Cynopsis: Kids!
08/27/08
Good morning. It’s Wednesday, August 27, 2008, and this is your first early morning Kids briefing.
Virgin Comics, the two year-old joint venture between the Virgin Group and India’s comic book publisher Gotham Entertainment, has closed its US offices in NY, at the very least, according to Publishers Weekly. The report cites a statement by Virgin Comics CEO and Gotham Entertainment Prexy Sharad Devarajan confirming the shuttering of the NY office and explaining that the company is restructuring and plans to relocate to LA, with more information coming in the next weeks. Financed by Richard Branson’s Virgin Group, Author/speaker Deepak Chopra is Chairman/Virgin Comics and his son Gotham Chopra is CCO and Editor-in-Chief of Virgin Comics and Virgin Animation respectively.
Cyma Zarghami, President/Nickelodeon/MTVN Kids and Family Group will be the keynote speaker at 16the annual Mipcom Junior, October 11-12, 2008, at the Carlton Hotel in Cannes, France. In her speech, Zarghami will discuss how the localization of worldwide hit properties can result in a stronger global brand presence.
Five, the UK terrestrial channel owned by RTL, is contemplating creating a stand alone preschool channel that would fall under its existing Milkshake brand, according to C21 Media. Such a channel would go up against existing channels in the market including CBeebies, Nick Jr., and Playhouse Disney.
MORE KIDS STUFF
Spain’s Imira Entertainment, a producer/distributor of youth programming, will showcase its new 3D animated offbeat adventure/comedy series, Myo & Ga (78×7), at Cartoon Forum where they will be looking for European broadcast partners. Targeted to K6+, Myo & Ga is a co-production with Korea’s Vooz Character Systems and Tooniverse, a Korean animation channel. Myo & Ga revolves around the friendship between Myo, a rabbit, and Ga, a turtle, and their best friend that happens to be a chicken, as they track down the mysterious Dragon Pearl of Wong and save the world from utter destruction.
V-me will celebrate Labor Day, Monday, September 1, with special programming throughout the day, including a kids marathon. A preschool marathon will air from 8a-5p, extending the regular 6-hour daily kids programming block including a range of its preschool programming and the debut of the new Boowa & Kwala series.
GNKids, an arm of Gorilla Nation the online ad rep firm, is tapped as the exclusive Canadian and Australian sales rep for select advertisers for various Hit Entertainment brand websites, including Barney.com, ThomasAndFriends.com, BobTheBuilder.com, and RainbowMagicOnline.com. Additionally, Gorilla Nation will also rep the US sites for these brands with select advertisers, for which it will develop customized online sponsorship and advertising efforts.
Magi-Nation: Battle for the Moonlands, Cookie Jar Entertainment’s online fantasy/adventure game that launched in April 2008, has expanded into the full multi-player experience. That means that players can now see each other and interact via in-game chatting, explore the newly expanded area including seven new landscapes, and 30+ new items have been added to the in-game shops (e.g. restore energy, boosts, increase avatar skills), among other updates.
Scholastic News introduces a range of new features to its Election 2008 website, including interactive election games where kids can campaign for president, balance the budget, design campaign posters, and choose how they’d run the country if the were President. The website is designed to let kids, parents and teachers explore the electoral process and dovetails with the election coverage of the magazines Scholastic News (kids in grades 1-6) and Junior Scholastic (grades 6-8). Ah, the site also includes Scholastic’s ever popular Scholastic Presidential Election Poll where kids can vote for who they want to be the next President of the United States, and an election blog featuring Scholastic Kids Press Corps’ comments and stories from the Democratic and Republican National Conventions, which can also be read on Twitter.
New partners Rock the Vote partners with Charles M. Schulz’s Peanuts are inviting Peanuts fans to log on and vote for Snoopy, Charlie Brown, Linus, Lucy or Sally for President at www.peanutsrockthevote.com. And yes, the site includes a bio on each of these animated candidates and their respective platforms as well, but more importantly the goal is while young folks are online for the mock election, to get them to register to vote in the real 2008 Presidential election. Personally, I’d offer a write-in candidate of Woodstock and I think the perfect running mate would be Pig Pen. FYI, Warner Home Video releases a re-mastered, deluxe edition DVD, You’re Not Elected, Charlie Brown on October 7, 2008. Peanuts is licensed and syndicated by United Media, which is a subsidiary of the E.W. Scripps Company.
MARKETING/LICENSING
Two new US licensing partners sign on for Fifi and the Flowertots in the US under deals crafted by Hit Entertainment, which represents the Chapman Entertainment stop-motion animated series in the US: Kids with Character signs on as the master apparel licensee and will manufacture and market a line of girl-targeted clothing for preschoolers and toddlers (e.g. apparel sets and separates and pram suits); Wiesner Products, Inc. is set to create and market a line of shoes and socks based on the property (e.g. athletic shoes, canvas, flip flops and slippers etc.).
Entertainment Rights unveiled plans to launch a new soft line program based on the Little Golden Books publishing series at the Magic Marketplace trade show this week in Las Vegas. The expanded consumer products plan includes new products from Briefly Stated (junior sleep and loungewear), Giant Merchandising (Juniors and Missy retro t-shirts), BioWorld Merchandising (kids and adult accessories), Cranston (cotton and fleece fabric), and CSS Industries, Inc. (Halloween costumes). The new collections will begin rolling out at retail from early 2009. Existing soft line licensees for Little Golden Books includes American Greetings (social expression), Brainytoys Ltd. (master toy), Briarpatch, Inc. (puzzles, card games) and Galison/Mudpuppy Press (puzzles, mini-cube puzzles).
Nickelodeon & Viacom Consumer Products teams with Lucky Brand for a line of 4,000 ($34 each) limited run election-themed kids’ t-shirts based on Nickelodeon’s Kids Pick the President campaign. The shirts will be sold nationwide at 115 Lucky Brand Kids, Lucky Brand Adult and Nordstrom stores. The shirts will be available for both girls and boys beginning mid-September, with each featuring a Kids Pick the President hangtag explaining and how kids cat get involved (http://nick.com/kpp). The deal was unveiled at the Magic Marketplace.
CBS Consumer Products has launched a global licensing program for the new TV series 90210, the upcoming spin-off of Beverly Hills, 90210, which is set to premiere September 2, 2008 at 8p on The CW. The new 90210 consumer products licensees (products), which debut from early 2009, include: LF USA (juniors and girls sleep and loungewear, underwear, t0shirts, fashion tops and fleece) products will be distributed by Giant, Briefly Stated and AME; FAB Starpoint (backpacks, bags, back-to-school stationery); Townley (licensed cosmetics, cosmetic accessories, nail products)
Fans of the Humongous adventure PC game series Pajama Sam, Freddi Fish and/or Spy Fox, we were big Pajama Sam players at my home, perk up, because, this week Majesco Entertainment Company releases Pajama Sam: Don’t Fear the Dark, Freddi Fish: Kelp Seed Mystery and Spy Fox in Dry Cereal on Wii
EXECUTIVE MOVES
GNKids grows its sales team to include JR Hoffman and Hayley Hapeman to manage its new Hit Entertainment account. Both Hoffman and Hapeman will report to Kyle Fletcher, VP/Sales.
Stephen Moore, formerly CEO of Fox and Aardman Animations, joins UK-based Abbey Home Media as a new partner and shareholder, per Variety. Abbey Home Media is an independent producer/distributor of preschool-aimed content.
RATINGS
Live + Same Day Ratings Kids Cable Network Averages (000) for Saturday, August 23, 2008, 6am-11pm, ranked by K2-11:
NICKELODEON: K2-11 1446; K6-11 890; TWEENS 9-14 578
DISNEY CHANNEL: K2-11 1144; K6-11 806; TWEENS 9-14 556
CARTOON NETWORK: K2-11 645; K6-11 431; TWEENS 9-14 348
TOON DISNEY: K2-11 154; K6-11 86; TWEENS 9-14 41
Source: MTVN Research from Nielsen Media Research Data
Live + Same Day Ratings Kids Cable Network Averages (000) for Sunday, August 24, 2008, 6am-11pm, ranked by K2-11:
NICKELODEON: K2-11 1132; K6-11 760; TWEENS 9-14 529
DISNEY CHANNEL: K2-11 983; K6-11 714; TWEENS 9-14 592
CARTOON NETWORK: K2-11 849; K6-11 513; TWEENS 9-14 319
TOON DISNEY: K2-11 120; K6-11 65; TWEENS 9-14 33
Source: MTVN Research from Nielsen Media Research Data
Live + Same Day Ratings Kids Cable Network Averages (000) for Monday, February 11, 2008, 6am-11pm, ranked by K2-11:
NICKELODEON: K2-11 1181; K6-11 623; TWEENS 9-14 448
DISNEY CHANNEL: K2-11 781; K6-11 558; TWEENS 9-14 456
CARTOON NETWORK: K2-11 626; K6-11 399; TWEENS 9-14 304
TOON DISNEY: K2-11 161; K6-11 95; TWEENS 9-14 48
Source: MTVN Research from Nielsen Media Research Data
Answer to Yesterday’s Trivia Question: In this educational show’s opening sequence, you saw a hand ringing a bell. What was the name of this early series? DING DONG SCHOOL (1952-1956) Kudos to: Sharon Lerner-Lerner Media for Little Learners/NY; Bob Eisenstaedt-Granite Springs Productions/Tampa; Michael Hawkins-PromoDoctors/Irving, TX; David Garber-Linzack Entertainment LLC/Woodland Hills, CA; Jeff Berkwits-Upper Deck Entertainment/Carlsbad, CA; Johnnie King-The Margaret G King Foundation/Las Vegas; Steve Granat & Cydne Clark-Bupkis Entertainment/Tarzana, CA
Today’s Trivia Question: On Disney Channel’s The Wizards of Waverly Place, who was the teacher at WizTech that tried to steal Justin’s powers? (Email [email protected] with your answer and be sure to include your name, company, city and time zone. Unofficial rules: Only the second four correct answers from each time zone will be mentioned; and once you’ve been mentioned in any of the Cynopsis editions, you can’t be mentioned again that calendar week.)
Later — Gwen
Gwen Billings for Cynopsis Kids!
08.27.08
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JOB OPENING: SR DIR/CONSUMER PROMOTIONS/The Golf Channel/Orlando: Dvlp/implement integrated nat’l promos. Establish/grow relationships with approp key brands/companies/partners. 7+yrs mktg/promo exp Resume: [email protected] (9/4)
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JOB OPENING: FREELANCE STUDIO PRODUCER/FSN-North: Produces compelling, informative and entertaining pre-game and post-game shows both in-studio and on location. Ref: www.foxcareers.com, FNG13617. (9/4)
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JOB OPENING: WRITER/PROD/EDITOR/ON-AIR PROMO/WCIU-TV/Chicago:TV 5+ yrs exp in on-air promos; highly creative, team player; write/prod all aspects from concept to on-air. Non-linear editing/AVID exp a must Apply: www.wciu.com (9/2)
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FALL INTERNSHIP CREDITS ONLY: INTERACTIVE PUBLISHING INTERN/NY: Need savvy, creative person for interactive guides. Website for collectors that combines video and social networking. Send resume to [email protected] (9/4)
FALL INTERNSHIP CREDITS ONLY: SALES INTERN/Ad Sales-Opt Homes/Autos: Woodbury, NY. Admin work, answering phones, presentations, creating reports. For detailed info/submit a resume, visit www.cablevision.jobs Enter Req ID:6945BR. (9/4)
FALL INTERNSHIP CREDITS ONLY: Liquid Theory/ LA FT and PT internships to assist our Fall productions. Strong digital skills and a positive approach a plus! Pls send resume/cover letter to [email protected] (9/4)
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FALL INTERNSHIP CREDITS ONLY: POST PROD/World Series of Poker: 3-5 days/wk/Soho NY: Log, transcribe & rsrch & full involvement in every aspect of post prod for a critically acclaimed series! Be a part of pop culture & apply: [email protected] (9/2)
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FALL INTERNSHIP CREDITS ONLY: INTERACTIVE PUBLISHING INTERN/NY: Need web savvy person for interactive guides. Online rsrch & creativity desired. Website for collectors that combines video and social networking. Res to: [email protected] (9/2)
FALL INTERNSHIP CREDITS ONLY: INTERNS (2) Montel Media Group: Passion for TV/Film a must and interest in mngmnt/dvlpmnt/production. Hands on experience. Must be energetic and reliable with strong comm. skills. Res/cover to: [email protected] (8/30)
FALL INTERNSHIP CREDITS ONLY: Thirteen/WNET/NY: Daily animated kids’ series seeks interns w/ interest in production & project development. Must be available 2 days/week. Email resume & cover letter w/ availability to: [email protected] (8/30)
FALL INTERNSHIP CREDITS ONLY: PUBLIC RELATIONS INTERN/IFC/NYC: The Intern will learn the fundamentals of the inner workings of TV and event publicity. For more info/submit a resume, visit www.cablevision.jobs Enter Requisition ID: 6910BR (8/30)
FALL INTERNSHIP CREDITS ONLY: DIGITAL & NEW MEDIA INTERN/Oxygen: Assist w/ production and promotion of digital initiatives, research, and admin tasks. Excel, PP & fast learner desired. 10-20 hrs/wk. Send res/cover to: [email protected] (8/30)
FALL INTERNSHIP CREDITS ONLY: PT Intern- CityListen Audio Tours. Online marketing, digital word of mouth. Flexible schedule/Work remotely. Passion for travel, enthusiastic, creative, web savvy; your own computer/access. Contact: [email protected] (8/29)
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SITUATION WANTED: EMMY AWARD WINNING PRODUCER (NY/LA): 7+Yrs Network /Cable: Reality, Celeb, Court, News, Scripted. Expertise: Field, Coordination, Rights & Clearances, Trades. Professional, personable, reliable. [email protected] (9/4)
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SITUATION WANTED: Need creative, effective traditional/nontraditional visibility? Indie PR/marketing company available for print, broadcast, online campaigns. Budget, brand conscious. 323.467.7633 or [email protected] (8/29)
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