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Great (Pay) Wall Delayed
Rupert building cartel?
The Murdochian plan to put a pay-wall around (everything, no?) his newspapers’ websites won’t meet the self-imposed deadline next year, says The Elder.
“We are working very, very hard at this but I wouldn't promise that we're going to meet that date," said he to a Daily Telegraph interviewer (November 5). "I'm not prepared to comment on that all. It's a work in progress. There's a huge amount of work going on, not just with our sites, but with other people like your company."
That last phrase caught the attention of Media Guardian’s Roy Greenslade. (See here )
“It raises questions that competition regulators should surely investigate. Are the companies - and, perhaps, others, such as Trinity Mirror and Associated - working together to co-ordinate the building of paywalls? That might be ok, but what if they are planning to set a similar fee structure?”
Perhaps The Elder is biding his time until elections next year in the UK, which the Murdoch-compliant Conservative Party is projected to win… with duly noted editorial endorsement. (JMH)
We’re number one
Sooner than you think
In 15 short years – or sooner – the internet will be the “number one entertainment medium,” says a glimpse into the future by TNS Infratest, Münchner Kreis , EICT , Deutsche Telekom. In ten years 95% of the Europeans and Americans will use the internet regularly. Within 5 (or 6) years the same percentage of people will access the internet through mobile devices.
Newspapers and magazines will “give up” paper, said the report, time frame not firm. All media content will be available on all platforms. Professional “content” on the Web will be, it says, all paid for.
But, said the authors, public opinion will continue to support “free” public service broadcasting. (JMH)
Advertising people thinking about next year
Don’t touch (or think about) that dial
“We need to think less of channels and more of content,” said Mediaedge:cia CEO Melanie Varley to an industry gathering, quoted by Kampanje.com (October 30). Next year – 2010 – is the year advertisers must think digital, she said. “2010 is the year when customers have to invest more actively in digital media, learn more about digital media and experiment more with social media and search.”
Her trends to watch…
Personalized ads to the set-top box: “Targeted television is just around the corner.”
Mobile media: she likes iPhone and Facebook together.
Search: Google is it.
Social media: ”This is more a PR tool.” (JMH)
So Few People In Europe Watch Cable News In The Morning?
We ran on Tuesday an interesting press release from the BBC (See here) crowing about how they had overtaken CNN in audience figures for morning and evening in Europe, but what really caught our notice was how small the actual numbers really are. (Ed. Note: TINY)
BBC World says it now has 63,000 viewers for the breakfast slot compared to 60,000 for CNN. Across Europe just 123,000 viewers for those two channels in the morning. Hardly seems worth getting up to produce.
The numbers are higher in the evening -- The BBC says according to the EMS survey that it now has 175,000 viewers compared to CNN’s 165,000. That still seems pretty low for all of Europe.
By comparison in the US during evening prime time CNN has anywhere from 400,000 – 600,000 viewers depending on the night and the program, and it is the lowest rated of the cable news channels.
So Much For Being A Bit Too Clever
Sam Zell has the business reputation that if anyone knows how to legally avoid paying tax it is he, so much was made of it at the time when he took over Tribune by using an ESOP (employee stock ownership plan) – the company would save a lot in taxes if successful, but employees would be left high and dry if the company faltered. Well, as we all know, the company is now in bankruptcy.
So it was interesting to see that Tribune management and the creditors have now recognized the errors of the ESOP and say it will not be resurrected when Tribune emerges from Chapter 11. The Tribune’s Michael Oneal says management has come to the conclusion “the complexity of keeping the ESOP in place was more costly than paying taxes.”
There is good ESOP news and bad ESOP news for Tribune employees. Come December there will be an allocation of ESOP shares; bad news is the shares aren’t worth anything. Bah Humbug.
Regulator gives HD Radio a boost
A new digital divide
Local radio stations in Switzerland can add digital programs from January 1st via the HD Radio technology, said regulator OFCOM (November 4). The Swiss Federal Council approved the rules change to “improve the conditions under which local radio… can diversify their range of programs with a relatively modest investment.” (See OFCOM statement here – in French). At a recent broadcasters conference on HD Radio an OFCOM official indicated that government approval was imminent. (See that story here)
Local radio concessions in Switzerland are the domain of the private sector. Public broadcaster SSR-SRG remains fully engaged in offering digital radio channels through the DAB and DAB+ platforms. Many private, commercial broadcasters have resisted DAB and DAB+, cost being the major consideration. The rule change makes more likely separate digital platforms for public and private sector radio broadcasters. (More on digital radio here)
In a separate decision OFCOM amended rules to allow local cable TV companies with 5,000 or fewer subscribers to broadcast radio and television signals without further licensing. (JMH)
The Catch-up Rage and Raging
Step up or fall out
Catch-up TV is all the rage. Where video on demand portals are available viewers flock. Broadcasters know this.
Actually, catch-up TV has been ragingly popular with viewers for decades. Before super-sized memories on PC’s there was the VCR, the thing nobody could correctly program. A couple of hot chips and hard-drive memory big enough to hold hours of video changed all that. Now, it’s click to watch anytime. (More on IPTV here)
Broadcasters and producers had enough pain with VCR’s. Viewers couldn’t be counted. Advertisers wouldn’t pay. Gimmicks to thwart those who could figure out how to program VCRs failed as video (and audio) found its way to the Web.
The catch-up TV success story is Hulu, the American video portal owned by NBC Universal, Disney and News Corporation. So far, only those with IP addresses in the United States can access Hulu. That could change, reports Le Monde (November 3). Hulu wants to offer its catch-up TV service in the UK and France.
Needless to say, French broadcasters are not pleased. TF1 CEO Nonce Paolini called Hulu “a threat” to French broadcasters. Several broadcasters offer IP-based video on demand services but the idea of them actually collaborating on one portal – and, thus, holding off competition from Hulu – could run afoul of competition authorities. Two weeks ago, Les Echos reported that TF1, M6 and Canal Plus were in talks to develop a counter-weight to Hulu.
In the UK, the now-dead Project Kangaroo would have given viewers that single portal to catch-up on all their favorite shows. Since it was to be a joint effort of the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 the UK competition authorities killed it – with some encouragement, it must be note, from BSkyB, the pay TV company principally owned by News Corporation. Competition is good, some think, just not too much.
The BBC iPlayer has proved wildly popular. Nearly one-in three in the UK (29%, according to regulator OFCOM figures) watch TV online, nearly all using iPlayer. Where that single service video on demand portal is available, people go for it. Where it isn’t available – Germany, for example – it’s, well, an opportunity. (JMH)
Can Tribune Live Without The AP?
It’s always fun to hear how a newspaper, in this case a group of newspapers in the US, think they can get along just fine without the AP. So here comes Tribune saying it is going to give it a go for a week.
Actually the AP should be pleased as punch about this for there is no better way for a newspaper to understand how much it depends on a news source than not to have that source. Tribune says it will make up the lack of AP with other news sources it usually doesn’t have such as Reuters and syndicated newspaper services, but the plain truth of the matter is that no one covers the United States, especially state coverage, like the AP and that is that.
Now Tribune canceled AP last year so with the two-year notice period in full sway perhaps this is a very public negotiating ploy to put AP on its toes. The truth is that the best bargain American newspapers have is the AP so here’s another test for Tribune to run – this week, while it is still using the AP, count up all the column inches that the AP news copy and pictures have filled in its newspapers and then figure out how much it would have cost to fill all that space with its own reporters and photographers. The answer is, already, that the AP is a great bargain for what it provides – as are all the major international news agencies.
According to ESPN, 29 of 60 newspapers that covered major league baseball teams away and at home were not covering the World Series and were relying on others to provide the stories and pictures. Has newspaper cost cutting really come to hit the finals of America’s favorite pastime this hard? Yes, it has.
Bud Selig, baseball commissioner, said he was saddened by the drop of on-the-spot coverage. “For me this is a very very unhappy development.” He added he recognized there was a problem within the newspaper industry today, and less staff coverage was not because of something baseball has done, “but I’m saddened by it, very saddened. Believe me, baseball will not be better off as a result.”
Of course for ESPN, the cable sports network, to make this point serves as more fodder for their cannons that newspapers are outmoded and the place to come for sports news these days is cable. Say it ain’t so.
Magazines Really In The Dumps
Last week we told of the carnage at Conde Naste – surprising because that’s the last place one expects loads of firings – but now comes word that when Time-Warner announces its Q3 earnings on Wednesday it is taking a big axe yet again to Time, Inc. – cuts of up to $100 million are forecast with the likelihood the bulk of that will be personnel, about 400 positions. Last year at about the same time the unit announced cuts of $150 million that translated into 600 jobs lost.
In Q2 Time Inc. publishing ad revenues were down 26% from Q2 the year before and the thinking is, based on what is happening elsewhere, that Q3 results will be worse. When the Washington Post Company announced its Q3 earnings last week it reported Newsweek ad revenues down 48% from the year before. Now, there has been a lot of messing this year with the Newsweek product, but will Time’s numbers be in the same percentage ballpark?
Last week Forbes Magazine bounced about 30 jobs. At Women’s Wear Daily, owned by Fairchild, about 5% of the workforce were let go.
If it’s not going to be a great Christmas then you just know the carnage will continue into next year.
Murdoch Gets Tough
Rupert Murdoch has let it be known he is a changed man – he seems to be Born Again when it comes to giving away his news. New International in the UK is now getting rid of bulk sales for its Times and Sunday Times, and that probably means that come the February ABCs the circulation at The Times could be down by more than 8% while at The Sunday Times it will be far less a drop, around 1.5%.
And while in the US Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal may be celebrating that it is now, by circulation, the largest US newspaper, that isn’t stopping it from taking out the knife. The WSJ announced it is closing its Boston bureau which currently has nine reporters, a bit surprising because Murdoch has made it known he wants to see far more general news in the WSJ so it can compete better against the New York Times, and Boston is one of the places he got a good supply of general news, especially on the education beat.
Editor Robert Thomson put it into perspective, “We remain in the midst of a profound downturn in advertising revenue and thus must think the unthinkable.” Makes one wonder what other “unthinkables” are ahead, not just at the WSJ but elsewhere, too.
German media family traditions
Transitions in times of stress
At last weeks annual press briefing Bauer Verlagsgruppe passed the €2 billion revenue mark for the first time. And, for the first time, more than half Bauer’s revenue is now foreign, outside Germany. The acquisition of UK radio stations and magazines (former Emap) contributed to pushing company revenue to €2.06 billion, 57% of which comes from outside Germany.
Revenues from German operations are expected to fall to €883 million from €925 million, said General Manager Andras Schoo. Ad sales are expected to be off 20%.
The other first was the appearance of Yvonne Bauer, age 32, among the five men in dark suits. Ms Bauer, who was named to the Executive Board of Bauer Media Group in June, is the fifth generation of the founding family. Succession is always an issue for family controlled companies. Ms Bauer gave a starkly negative appraisal of the company’s publishing business.
Her father, 70 year old Heinz Bauer, remains in charge. Austerity is his objective. Bauer will cut the German workforce to 2600 and close its Cologne printing plant. (JMH)
Embracing Facebook
“abrupt” traffic increase
Tired of hearing about social networking? Get over it. People are using Facebook more than other media.
In a study of Norwegian media usage, TNS Gallup found one in three people are using Facebook every day. More than half the Norwegian population visits Facebook each week.
“We don’t know other countries where Facebook has such a strong position,” said TNS Gallup media researcher Knut Arne Futsæter to Kampanje (October 28). Reasons, he suggested, are broad and easy internet access as well as a highly developed media technology culture in Norway.
The TNS Gallup survey showed Facebook in 5th place among Norwegians fifteen years and older in daily media use (34%). Above it were television channels NRK 1 (62%) and TV2 (58%). Public radio network NRK P1 places 3rd (37%). Then newspaper website VG Nett (36%). Other Norwegian newspaper websites, television and radio follow Facebook. (JMH)
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