| Cyn Wkndr 11/8/07 |
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Cynopsis:
Weekender 11/08/07 Good morning. It's Thursday, November 8, 2007, and this is Cynopsis: Weekender. Below are a handful of industry stories - with which you may agree or disagree. If you'd like to be heard - put together your own 350 word submission! Details below. Cynopsis Weekender College Edition deadline for student-written essays is tomorrow at midnight! Entries email to me at , subject Weekender College Edition. Top 4 essays are published in Weekender next week - authors paid $350 each. Students - be sure to include your name, age, college, college year, and major (if you know it), and how you can be contacted. Winners will be emailed no later than November 14. Good luck! And here's something else -- all students submitting essays can also submit (free!) their Situation Wanted ad which will run in all editions for one week beginning Nov 15, and the first ten Video Resumes submitted will run on the www.cynopsis.com Video Resume page. Check with at Cynopsis for added info. Writer's Strike Impact Reverberates from Late Shows to Online Video By Daisy Whitney Late night talk shows were the first programs to feel the brunt of the writer's strike earlier this week, but they won't likely be the last. "SNL" cancelled its episode this weekend, while late night shows "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno," "Late Show with David Letterman" and "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" went dark Monday night. If the strike continues as it's expected for several weeks, sitcoms will likely feel the impact next. Most dramas have more episodes in the can, but they'll likely be hurt by a protracted strike too. Premium networks probably won't feel the pain. HBO, for instance, says it has shot all episodes of upcoming series "The Wire" and "In Treatment" and is set until the summer. The good news is the strike won't have much impact on the ad market in the near term. "Even in the scatter market, most ad deals are made weeks in advance," said T.S. Kelly, SVP and Director of research & insight for Havas. "That said, a prolonged strike could translate into more ad dollars shifting online, perhaps even to video." Already, a handful of online video sites are looking to capitalize on the opportunity the strike affords to snag viewers away from the TV set. Online video site Break.com launched a contest on its site on Monday, giving striking writers a chance to submit videos, with the winning video receiving $5000. "We understand that although we are part of an alternative distribution discussion near and dear to their hearts, we also represent a new opportunity for them," said Keith Richman, CEO of Break.com. Internet TV network Revision3 plans to increase the number of cross-promotions it runs for its other shows within its programming during the strike. "There are a lot of people out there who have watched a little YouTube and will just do more tasting and by tasting more they are more likely to find something," said Jim Louderback, CEO of Revision3. Revision3 inked a deal earlier this week with Web video portal Pyro.TV as part of its push to take advantage of the possible dip in TV viewing. The network's flagship weekly show "Diggnation" generates about 1 million views per month, comparable to many cable networks. "There are a lot of people who will start going online to watch more," Louderback said. Follow the Money By Louis Chunovic Follow the money. That's sound advice, even though in reality the Watergate scandal's most famous admonition was never actually said, but was made up by William Goldman, the screenwriter on All the President's Men. So where is the media investment money going, moving forward in these uncertain times? Last week, at Media Magazine's Forecast 2008 conference in Manhattan, a group of money men assessed the future of media value. "Information companies are very valuable," said Richard Mead, Managing Partner, Jordan Edmiston Group, the media-focused investment bank. "Advertising-driven companies have a huge opportunity in front of them." "Out-of-home media," said Anthony Belinikoff, Managing Director, Sagent Advisors, an investment bank and mergers-and-acquisition advisory. "Generally, mobile -- mobile delivery, mobile content -- [and] gaming," said Tom Regan, Managing Director, GE Commercial Finance, a major financial services company (and a sister company of NBC). "We love gaming." "Marketing services in all of its different forms," said James Rutherford, EVP/Veronis Suhler Stevenson, a private equity firm specializing in middle-market media and other companies. "Out of home -- not just the billboard business, but all forms of out of home, particularly alternative out of home, and mobile media." Actually, PE firms are relatively new financial players in media. A decade ago, ten or so were "serious" investors in the media; today, there are around 450, Mead said. In 2001, approximately $15 billion was spent acquiring media businesses, with PE firms accounting for about 20 percent of that, he added; this year, through September, approximately $57 billion has been spent on media acquisitions, and PE firms accounted for a full 40 percent. One somber bottom-line reality: The Great Credit Crunch that set in on Wall Street this summer, when the magnitude of the subprime mortgage folly became clear, means that there simply will be less money for dealmaking in the credit markets pipeline in months and perhaps years ahead. "You've had deals that have fallen away," Regan said, "Cablevision most recently." Another, perhaps telling concern: the broadcast television business's possible future "disintermediation" (i.e., its elimination as an intermediary), despite its unparalleled mass reach and "fantastic" cash flows, when, in the coming digital era, it loses its distribution-system reason for being, said GE's Regan. Scare of The Week By Circlewipe Fascinating is the coverage of the WGA/AMPTP negotiations and the writers' strike which began on Monday. As with box office totals, corporate mergers, and star salaries, the business side of "this business we call show" has crept into the awareness of viewers, not just those of us in The Biz. A long way from the last such episode in 1988 when it was discussed and worried about internally, at network and studio water-coolers. Now, it's BREAKING NEWS on the cable channels, covered in major papers, websites, newscasts. Viewers are warned of dangers that lurk, threatening their very lives. E-coli and lead-tainted toys, step aside! Your daytime drama storylines may soon be suspended, re-runs of late-night comedy threaten to send us to bed without a laugh, and whatever will become of Heroes and According to Jim? While living in LA awhile ago, I attended a pre-strike members' meeting of the DGA in Beverly Hills. My 4-year old Toyota eventually found a spot in the parking lot, among the Jaguars, Mercedes, BMWs and the occasional Rolls. "Hard to feel sorry for this crowd", I thought. But, while some directors and writers in such lucrative communities do very nicely, others don't. Like actors, most writers and directors don't work full time in Guild jobs, or in the TV/Film business at all. They work other jobs, hoping for their turn in a lottery that may one day provide a living. Last Saturday, SNL made light of $200K writers vs. $20M studio heads. (Disclosure: SNL Skits are written by, you guessed it, WGA writers.) The Guilds attempt to even the playing field by ensuring that, as studios and networks find new income sources, the creators get a fair share of that increase. The realities of the industry change each year: VHS and DVD versions of productions were more expensive to manufacture in the past, now they cost pennies to turn out. (Yet, oddly, consumers pay more at the local Blockbuster.) And the cost of regenerating programs on the internet is dropping as technology advances. And while box office records are continually being broken, ticket prices continue to rise. Someone's making money, and someone ought to share.
* WEEK'S RECAP *
Friday, November 2, 2007
SUBMISSIONS / AD SALES/ SUBSCRIBE & UNSUBSCRIBE Cynopsis Ad Sales - Mark Bohn - 203-583-1224 / Article submissions for Cynopsis: Weekender are welcome, provided they are no longer than a maximum of 350 words. News articles used are paid at the rate of $1/word. Not all submissions are used. Editorials (also 350 word max) may be submitted but are not paid, and not all are used. Send submissions to Cynopsis at . The Weekender edition is published every Thursday and includes a few items to ponder over the weekend, as well as the highlights from the week. It is delivered to the entire Cynopsis subscriber list, unless you specifically request to be unsubscribed. To subscribe, unsubscribe or change your email subscription, go to the Cynopsis website, www.cynopsis.com and click on the subscribe tab. Emails to the Editor: subject E-Mails to the Editor Copyright Cynthia Turner 2006 Later -- Cyn 11/08/07 What's On This Weekend: Saturday: 8-11p, November 10, 2007 ABC: Saturday Night Football CBS: CSI: NY [r], Criminal Minds [r], 48 Hours Mystery FOX: Cops, Cops [r], America's Most Wanted ION: Movie: Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All [7p] MNT: NFL Total Access, IFL Battleground NBC: Bionic Woman, Chuck, Law & Order: SVU PBS: Austin City Limits [9p] TELE: Cine de Impacto [7p], Cine de Impacto UNIV: Sabado Gigante Sunday: 7-11p, November 11, 2007 ABC: AFV, EM: Home Edition, Desperate Housewives, Brothers & Sisters CBS: 60 Minutes, The Amazing Race 12, Cold Case, Shark CW: CW Now, Aliens in America, Life is Wild, America's Next Top Model FOX: King of the Hill, King of the Hill, The Simpsons, King of the Hill, Family Guy, American Dad ION: Movie: Jack and the Beanstalk: The Real Story NBC: Football Night in America, Sunday Night Football: Indianapolis at San Diego PBS: Nature, Masterpiece Theatre, Art in the Twenty-First Century TELE: Cine en Casa/Estreno, Cine Millonario/Estreno UNIV: Lo que no Vio de los Latin Grammy, Bailando por un Sueno Campeonato Internacional de Baile [p ] |
