating programs. And before you dismiss it as some sort of ponzi scheme, the creator, Mark Bowness, is the same person who created Tribewanted, a global tribe developing a sustainable eco community on an island in Fiji. Thinking a little more modestly? Then consider website itsmy.com where you can create your own personal mobile TV show using your content and the site’s sound files, avatars and animations for uploading and downloading.
A FINAL NOTE: From the people who brought you meter madness and ratings rubble comes a new idea. Nielsen Media has announced a ‘strategic investment’ in NeuroFocus, a firm specializing in applying brainwave research to advertising, programming and messaging. Susan Whiting, Executive Vice President of Nielsen, is quoted as saying the ‘alliance’ will allow Nielsen to gather unique insights about consumer attitudes and behavior, “but which they themselves may not even be fully aware.”
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
BROADCAST NETWORKS VERSUS CABLE NETWORKS
TRANSITION AND CONFUSION IN TELEVISION
THE U.S. VERSUS THE U.S.S.R. AGAIN
THE $500 BILLION BROADBAND PENETRATION
NEWS OF THE WEB WEIRD
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
GOOGLE VERSUS MICROSOFT – REVERBERATIONS AND RECRIMINATIONS: Not surprisingly, Google officials are warning a Microsoft takeover of Yahoo! would destroy Internet openness and innovation. Even less surprising, Microsoft officials say it would increase competition rather than reduce it. All that said, more figures have been released by Hitwise, comScore and Nielsen showing where the three behemoths stand. According to Hitwise, the market share of U.S. visits for Microsoft and Yahoo combined would be 15.6% of all Internet visits, with Google at 7.7% based on the week ended January 26th. However, Google accounts for 66% of all U.S. search volume while Yahoo and MSN Search combined would total 28%, according to December figures.
But, and here is where I don’t understand why Yahoo would be considered vulnerable, Yahoo has 71.4% of the U.S. market in portal front pages (MSN has 15.43%); Yahoo has 54.63% of Email services in the U.S. while Windows has 25.54% and Gmail has 5.51%; Yahoo News accounts for 7.38% of the market share in the news and media category for its Yahoo News, while MSNBC has 3.84%; Yahoo Finance has 29.15% of the business information category with MSN Money accounting for 10.14% of the U.S. market share; Yahoo Shopping has 8.68% of the rewards and directories categories followed by MSN shopping with 1.16%; Yahoo hotjobs accounts for 11.18% of the employment category; Yahoo Movies accounts for 8.33% of the movies category and so on and so on. Add to that the fact that Yahoo is far and away the leader in share of display ads with 18.8% of the market compared to Microsoft’s 6.7% and Google’s 1%, and I don’t get it.
In the end, if the two merge, Nielsen Online VP Ken Cassar says the combined entity would be visited by 86% of all U.S. Internet users, account for 15% of all time spent online and represent 59% of all online display ad impressions sold – the most significant revenue generator for most online publishers.
And for a different perspective altogether, Raycom Media CIO Dave Folsom reminded me of the flash online movie Epic2014 created for the Museum of Media History. An updated version of this prescient or pessimistic (depending on your perspective) look in the future, Epic2015, can be seen at http://epic.makingithappen.co.uk.
BROADCAST NETWORKS VERSUS CABLE NETWORKS: The four major Broadcast networks average a full minute more of advertising per hour than the leading cable networks, according to a study by the Kaiser Family Foundation. The main purpose of the study was to look at the amount of Public Service Announcements carried by the networks. As has been reported, the study found that less than one half of one percent of all air-time went to PSA’s (about 17 seconds an hour), roughly the same as it was five years before. And most of that (46%) was show in the hours from Midnight to 8:00 a.m. But also buried in the report was an analysis of non-programming content (ads, promos, psa’s, infomercials and ‘filler.) The time spent on ads has gone up an average of 24 seconds on the major broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC) in the five years from 2000 to 2005, but a whopping 50 seconds on the cable networks measured (CNN, ESPN, MTV, Nick and TNT). Still there is a full minute more of advertising per hour on the broadcast networks (13:36) compared to the cable networks (12.30). Both groups have reduced the amount of time spent on promos in that time period, but they are both about the same -- 2:17 an hour on broadcast networks compared to 2:14 seconds on the cable networks.
ABC averages the most time on ads (14:05), just slightly more than NBC (14:01), but significantly more than CBS (13:21) and Fox (12:56). ABC also spent the least amount of time on promos (2:01), followed again by NBC (2:16) which in turn is closely followed by CBS (2:17) but with Fox spending the ‘most’ time (2:37). Fox had the highest amount of ‘non-programming content’, much of that infomercials (5:36) which was more than three times any of the other broadcast networks. The five cable networks measured had no infomercial time, according to the study. Interestingly, the network with the least amount of advertising was Univision with an average of 7:15 per hour, and even more interesting Univision had the highest promo time of any network (5:05).
TRANSITION AND CONFUSION IN TELEVISION: Those are the two words used to describe the state of television in a report summarizing a panel discussion held by the Peabody Awards. The report likens the ‘new’ news environment to a “giant media echo chamber” in which viewers only see and hear what they want to see and hear. Viewers may get more information and ‘varying perspectives’ through fiction and documentary work than in traditional news presentations. Add to that a process the report calls “viralization” in which we don’t have to go get the news, it comes to us, often from other viewers. Gone are the days when television contributed to a shared sense of national community. Despite all that, the report says quality television still exists. But if television is going to contribute to public culture, industry leaders, policy makers and citizen groups must work toward the creation of “media commons” to make sure differing groups can exchange ideas and understand each other, rather than “retreat into gated communities for the like-minded.”
THE U.S. VERSUS THE U.S.S.R: The two former Cold War enemies are again competing on the world stage, but it’s not so much about Vladimir Putin and George W. Bush, as it is about Information and Communications Technology. Both scored #1 but in different areas for different reasons. Even more surprising is that countries that you hear so much about in terms of ICT (such as India and Korea) scored poorly. A professor at the London Business School along with global economic consulting firm LECG have created a “Connectivity Scorecard” which looks not just at the infrastructure and technology in each country but “how usefully connected” the consumers, businesses and governments in those countries are and what that means to economic growth. The study makes the point that it is widely accepted that modern economies are information economies but in reality ALL economies are information economies now, and that “optimizing connectivity usage is the best source of future economic growth.”
America scored first out of 16 “innovation driven” economies (what we would call developed countries) while Russia scored first out of 9 “efficiency and resource driven” economies (commonly called emerging or developing countries.) But even in first place, the U.S. only scored 6.97 out of 10, followed by Sweden (6.83), Japan (6.8), Canada (6.5), Finland (6.1), the U.K. (6.1), Australia (5.93), Germany (5.52), France (5.07), and Korea coming in at tenth (4.78) In the other group, Russia scored 6.11 out of 10, followed by Malaysia (5.82), Mexico (4.37), Brazil (4.28), South Africa (4.11), China (3.42), Phillipines (2.38), India (1.68) and Nigeria (1.01). The report says Korea needs to figure out why its businesses spend so little on enterprise telephony and IP applications, that India has to improve performance on basic literacy and access measures, and the U.S. needs to improve general broadband penetration and affordability.
THE $500 BILLION BROADBAND PENETRATION: The “connectivity scorecard” cites previous studies that improving broadband penetration in the U.S. could have an economic impact of upwards of $500 Billion. However, the LECG report’s call for improving broadband penetration in the U.S. runs counter to another report by the National Telecommunication and Information Administration which says broadband penetration has improved dramatically, growing 1,100 percent in the past eight years. The report by the agency, which is part of the U.S. Commerce Department credits the improvements to the the Bush administration’s policy of “taking the government out of decisions more appropriately left to the marketplace… clearing away regulatory obstacles… tax relief… seed-funding… (and its) pro-investment… deregulatory policies.” It should be noted that critics charge that the administrations’ definition of broadband as 220 Kilobytes per Second is only four times dial-up speed and barely fast enough to allow streaming video. It should also be noted that the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development ranks the U.S. 15th in broadband penetration, but U.S. officials say that does not take into account the large rural areas in America and the number of WiFi hotspots in the U.S.
NEWS OF THE WEB WEIRD: This may become a new MfM feature – a look at weird and sometimes wonderful websites that tell you something about where the Internet is going. For example, four guys in Scotland have created a site which allows you to bet on news stories. And even though the creators are in Edinburgh, the stories are focused on U.S. news. You sign up at the site, hubdub.com, and you get $1,000 in play money that can only be used on the site. Then you can bet on everything from the mundane (who will be elected President) to money matters (will the Dow Jones average fall below 12,000 today) to minutiae (who will be voted off Episode 2 Survivor 16) to the macabre (will more than 50 people be killed by a single suicide bomber in Pakistan). Meanwhile, website haveyougotthenerve.tv is looking for 3,000 ‘executive producers’ who will plunk down 60 English pounds to become part of an experiment in crowdsourcing, in which they are all part of a TV production company creating programs. And before you dismiss it as some sort of ponzi scheme, the creator, Mark Bowness, is the same person who created Tribewanted, a global tribe developing a sustainable eco community on an island in Fiji. Thinking a little more modestly? Then consider website itsmy.com where you can create your own personal mobile TV show using your content and the site’s sound files, avatars and animations for uploading and downloading.
A FINAL NOTE: From the people who brought you meter madness and ratings rubble comes a new idea. Nielsen Media has announced a ‘strategic investment’ in NeuroFocus, a firm specializing in applying brainwave research to advertising, programming and messaging. Susan Whiting, Executive Vice President of Nielsen, is quoted as saying the ‘alliance’ will allow Nielsen to gather unique insights about consumer attitudes and behavior, “but which they themselves may not even be fully aware.”
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Message From Michael -- February 4, 2008
MICROSOFT BID FOR YAHOO
SWEEPS
SUPER BOWL XLII
SUPER TUESDAY
DIGITAL SUPER FUTURE
ANOTHER SIDE OF MEDIA CREDIBILITY
ANOTHER SIDE OF MEDIA IMPORTANCE
COCKTAIL CHATTER
MICROSOFT BID FOR YAHOO: This is just too big a story not to mention. So… consider it mentioned. Watch for the reverberations and recriminations to come. The New York Times in its business pages and its Week In Review section is already labeling it a ‘desperation move’, comparing Microsoft to I.B.M. in the 80’s, and calling the move another example of “creative destruction” – the concept that new, innovative companies and concepts destroy and replace older, established companies and concepts. Meanwhile Wired magazine’s Bryan Gardiner did an interesting number comparison which noted that, based on Nielsen numbers, the combined search market share of Yahoo and Microsoft would be 31.5%. The search market share of Google as of December, 2007, was 56.3%. But that the combined ranking of a Microsoft/Yahoo merger in terms of domain level traffic would be 70 Billion. And based on the $44.6 Billion bid, Microsoft is paying $1,200 for each Yahoo visitor.
SWEEPS: In a similar vein, I couldn’t write an MfM in February without at least mentioning the fact that we’re in sweeps. So… consider it mentioned.
SUPER BOWL XLII: Ditto. Although I would note that the BIG story today (Monday) for all stations will be the Super Bowl ads as viewers pick their best and worst. Both comScore and Nielsen in separate reports note the jump in Web traffic the day after the game. A survey by comScore shows that while half of the people watching say the game itself is their favorite part of the Super Bowl experience, a quarter say it’s the ads. (The rest cite family and friends gathering.) And consumer generated ads are expected to generate a lot of buzz. Meanwhile, Nielsen noted that last year’s 2007 Super Bowl attracted 93 Million viewers with a 41.1 rating among men but a more than respectable 32.2 rating among women viewers.
SUPER TUESDAY: Ditto the ditto. However, again, let me add a few more resources and thoughts for you to consider. First off, a repeat from last week, interest in this election is very high. Non-profit researchers, Resource Shelf, provides a wide list of resources including USA.gov; the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (http://www.eac.gov) created by the Help America Vote Act, and which also has the Voter Information Center; Project Vote Smart (http://www.vote-smart.org) which lists elections, candidates and issues for both journalists and candidates themselves; and the State Department’s foreign press center (http://www.fpc.state.gov) which, as the Resource Shelf people put it, offers a “cornucopia” of information.
DIGITAL SUPER FUTURE: The Internet has officially taken over as the most important source of information – at least among Internet users, according to a study by the Center for the Digital Future at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School of Communication. But even among Internet users, there is still a question of trust and reliability. With the number of hours spent online rising a full hour per week from 2006 to 2007 to an average of 15.3 hours per week, four out of five Internet users (80%) consider the Internet to be an important source of information for them. That’s up dramatically from 66% the year before and is significantly higher than television (68%), radio or newspapers (both 63%). Yet less than half (46%) say that ‘most or all’ of the information online is generally reliable, although the same people say their particular, favorite Web sites are reliable by a margin of 83% and almost the same number (80%) say the established media websites are reliable.
The study which is in its seventh year found that more than half of the Internet users (55%) who are members of an online community feel as strongly about their online communities as they do about their real-world communities. That’s an increase from 43% just a year ago. And membership in online communities has more than doubled in the past three years. Of course that’s only 15%. More than half of the online community members (56%) reported meeting their online counterparts in person, but they also said they have an average of 5.2 friends online whom they have never met in person. Despite this, Internet users report spending slightly more time per week socializing with friends and family in person. When they are online they are buying things, with 60% saying they have bought something (usually under $100) online, and that they make an average of 36 purchases a year online; and yes, they do say it comes at the expense of retail stores.
And in a sort of good news, bad news cliché, the good news is that three out of five Internet users (60%) report looking for news online. Of course that’s still lower than the percentage (71%) who say they are just surfing with no specific destination. The bad news, at least for my newspaper brethren, is that one in five (21%) report they have stopped a subscription for a newspaper or magazine because they can get it, or related content, online. Some consolation comes from a new question in the poll which showed that half (52%) said they would miss the offline edition of the newspaper if it was no longer available while a quarter (27%) said they would not. Another new question in the poll showed that somewhere between a quarter and a third (29%) of Internet users say they have time shifted their TV viewing, using either a VCR or DVR.
ANOTHER SIDE OF MEDIA CREDIBILITY: Despite the Digital Future survey which showed a greater trust in traditional media Websites, another survey, this one by Sacred Heart University in Connecticut, finds increasing skepticism towards the media. While a little more than half (55.3%) say they believe “some” media news reporting, nearly a quarter (23.9%) say they believe little or none of the reporting. And only one in five (19.6%) of those surveyed said they could believe “all or most” of the reporting – a significant drop from the 27.4% reported five years ago in 2003. On top of that, most Americans (87.6%) believe the news media tries to influence public opinion. Less than half (40.7%) gave the media a positive rating for quality of reporting, and a little more than a third (36.9%) for accuracy and right at a third (33.3%) for ‘keeping any personal bias out of stories.’ The director of the polling institute scolded the media saying that, “Americans know bias and imbalance when they see it and they don’t like it. Americans know it’s just not that hard to present both sides and keep personal bias at home.” He compared the 40% rating to the consumer satisfaction ratings that businesses strive for – of 80% to 90%. One of the contributing factors, according to another professor at the university, is that the availability of alternative viewpoints and news sources through the Internet contributes to the skepticism.
Fox News has replaced CNN as “most trusted” for accurate reporting with a 27% for Fox compared to a 14.6% for CNN. This is almost an exact reversal of the figures from five years ago when CNN had a 23.8% compared to Fox’s 14.6%. In third place in terms of trust was NBC News (10.9%), followed by ABC (7%). Local news (6.9%) actually beat CBS News (6.8%) MSNBC (4%), and PBS News (3%).
ANOTHER SIDE OF MEDIA IMPORTANCE: The average viewer/reader/listener/consumer is either eating (68.8%), doing housework (58.3%), doing the laundry (58%), cooking (57.7%), or talking on the phone (48.6%) while that all important newscast, or radio program or Internet video is playing. Kind of puts what you do in perspective, doesn’t it? Just kidding. The Simultaneous Media Usage report from BigResearch reinforces the point made in other research as well as previous MfM reports that people are multi-tasking to an incredible degree while using media. Most people are watching TV, listening to the radio or going online while reading a newspaper, for example. The report also showed that nearly half the audience (41.2%) channel surf during commercials while a third (33.5%) talk with other people either in the room or on the phone. Another nearly third (30.2%) say they just “mentally tune out” commercials while only 5.5% say they “fully attend” to commercials.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Nearly one in five (17.9%) of all U.S. adults are now retired, according to a report from The Media Audit. And four-fifths (83%) of those own their own homes. Proof that the Baby Boomer version of retirement is different: They travel a lot; 16% of all adults who stay in hotels are retired. They drink a lot; 13% of ‘frequent beer consumers’ are retirees. They go out a lot; 20% of all adults who frequently dine out are retirees.
Now this is one I didn’t see coming. When it comes to golf, only one place in Florida makes it to the top ten – Fort Myers-Naples where one-fifth of the population (19.7%) play golf three or more times a year. The top ranked place for golfers, according to The Media Audit… Minneapolis where 20.6% are frequent golfers, followed by Omaha (20.5%), Grand Rapids (19.4%), Albany, New York (18.6%), Detroit (18%), Akron (17.9%), Spokane (17.7%), and Ann Arbor (17.1%). The report notes that Minnesota and Nebraska are among the top five states for the number of golf courses per capita.
A FINAL NOTE: This is somewhere between a plug and a note of congratulations. Friends and consulting colleagues Cliff Abromats and Graeme Newell along with researcher extraordinaire Earle Jones have joined forces to create a new firm that focuses on emotional branding as a way to recruit new viewers to a station. The group argues that most television consulting and research focuses on “an unimaginative list (of) cookie cutter research that have homogenized our industry.” Instead, they say, the key is to make a “personal connection across all news platforms… to build the brand from the audience up, not the product down.”
SUBSCRIPTIONS: 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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line. If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com.
SWEEPS
SUPER BOWL XLII
SUPER TUESDAY
DIGITAL SUPER FUTURE
ANOTHER SIDE OF MEDIA CREDIBILITY
ANOTHER SIDE OF MEDIA IMPORTANCE
COCKTAIL CHATTER
MICROSOFT BID FOR YAHOO: This is just too big a story not to mention. So… consider it mentioned. Watch for the reverberations and recriminations to come. The New York Times in its business pages and its Week In Review section is already labeling it a ‘desperation move’, comparing Microsoft to I.B.M. in the 80’s, and calling the move another example of “creative destruction” – the concept that new, innovative companies and concepts destroy and replace older, established companies and concepts. Meanwhile Wired magazine’s Bryan Gardiner did an interesting number comparison which noted that, based on Nielsen numbers, the combined search market share of Yahoo and Microsoft would be 31.5%. The search market share of Google as of December, 2007, was 56.3%. But that the combined ranking of a Microsoft/Yahoo merger in terms of domain level traffic would be 70 Billion. And based on the $44.6 Billion bid, Microsoft is paying $1,200 for each Yahoo visitor.
SWEEPS: In a similar vein, I couldn’t write an MfM in February without at least mentioning the fact that we’re in sweeps. So… consider it mentioned.
SUPER BOWL XLII: Ditto. Although I would note that the BIG story today (Monday) for all stations will be the Super Bowl ads as viewers pick their best and worst. Both comScore and Nielsen in separate reports note the jump in Web traffic the day after the game. A survey by comScore shows that while half of the people watching say the game itself is their favorite part of the Super Bowl experience, a quarter say it’s the ads. (The rest cite family and friends gathering.) And consumer generated ads are expected to generate a lot of buzz. Meanwhile, Nielsen noted that last year’s 2007 Super Bowl attracted 93 Million viewers with a 41.1 rating among men but a more than respectable 32.2 rating among women viewers.
SUPER TUESDAY: Ditto the ditto. However, again, let me add a few more resources and thoughts for you to consider. First off, a repeat from last week, interest in this election is very high. Non-profit researchers, Resource Shelf, provides a wide list of resources including USA.gov; the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (http://www.eac.gov) created by the Help America Vote Act, and which also has the Voter Information Center; Project Vote Smart (http://www.vote-smart.org) which lists elections, candidates and issues for both journalists and candidates themselves; and the State Department’s foreign press center (http://www.fpc.state.gov) which, as the Resource Shelf people put it, offers a “cornucopia” of information.
DIGITAL SUPER FUTURE: The Internet has officially taken over as the most important source of information – at least among Internet users, according to a study by the Center for the Digital Future at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School of Communication. But even among Internet users, there is still a question of trust and reliability. With the number of hours spent online rising a full hour per week from 2006 to 2007 to an average of 15.3 hours per week, four out of five Internet users (80%) consider the Internet to be an important source of information for them. That’s up dramatically from 66% the year before and is significantly higher than television (68%), radio or newspapers (both 63%). Yet less than half (46%) say that ‘most or all’ of the information online is generally reliable, although the same people say their particular, favorite Web sites are reliable by a margin of 83% and almost the same number (80%) say the established media websites are reliable.
The study which is in its seventh year found that more than half of the Internet users (55%) who are members of an online community feel as strongly about their online communities as they do about their real-world communities. That’s an increase from 43% just a year ago. And membership in online communities has more than doubled in the past three years. Of course that’s only 15%. More than half of the online community members (56%) reported meeting their online counterparts in person, but they also said they have an average of 5.2 friends online whom they have never met in person. Despite this, Internet users report spending slightly more time per week socializing with friends and family in person. When they are online they are buying things, with 60% saying they have bought something (usually under $100) online, and that they make an average of 36 purchases a year online; and yes, they do say it comes at the expense of retail stores.
And in a sort of good news, bad news cliché, the good news is that three out of five Internet users (60%) report looking for news online. Of course that’s still lower than the percentage (71%) who say they are just surfing with no specific destination. The bad news, at least for my newspaper brethren, is that one in five (21%) report they have stopped a subscription for a newspaper or magazine because they can get it, or related content, online. Some consolation comes from a new question in the poll which showed that half (52%) said they would miss the offline edition of the newspaper if it was no longer available while a quarter (27%) said they would not. Another new question in the poll showed that somewhere between a quarter and a third (29%) of Internet users say they have time shifted their TV viewing, using either a VCR or DVR.
ANOTHER SIDE OF MEDIA CREDIBILITY: Despite the Digital Future survey which showed a greater trust in traditional media Websites, another survey, this one by Sacred Heart University in Connecticut, finds increasing skepticism towards the media. While a little more than half (55.3%) say they believe “some” media news reporting, nearly a quarter (23.9%) say they believe little or none of the reporting. And only one in five (19.6%) of those surveyed said they could believe “all or most” of the reporting – a significant drop from the 27.4% reported five years ago in 2003. On top of that, most Americans (87.6%) believe the news media tries to influence public opinion. Less than half (40.7%) gave the media a positive rating for quality of reporting, and a little more than a third (36.9%) for accuracy and right at a third (33.3%) for ‘keeping any personal bias out of stories.’ The director of the polling institute scolded the media saying that, “Americans know bias and imbalance when they see it and they don’t like it. Americans know it’s just not that hard to present both sides and keep personal bias at home.” He compared the 40% rating to the consumer satisfaction ratings that businesses strive for – of 80% to 90%. One of the contributing factors, according to another professor at the university, is that the availability of alternative viewpoints and news sources through the Internet contributes to the skepticism.
Fox News has replaced CNN as “most trusted” for accurate reporting with a 27% for Fox compared to a 14.6% for CNN. This is almost an exact reversal of the figures from five years ago when CNN had a 23.8% compared to Fox’s 14.6%. In third place in terms of trust was NBC News (10.9%), followed by ABC (7%). Local news (6.9%) actually beat CBS News (6.8%) MSNBC (4%), and PBS News (3%).
ANOTHER SIDE OF MEDIA IMPORTANCE: The average viewer/reader/listener/consumer is either eating (68.8%), doing housework (58.3%), doing the laundry (58%), cooking (57.7%), or talking on the phone (48.6%) while that all important newscast, or radio program or Internet video is playing. Kind of puts what you do in perspective, doesn’t it? Just kidding. The Simultaneous Media Usage report from BigResearch reinforces the point made in other research as well as previous MfM reports that people are multi-tasking to an incredible degree while using media. Most people are watching TV, listening to the radio or going online while reading a newspaper, for example. The report also showed that nearly half the audience (41.2%) channel surf during commercials while a third (33.5%) talk with other people either in the room or on the phone. Another nearly third (30.2%) say they just “mentally tune out” commercials while only 5.5% say they “fully attend” to commercials.
COCKTAIL CHATTER: Nearly one in five (17.9%) of all U.S. adults are now retired, according to a report from The Media Audit. And four-fifths (83%) of those own their own homes. Proof that the Baby Boomer version of retirement is different: They travel a lot; 16% of all adults who stay in hotels are retired. They drink a lot; 13% of ‘frequent beer consumers’ are retirees. They go out a lot; 20% of all adults who frequently dine out are retirees.
Now this is one I didn’t see coming. When it comes to golf, only one place in Florida makes it to the top ten – Fort Myers-Naples where one-fifth of the population (19.7%) play golf three or more times a year. The top ranked place for golfers, according to The Media Audit… Minneapolis where 20.6% are frequent golfers, followed by Omaha (20.5%), Grand Rapids (19.4%), Albany, New York (18.6%), Detroit (18%), Akron (17.9%), Spokane (17.7%), and Ann Arbor (17.1%). The report notes that Minnesota and Nebraska are among the top five states for the number of golf courses per capita.
A FINAL NOTE: This is somewhere between a plug and a note of congratulations. Friends and consulting colleagues Cliff Abromats and Graeme Newell along with researcher extraordinaire Earle Jones have joined forces to create a new firm that focuses on emotional branding as a way to recruit new viewers to a station. The group argues that most television consulting and research focuses on “an unimaginative list (of) cookie cutter research that have homogenized our industry.” Instead, they say, the key is to make a “personal connection across all news platforms… to build the brand from the audience up, not the product down.”
SUBSCRIPTIONS: 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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line. If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “unsubscribe-MM” in the subject line. Also, back issues of MfM are available at the website, media-consultant.blogspot.com.
Message From Michael -- January 28, 2008
SWEEPS – THE PAIN IN THE PATOOT
NEWS ‘WORKERS’ VERSUS NEWS DIRECTORS ON CONVERGENCE
MAKING DIGITAL NATIVES INTERESTABLE
FACTOID FODDER REPLACES 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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SWEEPS: Here it is… the biggest pain-in-the-patoot sweeps period of the year – February. It starts Thursday. Those who have been reading the weekly MfM for any length of time will already know what I’m going to say next – Start early. You should have special reports airing before the sweeps start. Also, as a service to readers of MfM, a reminder of the big events in February: The Super Bowl on Fox on Sunday, February 3rd, Super Tuesday elections (which is generating more interest than normal) with primaries in two dozen states on Tuesday, February 5th, The Grammy Awards on CBS on Sunday, February 10th, and finally the writers-strike-plagued Academy Awards on Sunday, February 24th.
NEWS ‘WORKERS’ VERSUS NEWS DIRECTORS ON CONVERGENCE: A survey by three professors at the University of South Carolina finds “a fair amount of discontent exists in the newsroom regarding convergence work.” Not too surprisingly, reporters and producers were significantly more likely than news directors and general managers to believe that producing content for other media outlets (mainly the Web) was challenging. Despite this, nearly two thirds (60.8%) saw their stations overall experience with convergence to be ‘positive or very positive,’ according to the study published in the Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media. Even more interesting, more than half reported that they personally enjoyed working with other media outlets, but only a quarter of them believed their co-workers enjoyed the work. Curiously, the authors (Laura K. Smith, Andrea H. Tanner and Sonya Forte Duhe) found that reporters in medium-sized markets (DMA’s 51 – 100) had the most negative perceptions about the effects of convergence, in part it seems because they had bigger workloads than other markets. It should be noted that markets 50 and above were not surveyed because the reporters and producers were less likely to perform actual convergence duties, so the authors focused on markets 51 to 100, 101 – 150 and 151 – 200.
Even more interesting, not a single reporter or producer surveyed (out of nearly 300 surveyed) said he or she produced Internet-only stories. Most of the convergence work was either writing summary stories for the station Website (49.3%) or physically posting content (47.9%). Less than a third took part in question and air sessions with viewers (32.5%) while only one in five (21.6%) provided unaired video or soundbites for the Web. Even fewer (15.4%) provided links for viewers to find more information and fewer still (12.3%) provided streaming video of stories. Hardly any (4.5%) provided still pictures while even fewer (2.7%) of the reporters and producers created blogs or provided additional story facts or copy. Lastly, it should be noted, as the authors pointed out that almost invariably the television news managers “defined convergence in terms that mirrored the way their station already practiced it.”
MAKING DIGITAL NATIVES INTERESTABLE: Before anybody scolds me about using a weird word, I should say it comes from the Media Management Center at Northwestern University which has published a study of teen news habits which found, not surprisingly, that teenagers “aren’t much into following serious news online.” The qualitative study which examined the news habits of a diverse but limited (65) group of Chicago teenagers found that ALL of them have been “Digital Natives” going on-line for at least three years while half of them have been online for six years or more. The study authors argue that the news can be made “interestable” to teenagers and that news organizations can help teens develop a ‘news persona” by working with parents and teachers and by working with how they present their product. The report is titled “If It Catches My Eye” because the study authors say that was the constant refrain they heard from teenagers. They would watch the news or read a story if something about it caught their eye. Usually that meant videos, photos and motion, but it also included celebrity, sports, music and fashion news that lead them to other news stories or – the most popular – news of the weird. The teens also put a lot of emphasis on ‘new and current’ and that meant Websites that weren’t just updated daily but hourly.
Even so, the study says the problem is that not only do the teenagers find news “just not that interesting,” the teenagers also find that “news stresses them out.” It makes them feel unsafe. Not surprisingly teenagers didn’t differentiate between sites that aggregate news and sites that actually generate news; but somewhat surprisingly it was important to them that they get “information that I can trust” and that usually translated into major sites and major brands. Trust was one of the four driving factors for teens’ interest in news along with -- a website that is easy to use (they’re used to Websites with multiple elements); that gives them useful information (such as with their homework); and gives them things to talk about (they feel good when they are the knowledgeable one, the first to know.)
Unlike adults who often get their news during the work hours, most teenagers (60%) get their news from 6pm to 10pm. As noted earlier, it usually comes by happenstance while they’re visiting the major aggregator or video sharing sites. Local newspapers beat out local TV by a long shot when it come to the online news experience for teens with nearly half (43%) saying they visited a local newspaper website in the last week while only a quarter (27%) visited a television website in the last week. Even more telling, when asked to pick three websites they go to for news, one in ten (9%) cited the local newspaper website, but less than half of that (4%) cited the local television station website.
FACTOID FODDER: This is normally where Cocktail Chatter goes, but I found that facts and figures dominated so much of the CC this week that I decided to change the headline.
China’s ‘net population’ has soared from 137 Million at the end of 2006 to 210 Million by the end of 2007. English-speaking Asian-Americans are online more often than the rest of the Internet population with 74% online compared to 71.7% for whites, according to eMarketer. According to an analysis of Bureau of Labor statistics by Ad Age, employment in U.S. advertising and marketing sectors has hit a record 1.64 Million people, with online media growing the fastest at 24.2% year to year. Apple’s iTunes store has sold 4 Billion songs, 125 Million TV shows and 7 Million movies, according to data released by the company. Research firm AccuStream iMedia says viewings of user-generated video jumped to 22.4 Billion views in 2007, a 70% increase over 2006’s 13.2 Billion viewings. It also reports that 1.2 Million videos and 26.5 Million comments were published to user generated video sites in 2007. Sports website ESPN.com reported its users viewed a record 1.2 Billion videos on its site last year, a 54% increase over the previous year.
Okay, this one falls into the category of Cocktail Chatter: The top city in the U.S. when it comes to growth in podcast use is Chattanooga with a 644% increase over the previous year. Other cities in Wizzard Media’s podcasting top ten network are Tampa-St. Petersburg with a 380% increase; Kansas City (348%); Green Bay – Appleton (339%); Fresno-Visalia (173%); Toledo (106%); Houston (101%); Nashville (82%); Washington DC (72%) and San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose (68%).
Finally, this has been reported extensively already, but I find it so fascinating that I think it’s worth repeating. Talk show host Ellen DeGeneres has beaten out fellow talk show host and media mogul Oprah Winfrey as the ‘most beloved’ TV personality, according to a new Harris Poll. Following Oprah is Jay Leno in the #3 spot, followed by Hugh Laurie (House) in #4; Jon Stewart #5; David Letterman and Stephen Colbert tied for #6; Bill O’Reilly #8; and Ray Romano and Homer Simpson tied for #9. Not surprisingly Republicans cite Bill O’Reilly as their favorite, but surprisingly, people who identify themselves as conservatives don’t pick O’Reilly. Instead they pick Jay Leno. Democrats and those identifying themselves as liberal cite Ellen DeGeneres.
A FINAL NOTE: One of LATimes.com’s web mavens has built a tagcloud (that’s those displays in which words are larger or smaller depending on how often they’re used) outlining the technical skills needed for online journalists by picking the words used in a series of online job descriptions. The number one word was ‘interactive’ followed by blogs and flash. You can see the tagcloud yourself by visiting Eric Ulken’s website at http://ulken.com/index.html.
A FINAL, FINAL NOTE: As long as I am pointing out websites, a really neat website is BigThink.com which features interviews with some of today’s leading “thinkers, movers and shakers” including politicians like Ted Kennedy and John McCain, businessmen like Sir Richard Branson of the Virgin Group and Patrick Byrne, founder and CEO of Overstock.com, academicians like Larry Summers, President of Harvard and Shirley Tilghman, President of Princeton University, journalists like Jon Meacham, Editor of Newsweek, and David Remnick, Editor of The New Yorker. Okay, you get the idea. Anyway, some very cool stuff.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
NEWS ‘WORKERS’ VERSUS NEWS DIRECTORS ON CONVERGENCE
MAKING DIGITAL NATIVES INTERESTABLE
FACTOID FODDER REPLACES 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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SWEEPS: Here it is… the biggest pain-in-the-patoot sweeps period of the year – February. It starts Thursday. Those who have been reading the weekly MfM for any length of time will already know what I’m going to say next – Start early. You should have special reports airing before the sweeps start. Also, as a service to readers of MfM, a reminder of the big events in February: The Super Bowl on Fox on Sunday, February 3rd, Super Tuesday elections (which is generating more interest than normal) with primaries in two dozen states on Tuesday, February 5th, The Grammy Awards on CBS on Sunday, February 10th, and finally the writers-strike-plagued Academy Awards on Sunday, February 24th.
NEWS ‘WORKERS’ VERSUS NEWS DIRECTORS ON CONVERGENCE: A survey by three professors at the University of South Carolina finds “a fair amount of discontent exists in the newsroom regarding convergence work.” Not too surprisingly, reporters and producers were significantly more likely than news directors and general managers to believe that producing content for other media outlets (mainly the Web) was challenging. Despite this, nearly two thirds (60.8%) saw their stations overall experience with convergence to be ‘positive or very positive,’ according to the study published in the Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media. Even more interesting, more than half reported that they personally enjoyed working with other media outlets, but only a quarter of them believed their co-workers enjoyed the work. Curiously, the authors (Laura K. Smith, Andrea H. Tanner and Sonya Forte Duhe) found that reporters in medium-sized markets (DMA’s 51 – 100) had the most negative perceptions about the effects of convergence, in part it seems because they had bigger workloads than other markets. It should be noted that markets 50 and above were not surveyed because the reporters and producers were less likely to perform actual convergence duties, so the authors focused on markets 51 to 100, 101 – 150 and 151 – 200.
Even more interesting, not a single reporter or producer surveyed (out of nearly 300 surveyed) said he or she produced Internet-only stories. Most of the convergence work was either writing summary stories for the station Website (49.3%) or physically posting content (47.9%). Less than a third took part in question and air sessions with viewers (32.5%) while only one in five (21.6%) provided unaired video or soundbites for the Web. Even fewer (15.4%) provided links for viewers to find more information and fewer still (12.3%) provided streaming video of stories. Hardly any (4.5%) provided still pictures while even fewer (2.7%) of the reporters and producers created blogs or provided additional story facts or copy. Lastly, it should be noted, as the authors pointed out that almost invariably the television news managers “defined convergence in terms that mirrored the way their station already practiced it.”
MAKING DIGITAL NATIVES INTERESTABLE: Before anybody scolds me about using a weird word, I should say it comes from the Media Management Center at Northwestern University which has published a study of teen news habits which found, not surprisingly, that teenagers “aren’t much into following serious news online.” The qualitative study which examined the news habits of a diverse but limited (65) group of Chicago teenagers found that ALL of them have been “Digital Natives” going on-line for at least three years while half of them have been online for six years or more. The study authors argue that the news can be made “interestable” to teenagers and that news organizations can help teens develop a ‘news persona” by working with parents and teachers and by working with how they present their product. The report is titled “If It Catches My Eye” because the study authors say that was the constant refrain they heard from teenagers. They would watch the news or read a story if something about it caught their eye. Usually that meant videos, photos and motion, but it also included celebrity, sports, music and fashion news that lead them to other news stories or – the most popular – news of the weird. The teens also put a lot of emphasis on ‘new and current’ and that meant Websites that weren’t just updated daily but hourly.
Even so, the study says the problem is that not only do the teenagers find news “just not that interesting,” the teenagers also find that “news stresses them out.” It makes them feel unsafe. Not surprisingly teenagers didn’t differentiate between sites that aggregate news and sites that actually generate news; but somewhat surprisingly it was important to them that they get “information that I can trust” and that usually translated into major sites and major brands. Trust was one of the four driving factors for teens’ interest in news along with -- a website that is easy to use (they’re used to Websites with multiple elements); that gives them useful information (such as with their homework); and gives them things to talk about (they feel good when they are the knowledgeable one, the first to know.)
Unlike adults who often get their news during the work hours, most teenagers (60%) get their news from 6pm to 10pm. As noted earlier, it usually comes by happenstance while they’re visiting the major aggregator or video sharing sites. Local newspapers beat out local TV by a long shot when it come to the online news experience for teens with nearly half (43%) saying they visited a local newspaper website in the last week while only a quarter (27%) visited a television website in the last week. Even more telling, when asked to pick three websites they go to for news, one in ten (9%) cited the local newspaper website, but less than half of that (4%) cited the local television station website.
FACTOID FODDER: This is normally where Cocktail Chatter goes, but I found that facts and figures dominated so much of the CC this week that I decided to change the headline.
China’s ‘net population’ has soared from 137 Million at the end of 2006 to 210 Million by the end of 2007. English-speaking Asian-Americans are online more often than the rest of the Internet population with 74% online compared to 71.7% for whites, according to eMarketer. According to an analysis of Bureau of Labor statistics by Ad Age, employment in U.S. advertising and marketing sectors has hit a record 1.64 Million people, with online media growing the fastest at 24.2% year to year. Apple’s iTunes store has sold 4 Billion songs, 125 Million TV shows and 7 Million movies, according to data released by the company. Research firm AccuStream iMedia says viewings of user-generated video jumped to 22.4 Billion views in 2007, a 70% increase over 2006’s 13.2 Billion viewings. It also reports that 1.2 Million videos and 26.5 Million comments were published to user generated video sites in 2007. Sports website ESPN.com reported its users viewed a record 1.2 Billion videos on its site last year, a 54% increase over the previous year.
Okay, this one falls into the category of Cocktail Chatter: The top city in the U.S. when it comes to growth in podcast use is Chattanooga with a 644% increase over the previous year. Other cities in Wizzard Media’s podcasting top ten network are Tampa-St. Petersburg with a 380% increase; Kansas City (348%); Green Bay – Appleton (339%); Fresno-Visalia (173%); Toledo (106%); Houston (101%); Nashville (82%); Washington DC (72%) and San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose (68%).
Finally, this has been reported extensively already, but I find it so fascinating that I think it’s worth repeating. Talk show host Ellen DeGeneres has beaten out fellow talk show host and media mogul Oprah Winfrey as the ‘most beloved’ TV personality, according to a new Harris Poll. Following Oprah is Jay Leno in the #3 spot, followed by Hugh Laurie (House) in #4; Jon Stewart #5; David Letterman and Stephen Colbert tied for #6; Bill O’Reilly #8; and Ray Romano and Homer Simpson tied for #9. Not surprisingly Republicans cite Bill O’Reilly as their favorite, but surprisingly, people who identify themselves as conservatives don’t pick O’Reilly. Instead they pick Jay Leno. Democrats and those identifying themselves as liberal cite Ellen DeGeneres.
A FINAL NOTE: One of LATimes.com’s web mavens has built a tagcloud (that’s those displays in which words are larger or smaller depending on how often they’re used) outlining the technical skills needed for online journalists by picking the words used in a series of online job descriptions. The number one word was ‘interactive’ followed by blogs and flash. You can see the tagcloud yourself by visiting Eric Ulken’s website at http://ulken.com/index.html.
A FINAL, FINAL NOTE: As long as I am pointing out websites, a really neat website is BigThink.com which features interviews with some of today’s leading “thinkers, movers and shakers” including politicians like Ted Kennedy and John McCain, businessmen like Sir Richard Branson of the Virgin Group and Patrick Byrne, founder and CEO of Overstock.com, academicians like Larry Summers, President of Harvard and Shirley Tilghman, President of Princeton University, journalists like Jon Meacham, Editor of Newsweek, and David Remnick, Editor of The New Yorker. Okay, you get the idea. Anyway, some very cool stuff.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
Message From Michael -- January 21, 2008
SHE LOVES ME; SHE LOVES ME NOT
THE ENGAGED CANNIBAL
SUPERBOWL – THE ULTIMATE TORTURE TEST
GIANT KILLER OR KILLER GIANT
COCKTAIL CHATTER – BLACK OWNED TV AND CHINESE ADULTERY
A FINAL SALUTE
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SHE LOVES ME; SHE LOVES ME NOT: Several recent reports seem to be sending the same mixed signals about the Internet and politics, just like the childhood game of plucking petals from a flower to find out if ‘she loves me’ sent me some mixed signals when I was young. If you pick the flower message from the Pew Research Center, the Internet is becoming a “major source” of campaign news, particularly for young people. The Pew study says a quarter (24%) of Americans say they regularly learn something about the campaigns from the Web, which is double the number (13%) in the 2004 campaign. But if you pick the flower message from Presidentialwtch08.com, the presidential candidates may need to rethink their Internet strategies because their sites have little or no impact on voters, according to an analysis by AdWeek’s Wendy Melillo. The website which provides a map of political conversations shows links between websites and it shows very few links between candidate’s websites and political websites and vice versa. Ah, ha, you say, the difference is the candidates’ website versus other political websites. I thought the same thing except MediaWeek reports that sites like WashingtonPost.com, Slate and Wall Street Journal online report little to no political ad activity so far. Even the candidates themselves say Web ads can only go so far building momentum for political campaigns, according to a report by The ClickZ Network. The explanation for the discrepancy may come in a line in the Pew Study which notes that more than half (52%) of the people getting political news on the Internet got it by accident, so to speak, because they came across it while surfing for something else. The Pew study says TV remains the main source of political news by a wide margin even though local TV and the network news’ share is down significantly while cable is basically flat, but that the Internet has beaten newspapers in the political news category. One analysis comes from a report by Mark Walsh at MediaPost which suggests alliances between old media and new media (such as the ones between CNN and YouTube, MTV and MySpace, and ABC News and Facebook) may be “the first steps toward the increasing convergence of TV and the Internet in shaping political coverage in the digital age.”
Several politically themed websites have been created, including Scripps’ RedBlueAmerica.com, Lin TV which has launched political sites in each of its 17 markets, and AOL’s Truveo. The two best – in my humble opinion – are the University of Pennsylvania Annenberg Schools’ FactCheck.org AND Votegopher.com, which was created by a Harvard grad who has done a remarkable job of outlining every issue and every candidate’s stance on the issue along with the latest polls, statements and news stories about the candidates.
THE ENGAGED CANNIBAL: If I were to headline this, ‘online video use is growing,’ you’d say, sarcastically, ‘oh, really, no kidding.’ However, some of the figures are pretty staggering. For example, technology research firm ABI says the number of video downloads will spike from 215 Million this year to more than 2.4 Billion in 2012, with rentals making up half the market. Our friends at the Pew Internet Project say nearly half (48%) of US Internet users (those already on the Internet) visited a video sharing site during 2007 and that 15% were either watching or posting video on a typical day. And that last number is double the figure of a year ago. Consulting firm Deloitte & Touche says more than a third (38%) of consumers watch TV shows online and that a fifth (20%) say they are viewing video content on their cell phones daily or almost daily. Research and consultancy firm Horowitz Associates says the figures are even higher for high-speed Internet users with six out of ten either watching or downloading video content at least once a week and nearly nine out of ten (86%) doing so on a monthly basis. And those figures are up dramatically from the year before.
The Horowitz study says that even though the number of people watching full episodes of TV shows online doubled from last year’s study to 16% of high-speed Internet users, ‘traditional’ TV remains the preferred platform. It also says handheld devices are becoming more popular, and that as broadband content gets better, more consumers are brought to the online platform. Despite this AdWeek quotes company president Howard Horowitz as saying that, “the data suggest that broadband video is not cannibalistic to linear video but rather an enhancement to consumers’ traditional TV experience.” A slightly different view comes from Experian Research Services’ Simmons group which found that consumers who watch TV online are ‘more engaged’ than consumers who watch TV programs on regular TV sets. And the firm says engagement equals ‘ad receptivity.’ In fact they say viewers are 47% more engaged with ADS shown during online TV programs than those shown on regular TV sets but ‘only’ 25% more engaged with the actual CONTENT of online shows compared to content on regular TV sets. The study says a similar higher level of engagement applies to online versions of magazines compared with print versions. However, it should be noted that the report says print, in general, enjoys higher levels of engagement than either TV or the Internet.
I also think it’s worth noting the six dimensions of engagement as defined by Simmons. The company says respondents identify with media they consume as either – inspirational, trustworthy, life-enhancing, social interaction, personal time-out, and ‘ad attention/ receptivity.’
I should also note the Horowitz study says the most ‘highly-viewed’ video content is news, followed by user-generated content, followed by movie previews, music videos and segments of television shows.
SUPERBOWL – THE ULTIMATE TORTURE TEST. And I’m not talking about the game. According to Pete Blackshaw, executive vice president of strategic services for Nielsen Online, the Super Bowl is the ultimate torture test in marketing ROI with the ‘buzz factor’ often becoming “the final arbiter of success or failure of the advertising.” Nielsen is going to issue special reports, tracking messages across 70 million blogs and websites, and has its own blog – The Road to the Big Game. Blackshaw’s analysis of a successful Super Bowl ad is good advice for marketers: “Brands that wrap holistic, well-integrated marketing programs around the television advertising typically reap higher dividends.” In keeping with that holistic approach, Fox is leveraging MySpace as part of its advertising plan. Nielsen says that may explain, in part, why Fox has reported the earliest sell-out for in-game ad inventory in several years with movie companies and automakers leading the pack even though other reports note that former advertisers, including tech companies, are sitting on the sideline. Oh, by the way, did I say how much an ad is going for? -- $2.7 Million.
GIANT KILLER OR KILLER GIANT: That’s the question as Google and Wikipedia square off, by stepping into each other’s turf. Wikia co-founder Jimmy Wales has launched a user-based search engine because he says it’s necessary for the public to take control of search. Meanwhile Google has announced that it is launching a sort-of Wiki competitor, Knol, “to make information easier to find and more authoritative.”
COCKTAIL CHATTER: According to the group Free Press, as reported by FinalCall.com, black television station ownership has dropped 60% over the last year from 19 to 8, “making black ownership almost non-existent.” The animated film Ratatouille was the highest rated film of 2007 by the readers of The New York Times. The hot thing in the Chinese blogosphere is a video of the wife of a TV sports anchor commandeering the microphone at an Olympic media event to accuse her husband of adultery. The U.K. publication The People reports that the 81-year-old Queen Elizabeth II has become a Wii addict after getting hold of one of the video game consoles from grandson Prince William. According to the Census Bureau, as reported by FactCheck.org, one out of four (27%) of U.S. adults have a bachelor’s degree.
A FINAL NOTE: Allow me to make a personal salute to Karl Davis, General Manager of WECT-TV, Wilmington, North Carolina who died recently while motorcycling with friends. Karl was that unusual combination of manager and leader who had the even more unusual talent of being respected by the people who worked for him, not just because he was a good boss but because he was a good person. I had the honor of calling WECT a client station for many years; I had the greater honor of being able to call Karl a friend.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
THE ENGAGED CANNIBAL
SUPERBOWL – THE ULTIMATE TORTURE TEST
GIANT KILLER OR KILLER GIANT
COCKTAIL CHATTER – BLACK OWNED TV AND CHINESE ADULTERY
A FINAL SALUTE
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 Michael@MediaConsultant.tv with the word “subscribe-MM” in the subject line.
SHE LOVES ME; SHE LOVES ME NOT: Several recent reports seem to be sending the same mixed signals about the Internet and politics, just like the childhood game of plucking petals from a flower to find out if ‘she loves me’ sent me some mixed signals when I was young. If you pick the flower message from the Pew Research Center, the Internet is becoming a “major source” of campaign news, particularly for young people. The Pew study says a quarter (24%) of Americans say they regularly learn something about the campaigns from the Web, which is double the number (13%) in the 2004 campaign. But if you pick the flower message from Presidentialwtch08.com, the presidential candidates may need to rethink their Internet strategies because their sites have little or no impact on voters, according to an analysis by AdWeek’s Wendy Melillo. The website which provides a map of political conversations shows links between websites and it shows very few links between candidate’s websites and political websites and vice versa. Ah, ha, you say, the difference is the candidates’ website versus other political websites. I thought the same thing except MediaWeek reports that sites like WashingtonPost.com, Slate and Wall Street Journal online report little to no political ad activity so far. Even the candidates themselves say Web ads can only go so far building momentum for political campaigns, according to a report by The ClickZ Network. The explanation for the discrepancy may come in a line in the Pew Study which notes that more than half (52%) of the people getting political news on the Internet got it by accident, so to speak, because they came across it while surfing for something else. The Pew study says TV remains the main source of political news by a wide margin even though local TV and the network news’ share is down significantly while cable is basically flat, but that the Internet has beaten newspapers in the political news category. One analysis comes from a report by Mark Walsh at MediaPost which suggests alliances between old media and new media (such as the ones between CNN and YouTube, MTV and MySpace, and ABC News and Facebook) may be “the first steps toward the increasing convergence of TV and the Internet in shaping political coverage in the digital age.”
Several politically themed websites have been created, including Scripps’ RedBlueAmerica.com, Lin TV which has launched political sites in each of its 17 markets, and AOL’s Truveo. The two best – in my humble opinion – are the University of Pennsylvania Annenberg Schools’ FactCheck.org AND Votegopher.com, which was created by a Harvard grad who has done a remarkable job of outlining every issue and every candidate’s stance on the issue along with the latest polls, statements and news stories about the candidates.
THE ENGAGED CANNIBAL: If I were to headline this, ‘online video use is growing,’ you’d say, sarcastically, ‘oh, really, no kidding.’ However, some of the figures are pretty staggering. For example, technology research firm ABI says the number of video downloads will spike from 215 Million this year to more than 2.4 Billion in 2012, with rentals making up half the market. Our friends at the Pew Internet Project say nearly half (48%) of US Internet users (those already on the Internet) visited a video sharing site during 2007 and that 15% were either watching or posting video on a typical day. And that last number is double the figure of a year ago. Consulting firm Deloitte & Touche says more than a third (38%) of consumers watch TV shows online and that a fifth (20%) say they are viewing video content on their cell phones daily or almost daily. Research and consultancy firm Horowitz Associates says the figures are even higher for high-speed Internet users with six out of ten either watching or downloading video content at least once a week and nearly nine out of ten (86%) doing so on a monthly basis. And those figures are up dramatically from the year before.
The Horowitz study says that even though the number of people watching full episodes of TV shows online doubled from last year’s study to 16% of high-speed Internet users, ‘traditional’ TV remains the preferred platform. It also says handheld devices are becoming more popular, and that as broadband content gets better, more consumers are brought to the online platform. Despite this AdWeek quotes company president Howard Horowitz as saying that, “the data suggest that broadband video is not cannibalistic to linear video but rather an enhancement to consumers’ traditional TV experience.” A slightly different view comes from Experian Research Services’ Simmons group which found that consumers who watch TV online are ‘more engaged’ than consumers who watch TV programs on regular TV sets. And the firm says engagement equals ‘ad receptivity.’ In fact they say viewers are 47% more engaged with ADS shown during online TV programs than those shown on regular TV sets but ‘only’ 25% more engaged with the actual CONTENT of online shows compared to content on regular TV sets. The study says a similar higher level of engagement applies to online versions of magazines compared with print versions. However, it should be noted that the report says print, in general, enjoys higher levels of engagement than either TV or the Internet.
I also think it’s worth noting the six dimensions of engagement as defined by Simmons. The company says respondents identify with media they consume as either – inspirational, trustworthy, life-enhancing, social interaction, personal time-out, and ‘ad attention/ receptivity.’
I should also note the Horowitz study says the most ‘highly-viewed’ video content is news, followed by user-generated content, followed by movie previews, music videos and segments of television shows.
SUPERBOWL – THE ULTIMATE TORTURE TEST. And I’m not talking about the game. According to Pete Blackshaw, executive vice president of strategic services for Nielsen Online, the Super Bowl is the ultimate torture test in marketing ROI with the ‘buzz factor’ often becoming “the final arbiter of success or failure of the advertising.” Nielsen is going to issue special reports, tracking messages across 70 million blogs and websites, and has its own blog – The Road to the Big Game. Blackshaw’s analysis of a successful Super Bowl ad is good advice for marketers: “Brands that wrap holistic, well-integrated marketing programs around the television advertising typically reap higher dividends.” In keeping with that holistic approach, Fox is leveraging MySpace as part of its advertising plan. Nielsen says that may explain, in part, why Fox has reported the earliest sell-out for in-game ad inventory in several years with movie companies and automakers leading the pack even though other reports note that former advertisers, including tech companies, are sitting on the sideline. Oh, by the way, did I say how much an ad is going for? -- $2.7 Million.
GIANT KILLER OR KILLER GIANT: That’s the question as Google and Wikipedia square off, by stepping into each other’s turf. Wikia co-founder Jimmy Wales has launched a user-based search engine because he says it’s necessary for the public to take control of search. Meanwhile Google has announced that it is launching a sort-of Wiki competitor, Knol, “to make information easier to find and more authoritative.”
COCKTAIL CHATTER: According to the group Free Press, as reported by FinalCall.com, black television station ownership has dropped 60% over the last year from 19 to 8, “making black ownership almost non-existent.” The animated film Ratatouille was the highest rated film of 2007 by the readers of The New York Times. The hot thing in the Chinese blogosphere is a video of the wife of a TV sports anchor commandeering the microphone at an Olympic media event to accuse her husband of adultery. The U.K. publication The People reports that the 81-year-old Queen Elizabeth II has become a Wii addict after getting hold of one of the video game consoles from grandson Prince William. According to the Census Bureau, as reported by FactCheck.org, one out of four (27%) of U.S. adults have a bachelor’s degree.
A FINAL NOTE: Allow me to make a personal salute to Karl Davis, General Manager of WECT-TV, Wilmington, North Carolina who died recently while motorcycling with friends. Karl was that unusual combination of manager and leader who had the even more unusual talent of being respected by the people who worked for him, not just because he was a good boss but because he was a good person. I had the honor of calling WECT a client station for many years; I had the greater honor of being able to call Karl a friend.
SUBSCRIPTIONS: If you wish to stop receiving this newsletter, e-mail Michael@MediaConsultant.tv 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 my website MediaConsultant.tv.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
