Wednesday January 17, 2024

Today’s Finale
HGTV: Help! I Wrecked My House at 9p

IN THE NEWS

Broadcast and cable TV viewing in December 2023 versus the year prior was down 6% and 10%, respectively, according to Nielsen. For broadcast TV, December was down 4.3% from November 2023 in usage, while cable was up 1% for the month. Streaming platforms inched up 1.2% from November to December, accounting for a 35.9% share of viewing.

Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis could have a lonely time on the debate stage in New Hampshire. Fellow contender Nikki Haley said Tuesday that if Donald Trump continues to be a no-show, she will skip the events, too. “We’ve had five great debates in this campaign. Unfortunately, Donald Trump has ducked all of them,” said the former UN ambassador in a statement. “He has nowhere left to hide. The next debate I do will either with Donald Trump or with Joe Biden. I look forward to it.” DeSantis responded by saying Haley “is afraid to debate because she doesn’t want to answer the tough questions.” ABC News has a debate scheduled for tomorrow, while CNN has another slated for Sunday.

Users will have access to over 150 3D movies on Apple Vision Pro beginning February 2. With more pixels than a 4K TV for each eye, combined with an advanced Audio system, Vision Pro enables users to watch shows and films from streaming services including Apple Originals from Apple TV+, transport themselves to landscapes with Environments, and partake in new spatial experiences like Encounter Dinosaurs. Count Disney in – in addition to 3D content from Disney+ at launch, subscribers will get special animated screening environments. “At Disney, we’re constantly searching for new ways to entertain, inform, and inspire by combining exceptional creativity with groundbreaking technology to create truly remarkable experiences,” said Bob Iger, The Walt Disney Company’s CEO. “Apple Vision Pro is a revolutionary platform that will bring our fans closer to the characters and stories they love while immersing them more deeply in all that Disney has to offer.”

More than half (53%) of connected TV users wish TV ads had a quick option to buy the product, according to a new LG Ad Solutions study, “The Shoppable TV Report: 2024 and Beyond.” Other highlights from the study, which surveyed more than 1,200 US consumers: 63% want to see inventory via their TV; 81% were influenced in making shopping decisions and 63% discovered new brands/products via TV ads. About 47% said they have made a purchase after seeing an ad on TV over the past three months and 70% said they like ads with QR codes, with 62% open to using one in the next 12 months and 38% likely to make a purchase after scanning.

NBCUniversal has launched nine new entertainment and sports FAST channels from its television and streaming portfolio and the NBCUniversal Global TV Distribution library on The Roku Channel. FAST channels now include “GolfPass;” “Universal Westerns;” “American Crimes;” “The Lone Ranger;” “Top Chef Vault;” “Made in Chelsea;” “Oxygen True Crime Archives;” “Bravo Vault;” and “Lassie.”

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VIP 2000 TV and GoQuest Media have partnered to co-produce Turkish drama series “Kuma” / ‘’The Other Wife”. Stellar Yapim will helm the production. With more than 1,000 episodes, the series sold to more than 40 countries.

Scripted TV and film production in Los Angeles has been slow to recover from the recent WGA and AFTRA strikes, according to Variety. Citing data from FilmLA, Variety said scripted TV production was up slightly in Q4 compared to Q3, but still below historic levels. Film production continued its decline even after the WGA and AFTRA strikes ended on September 27 and November 9, respectively. According to FilmLA, overall location filming fell 32.4% compared to 2022, including commercials and reality TV which weren’t directly impacted by the strikes.

NEW & RETURNING SERIES

Hidden camera series “Impractical Jokers” returns to truTV on February 8 at 10p, with new episodes featuring a fresh roster of celebrity guests including Harvey Guillén (“What We Do in The Shadows”), comedians Roy Wood Jr. (“The Daily Show”), Bobby Moynihan (“SNL”), Michael Ian Black (“Wet Hot American Summer”) and Kim Field (“Living Single”), plus a special appearance by ALF the puppet. Next month also marks the second annual Impractical Jokers Day, declared by the Borough of Staten Island to be held on the first Monday in February.

Controversial Mexican TV icon Alfredo Adame will join Telemundo reality series “La Casa de los Famosos” on January 23 at 7p. He joins the list of personalities already announced: Daniela ‘La Bebeshita’ Alexis, Silvia ‘La Bronca’ Del Valle, Sophie Durand, Pedro ‘La Divaza’ Figueira, Thalí García, Carlos Gómez, Mariana González, Ariadna Gutiérrez, Alana Lliteras, Fernando Lozada, Clovis Nienow, Gregorio Pernía, José Reyes, Lupillo Rivera and Maripily Rivera.

TECH

Republicans spent $318.7 million on political ads in 2023 ahead of the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries, according to AdImpact. As of January 5, Republican presidential primary spending totaled $259 million, with $200 million coming from issues groups and $59 million from candidates’ campaigns. Candidates and issues groups spent the most on broadcast TV ($129.8 million), followed by cable ($77.1 million) and Facebook/Google ($19 million). About 271 unique ads were run with 146,000 airings. Nikki Haley received the most ad support at $63.7 million, followed by Ron DeSantis ($58.1 million) and Donald Trump ($51.7 million).

Omnichannel supply-side platform OpenX Technologies and StackAdapt, a multi-channel advertising platform, are partnering to help enable political advertisers to reach their target audiences programmatically across CTV, mobile, web and display. “This partnership will greatly benefit our political advertiser customers as we lean in on what
will be a huge year for this vertical market,” said Michael Shang, Vice President of Partnerships and Business Solutions at StackAdapt. “Through OpenX’s innovative creative review tool, advertisers partnering with StackAdapt can anticipate expedited creative approvals.”

For more on political advertising on CTV this rough-and-tumble election year, register for the CTV Connect event, March 13-14 in NYC. The session “CTV: A Winning Strategy for Political Advertisers” features buyers on both side of the aisle looking at solutions for hyper-local targeting – you can grab a seat here

Imagine Communication has agreed to purchase Marketron’s REV broadcast sales and order management platform, integrating it into its own core ad tech portfolio. After some enhancements for broadcast TV, the product will be re-released as CrossFlight and will be available in early 2024.

Streaming network FilmRise has expanded its relationship with ITV Studios for over 5,000 hours of programming containing 3,000 hours of newly added content. Included in the deal are renewals of existing franchises like “Hell’s Kitchen” and “Kitchen Nightmares” as well as unscripted/factual content across Home & Garden, Lifestyle, True Crime, Competition and Reality genres. New series include seasons 1-5 of “Brassic”; seasons 1 and 2 of “Romulus”; the complete series of “Prime Suspect,” all five seasons of “Upstairs, Downstairs,” four seasons of “Nanny 911,” and 12 seasons of “The Hotel Inspector.”

COMING UP

“Crisis Point” premieres Monday, January 22 at 9p on Reelz, with three back-to-back episodes. The caught-on-camera crime show allows viewers to ride along for the action.

SPORTS ROUNDUP

Sports streamer DAZN said it retained exclusive rights for all UEFA club competitions in Canada – UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League, and UEFA European Conference League – for the upcoming three-year broadcast cycle, 2024/25 – 2026/27, inclusive. UEFA content is available with NFL, MLB, Bundesliga and Six Nations for $19.99/month or an annual subscription of $199.99.

GOING GLOBAL

Discovery Spain has renewed the license for five seasons of medical reality series “Untold Stories of the ER,” and purchased an additional license for the most recent season (13) of the program. “Untold Stories of the ER” has been broadcast in 214 territories. GRB Media Ranch added that another of its programs, “Death Walker,” with 4 seasons produced, has been purchased by both Discovery UK and France’s Canal Plus.

Rock Entertainment Holdings’ ROCK Action and Global Trekker channels launched in Taiwan on basic cable across all major operators earlier this month. The channels, previously only available via premium cable packages in the market, are now accessible to more than 6 million homes in Taiwan.

Adform and Samba TV have announced a partnership to integrate Samba TV’s proprietary first-party Connected TV data with Adform’s omnichannel DSP. The new offering will be available for all Adform’s buyers in Germany, U.K., France, Italy and Spain in Q1.

Pay TV provider Sky Mexico has deployed ThinkAnalytics’ Think360 as its personalization and viewer engagement platform for its AndroidTV, web, apps, iOS and Android services. System integrator Trektel provides the interface and on-the-ground support for Sky Mexico.

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Answer to Our Last Trivia Question
Which miniseries cast included Angie Dickinson, Robert Wagner and Dennis Weaver? “Pearl” (1978). Kudos to: Justin Pierce-JP Consulting Group/LA; Wendy Holmes/Denver; Joe Dal-Bo-XR Extreme Reach/NYC; Andrew Goldman-Phanes Funding Group/NYC; Louis Lewow-TrillerTV/Atlanta; Mark Wajda/Clermont, FL; David Garber-Loyola Marymount University/Playa Vista, CA; Tom Moore-Kalt Productions/LA; Susan Nessanbaum-Goldberg-M and S Entertainment/LA

Today’s Trivia Question
What team did Spencer own on “Ballers” (2015-19)? (Email [email protected] with your answer and be sure to include your name, company, city and time zone. Unofficial rules: a limit of four answers per time zone.)

Cynopsis Team