Saturday’s NY Times Television story, You’ve Seen the YouTube Video; Now Try the Documentary, describes a viral video’s journey from YouTube to National Geographic Channel.  It’s an extraordinary video of a herd of buffalo fighting off a pride of lions and a croc to save one of its calves, and the video’s adventure is almost as fascinating as the battle footage, with its viral popularity and National Geographic’s interest triggered by an incidental upload to YouTube because it was cheaper and easier than burning a DVD and mailing via USPS.

Battle at Kruger - YouTube Video

The New York Times story speaks to the growing power and influence of the internet and YouTube relative to broadcast television.  But there’s also a meta-story that reinforces the challenge that traditional media companies face as they come to terms with the internet.

The print world has been forced to open up its content to the online world.  Readers who want online news content will find it, and the print ad revenue those readers used to bring with them is being replaced by smaller online ad revenues.  The only choice for newspapers has been to keep at least the online ad revenue by opening up their content and maximizing monetization, or to let their competitors take all the revenue from them.

So nytimes.com, the only way I read that paper, carries the full story online, accompanied by beautiful hires images and an unfortunately no longer functioning link to the original YouTube post.  Someone in nytimes.com’s ad sales department did a great job too, as the article is surrounded by banner ads for the National Geographic Channel episode.  Or also likely, the article and the advertising were planned together - in a world where content is free, content and advertising are increasingly one and the same. Either way, there is no doubt that those well-targeted ads are maximizing the revenue potential for this particular story.

Click on any of those banner ads and you’ll get a stark reminder that television and print are still in very different worlds.

The National Geographic Channel has a well-constructed mini-site for Caught on Safari: Battle at Kruger, featuring the next prime time airing and accompanied by a video short/promo, the full YouTube clip, photos, information about Kruger, and related stories.  But you won’t find the the hourlong episode online.  The “real” content can only be accessed through your cable or satellite feed, where Newscorp and National Geographic, who jointly run National Geographic Channel, ring the cash register.

Print, and more profoundly, music, were the first media for which the internet could deliver a competitive and over time superior audience experience at a lower distribution cost.  As described above, the only response available to most outlets has been to cannibalize themselves or be killed.  No surprise that shares in The New York Times Company (NYT), at $19.67, are down 57% over a five year period; other major papers are in the same boat.

The internet does not yet deliver a super audience experience at a lower distribution cost compared to television.  Not yet.  Most streaming, YouTube in particular, is nowhere near standard broadcast quality, let alone HD, but there are an increasing number of exceptions.  It’s still pretty expensive to stream high quality video.  Getting internet video into the living room is costly, kludgy and not ready for the mass market, but then again, I also prefer reading a physical newspaper over breakfast than catching up on the news with my laptop.

So the networks have benefited from the luxury of time and insight from print and music as they experiment with online content and monetization.  They can still keep their highest value content available through broadcast only, where most of the money is, and use online as a tool for promotion and viewer engagement, selectively releasing episodes where doing so reinforces that dynamic.  Investors aren’t betting against the networks; shares in News Corp. (NWS), at $19.35, are up 33% over their price five years ago.

In the meantime, internet video is beginning to breach the walls of the living room, and the quality / cost tradeoff of internet video distribution continues to progress along the path suggested by Moore’s law.  The networks have some more time to work out how to maximize online monetization, but they don’t have forever.  And while they have a big leg up on the newspapers and music labels in this game, it’s sobering to bear in mind that investors weren’t betting against those players either five years ago.

Technorati Tags: Battle at Kruger, National Geographic Channel, New York Times, News Corp

Tony Ponturo, President and CEO of Busch Media Group, spoke at the Future of Television conference. Tony observed the increasing complexity of marketing as the number of channels has exploded from the basic three back in 1972 to hundreds of thousands today with the web.

At the same time, the consumers are getting more sophisticated, diverse and elusive. Tony describes how the demographics of college markets are changing rapidly, in particular the increasing share of women in the college ranks and how that will change their marketing in the future.

He goes on to describe the rise of UGC and changing consumer media habits. Today, adults 21-34 consume over 58 hours of media each week (28+ hours on TV) . The internet has risen to 6.4 hours per week on average, and it consumes an average of 8.5 hours per week for those that have Internet access.

In the 80’s and 90’s, “consumers had to come to us”. In the latter 90’s through today, you need to go to the consumers. You need to find the consumer. While 90% of media spend is still on traditional sources, almost every deal needs to integrate into the digital space in some way.

Tony described the example of Swear Jar, which was originally done for the Super Bowl, but was considered too racy for TV given the bleeped out language. They bought 6.2 million views on Yahoo and Break. It then got 2.7 million more views on YouTube.

Tony showed the original internet spots for the Dude campaign which allowed the creative team to develop something unique, which then led to TV commercials with the same theme.

TV strategies are focused on Tivo proof TV such as big events and sports which have managed to retain their audiences. He sees an increasing shift to cable spend. Cable is up form 19% in 1998 to 30% in 2008.

Another major theme has been an increase in product placement in TV and movies.

The integration of TV and online is important. He describes how they get 32 million views online after the Super Bowl.

TV is as strong as ever, but there is now more need for added value and consumer engagement.

In addition to TV, Tony sees product placement and the convergence of broadcast marketing with online publishing as important brand marketing priorities going forward.

Technorati Tags: Future of Television, brand marketing, Busch Media Group

A traditional media guy by day and a new media student by night, Carson Daly spoke at Future of Television.

He describes how due to budget constraints he has had to figure out how to make his show work at 5 times the productivity of other shows. The tools and skills of the online content creators have proven that it can be done. Quality TV can be made for much less.

As for TV, it’s not dead. That’s crap.

Every one of those kids dancing in front of their webcams wants to be on TV.

Carson describes the early days of cable when shows and channels were very fragmented and later were consolidated to make it easier to buy and sell advertising. He thinks that in a similar way we are in the early fragmented days of the Internet.

Carson describes how CarsonDaly.TV has become a new channel for him with 2 million views. This dot TV site has created a new way for fans, bands and others to reach him and his audience. He says he used to get crappy tape versions of talent sent to him. Now he gets high quality multimedia packages from talent that wants to get his attention.

The biggest difference now is distribution. TV’s job now, is to find the audience. If you want to find a 30 year old male they can be found, you just have to know where to look.

Carson goes out of his way to complement Hulu as an elegant design and an amazing new way to distribute his show.

Technorati Tags: Future of Television, Carson Daly

This panel at the Future of Television conference focused on producing content specifically for the web. Do we need it? How should we approach it?

Panelists
Alex Barkaloff, Executive Producer, Digital Media, Lionsgate
David Leibowitz, EVP, Business & Legal Affairs, Gotuit
Mara Winokur VP, Digital Media & Business Development, Starz Media LLC
John Edwards, CEO & President, Move Networks
Keith Richman, CEO, Break.com
Moderator: Lindsay Campbell, Host, MobLogic (a CBS company)

Do we need content created specifically for the web?

Alex says absolutely. Re-purposed content from one platform to another is just not the same. It’s not optimized to that platform. He points to Weedisodes that will be created specifically for the web as an example of something that’s appropriate for the web.We need this because its where people are going.

Mara says there is no formula. Different things work for different brands. Mara says that clips didn’t work originally for their Monga(sp?) site, but when packaged into channels they became much more successful.

The content needs to be true to the brand. If it’s Weed’s related content it needs to be zany, but for others it may be a different type of content that works.

What about downloadable media?

The challenge is tracking the data for downloadable media. Without the data, a view doesn’t count as much. John discounts downloadable because people want it now, but he admits that we don’t know what people want or where they want it. He points to the difference between email and texting based communication segments. Different segments want different things. He says that the key is to experiment and measure to find what works.

Are people looking online because the content on TV is not good enough?

John points out that to a large extent what they want online is what the want on TV. The challenge for users is that when and where it’s shown on TV may not be convenient for users. The net provides a way to place and time shift content viewing. John goes on to say that distribution should not get in the way of viewers. Distribution needs to be transparent to the viewers to eliminate speed bumps.

How to build an audience and get sponsors?

Keith Richman says that the people who focus on specific target group or interest group will build an audience. Focus really helps in building that audience. He goes on to say that with good packaging and programming advertisers can get comfortable with lots of different content. Providing some confidence and consistency in the programming, even if it’s silly/strange content, is very helpful to getting the advertising dollars.

Technorati Tags: Future of Television, internet content

This panel at the Future of Television conference focused on the state of Mobile TV and its chances for success.   How is it doing?  What is needed for breakout success?

Panelists
Bill Sanders, VP Mobile Programming & Digital Development, Sony Pictures Television
Derek Broes, SVP Worldwide Business Development, Paramount Pictures
Steve Smith, Managing Director, Playboy TV International
Douglas Craig, SVP Digital Media Operations, Discovery Communications
Seamus McAteer, Chief Product Architect & Senior Analyst, Media Metrics
Moderator: Ted Cohen, Managing Partner, TAG Strategic

What are the gating factors for Mobile TV acceptance?

Hasn’t been an overwhelming response for adopting Mobile TV.  Insufficient marketing to consumers; marketing is not the carriers’ core competence, just as software development is not the core competence of studios.  The numbers are still small - one or two percent - of the mobile phone market in US and Europe, but it’s meaningful, and five to ten percent of the addressable market of video-capable handsets.  The combination of flat rate data with increasing video capable handset and YouTube-like free video should be powerful drivers of adoption.  If it’s free, everyone will try it at least once.

What are the major content and user interface issues?

Need to build products and services in the way that our kids want, not based on the constraints that we place on them.  Examples of limitations: content deleted after 24 hours, inability to pause and come back to content later.  Short form is performing better than long form, of course.  Foreign language is an issue - need dubbing, subtitles don’t work on mobile (Sony does subtitle, though).  Every panelist is doing a combination of repurposing existing and developing original content.

Whether long or short form, it’s about building habit — people returning to the brand again and again.  For example, Sony did 200 Ripley Believe It or Not clips.  Traditional carrier approach, put them all out there on the shelf and let them die a quiet death.  Bill is pushing to go back to original comic strip format, thirty seconds every day with a shelf life.  Perishability is important to drive habit building.  On YouTube, you want to be the person who discovers the clip and forwards it to your friends.  This is something that we should have learned from traditional media.

On digital rights, the most important lesson is that the consumer will do what’s convenient whether it’s legal or not; we need to get in front of the needs and offer what consumers want legally.  Should you ask for permission first or forgiveness later?  With talent, ask for permission.  In other cases, bias toward asking for forgiveness.

What will make Mobile TV prime-time, with DVR- and HD-like uptake?

Forcing the issue on studios and other content owners by device users figuring out how to get the content on the devices.  These mobile devices increasingly have the capability of PCs, access to broadband networks, and the ability to sync with PCs.

What about the opportunity for direct-to-consumer, internet / browser based mobile portals, bypassing operators?

Hard to market and reach consumers without carrier support.  However, YouTube has some success in mobile.  Operators are very concerned about this, want to stay well ahead of it.  Also, trying to convince carriers that they can be “smart pipes” without being the programmer, e.g. billing relationship.

This panel at the Future of Television focused on the metrics for TV 2.0

Panelists
Eric Garland, CEO, BigChampagne
Eric McMillain, Partner, Proace
Steve Markov, SVP, Sales, Teletrax
Howard Shimmel, SVP, Client Insights, The Nielsen Company
Moderator: Chris Lang, SVP, Research Strategies, SmithGeiger, LLC

What are the measurement challenges?

Eric Garland points out that metrics are expanding fast and we’re now seeing data by the pound. We need to get beyond the endless pile of data to meaningful analysis of what’s going on. Howard adds that this explosion of data will continue. He says we have a huge amount of data, but very little insight. He provides an example that provides answers in the brand management space that provides real insight. He says we are light years away from having the insight tools we need.

Eric McMillion has a perspective that different channels have different values and that a view on one channel may not be the same as another. It would be good to get to some sort or “gold” standard that would allow more efficient comparisons.

When thinking about cross platform measures, Howard asks is the industry willing to sacrifice some level of quality in exchange for more holistic measures? He hasn’t seen companies willing to do this. Eric Garland points out that the perfect can be the enemy of good enough. He says we need to focus on the answers business.

How do we measure engagement?

Howard says that it’s an important issue, but the question is what are we measuring engagement to? Without answering that question, it becomes circular logic.

Both Eric’s point out that we have more data online than we have ever had in traditional media. When looking at different generations, Gen Y is much more engaged with content in a certain way. They talk about it, share it, move it, do everything with it. But when it comes to focus as a measure of engagement they are terrible. They watch three things at once. So we need to get better about our definition of what we mean by engagement.

Howard says that the research is conflicting. Some says that when you are really engaged with content you stay engaged with advertising. The other side says that when you are deeply engaged in content you actually need a break at the commercial and therefore disengage.

How do we take advantage of better usage data?

Howard contrasts how traditional advertising is based upon average demographics and time slots, as compared to Google which is offer user specific offers based upon your profile. The challenge is how to do that on TV. Eric Garland suggests that perhaps we should focus on how to make the content and experience better. Make it better than the experience the pirates offer and then serving the right ads becomes much easier.

Technorati Tags: Future of Television, metrics, performance measurement

Television is changing a lot and television advertising is changing with it. Tivo, DVRs and the internet are changing the way content and advertising is consumed. It changes the way TV ads need to work. This panel explores some of the changes they see on the horizon.

Panelists
Karen Bressner, SVP, Advertising Sales, TiVo
Eric Hadley, Chief Marketing Officer, Heavy Corporation
Rick Mandler, VP, Digital Media Advertising, Disney/ABC Media Networks
Robert Riesenberg, President & CEO, Full Circle Entertainment
Moderator: Joe Adalian, Television Editor, Variety

What’s the future of the 30 second spot?
The 30 second spot is still an important marketing tools and will remain so into the future. As long as television is important spots like 30 second or 15 second ads will be important. Karen from Tivo says they can enhance the 30 second spot by making it interactive. Eric points out that the importance of TV will change for different segments as young males are using the Internet with increasing intensity on sites like Heavy.com. He says the key is to respecting the viewer and make the advertising relevant and engaging.

How important is diverse portfolio in marketing?
In this day and age, when a network has a show doing 7-8 share its a success. It demonstrates the fragmentation of advertising channels and the need for marketers to explore a diverse set of channels to find their audience.

What one thing should change, what would be the new rule?
As the networks have jumped on the bandwagon of integration it has become more commoditized. The integration needs to be more strategic and in harmony with the show as opposed to something that is just a media deal done for an advertiser wanting integration. Rick would like to see more aggregation of agencies to make it easier to coordinate marketing and make it more integrated. Eric suggests that measures need to be tied to the intent of the campaign, not just what can be measured. Just because you can measure impressions or click throughs does not make it a good measure for everything.

What new capabilities will brand marketers need to become publishers of relevant and engaging content?
Need to become masters of what data comes from set top boxes and DVRs to understand what works in different environments. There is also a crying need for different kinds of resources within the marketing infrastructure. Interactive capabilities are still very underdeveloped and need to improved. Brand marketers will need to integrate these new capabilities with their traditional story telling strengths to make interesting content.

Should brands rent or own their content?
Rick suggests that brands should rely on rented content. Content is not what advertisers do so they should leave it to the traditional content producers. Eric suggests that it doesn’t matter whether you rent or own it. What matter is that you need good content wherever the content comes from.

Technorati Tags: Future of Television, television, advertising

This panel was focused on the new television technologies. The group focused the discussion on content distribution, in home media management, DVD-make-on-demand and the role of set top boxes/rental boxes.

Panelists
Ashwin Navin, President & Co-Founder, BitTorrent
Anton Monk, Board Member & CTO, Multimedia over Coax Alliance (MoCA)
Jeff Siegel, SVP, Regional Sales, Direct Response & Emerging Media, ESPN
Perry Solomon, SVP, Product Mktg, Monetization Solutions, FAST Search & Transfer
Brad Auerbach, VP, Strategic Business Development, Hewlett-Packard
Moderator: Kurt Scherf, VP & Principal Analyst, Parks Associates

What’s exciting about this space?
The ability to enjoy internet content in the living room. It brings huge diversity of content and new monetization options. The ability to discover, personalize and move content around the home and across the three screens. This concept of mass personalization seems to be the exciting thing for the panel.

What ideas do you see as not ready for prime time?
Kurt the moderator suggested that we’re not ready for Facebook on TV. Ashwin says he does not get the TV rental boxes or the real value proposition for these boxes. Ashwin says the cost of moving large volumes of data is still expensive, which is where P2P distribution comes into play.

What technologies should we be watching?
Brad Auerbach observed that there are still a lot of DVD boxes out there that still need to be fed. There is still lots of opportunity for manufacturing and distribution of DVDs on demand. Brad points to three buckets of DVD on demand - kiosks, buy online make to demand, and buy online burn at home,

Ashwin points to P2P technology as a way to lower costs of distribution substantially and re-deploy capital from the network to devices that can make use of high definition content.

Kurt asks about recommendation engines and Perry responds that sophistication of technology is increasing and will help make recommendation technology more effective. Anton points to the increasing capacity of home servers and broadband within the home as an important development in improving the in home experience.

Anton makes a good point that we will not see the set top boxes go away any time soon as the cable operators have considerable rights that protect their positions and the functionality we see in other boxes (eg Xbox) is integrated into the set top box. He also points to the integration of services like showing a telephone number from an inbound phone call on screen so you don’t have to go check the phone as further evidence that the set top boxes are here to stay.

How will the television user interface change?
Kurt points to UIs like the Wii as a new way to interact the TV. Anton says that the carriers avoid changes to the UI because they are afraid of the cost of the phone calls they will get from changes in the UI. He thinks this will hold back innovation in the UI.

Technorati Tags: Future of Television, television technologies

Everyone seems to be producing content these days and the Internet is becoming a sort of worldwide TV network for audiences seeking entertainment. With global online video services, social media networks, and place-shifting devices national borders matter less and less in the television landscape. This panel discussed the consequences for the perspective of content creators, producers and advertisers as well as distributors and consumers.

This panel consisted of a range of industry executives including:

Greg Clayman, EVP, Digital Distribution & Business Development, MTV Networks
Ben Huang, Director of Product Management, Microsoft TV
Steve Jang, CMO & Head of Business Development, imeem
Steve Mitgang, CEO, Veoh Networks
Jason Kirk, Vice President, MySpace TV
Moderator: Mike Vorhaus, Managing Director, Frank N. Magid Associates

What countries are really breaking out with online video?

Korea is really breaking out for MTV Networks. These high bandwidth markets have gone straight to longer full length shows. Veoh’s CEO does not see a significant difference in what’s being consumed.

What will P2P mean for the industry - will piracy take over?

People use these services because they are better experiences than the alternatives, not because they want to steal. It’s better to download and view than waiting for poor quality streaming. Free is also a big advantage. The key is to figure out how to compete with P2P on pricing and on ease of use.

How will global content distribution impact ad formats?

Pre-rolls perform poorly overall. Overlays are being much better received. Relevance to the audience is critical, but format and timing play a major role. 95% or more of YouTube’s revenue is the display ad next to the video. Veoh’s seeing a disproportionate impact and click through compared to experience at Yahoo. Streaming across the bottom of the page is also emerging as a popular format.

What’s blocking global distribution?

The country based silos of media companies make it difficult to coordinate the global distribution of content. This was how television grew up and programming was localized to each market. Compared to the organizational problems, the technical challenge of going global is comparatively simple. This is not only a challenge for the media companies, it’s a challenge for the brands and their agencies for the same organizational reasons.

Three years from now where will YouTube be positioned?

Jason sees YouTube as being the leader now. They will struggle with content copyright issues if they cannot overcome that problem. If YouTube’s role for Google is the avenue to tap into brand advertising, it will need to transform to something other than the video clip business. It will mean different formats and different licensing arrangements. There is still a real opportunity for someone to fill this role.

Vertical content along genres and interests seem to be accelerating and may be a powerful way of organizing social communities that provides an alternative to YouTube.

Short form content is important, but long form dominates the majority of the viewing time. YouTube will need to break into longer form video for them to stay dominant. Search will also be an important component of helping people find content they enjoy.

Technorati Tags: Future of Television, content distribution

This is the panel that focused on what’s next for reality TV:
Andrew Cohen, SVP, Production & Programming, Bravo, NBC Universal
David Lyle, President, Fox Reality Channel
John Saade, SVP, Alternative Series, Specials & Late-Night, ABC Entertainment
Ryan O’Hara, President, TV Guide Network & TV Guide Broadband
Moderator: Ken Rutkowski, Host & President, KenRadio Broadcasting

Do you start with content or advertising when you consider a reality show? Aware that advertisers may not support some show, but the greatest influence is to produce shows that breakout. They need to be self-publicizing. The focus is usually on finding content that fits with the target audience.

How important is the connection to the major network?

It helps, but it’s really about knowing the audience, the fit with the channel. The programming is the driver.

As your making the shows - how soon do advertisers get involved?

Typically, can’t wait for advertisers because they don’t really want to be involved until the show is proven. That’s why the start is the show. You have to triangulate between the producers, sales and advertising agency and the client. In that group, anyone can block the deal which makes it tricky.

When a show fits well with advertisers it can lend itself well and drive to higher ratings. A fashion related show might pull in higher CPMs for the same audience than a less advertiser attractive program.

How does new media fit in?

As long as it can be supported by advertising, the online media sites like Hulu will play an important role. It’s almost like a virtual Comcast. Media companies are seeing that the they should be putting their content everywhere. It provides way to expand the audience and keep people up to date.

New media is also an important part of the consideration about how to develop the show. Mobile is important in this process as well. How the monetization for online and mobile will develop is still up in the air.

Live web shows, webisodes, games are all part of the package for the audience.

What will it take to get mobile more integrated into shows?

Big Brother is a great example of this. America’s super model is also using it as voting mechanism. Voting is key mechanism for using

How important is Social Networking?

MySpace was used to promote a show called “Look a like”. They did a partnership with MySpace who do you look like? Turned it into a viral explosion of promotion. They then took a contestant and brought them onto the show. She was dressed up like Angelina Jolie and it was a great success.

Bravo has worked a lot with MySpace and at BravoTV.com and sees them as a key part of the programming.

What’s happening with to the cost of reality TV?

Cheapest reality $50,000 per hour. $200k-300k per hour of reality for focused reality shows and $1 million per hour for broadcast television, with occasional peaks of $1.5 million. The panel seemed to think that costs are continuing to drop.

What’s the next year look like?

Reality could be quite strong given the shortage of scripted TV episodes and the number of reality shows that have been produced.

Technorati Tags: Future of Television, reality tv