Category: media

“There are going to be dozens or hundreds of shows that are either not produced or cancelled because of the DVR. The recording devices, which are in about 20 percent of American homes, are a boon for couch potatoes but a headache for TV networks. Advertisers don’t want to pay for non-live viewing because they figure DVR viewing involves a lot of ad-skipping. And if advertisers don’t want to pay for commercials, networks cancel shows.”

“Members of the Writers Guild of America voted by an overwhelming margin to authorize their leaders to call a strike if they can’t negotiate a three-year contract with the major studios to replace one that expires Oct. 31. Of 5,507 members who voted, 90% favored granting a strike authorization. Guild officials said the turnout was a record for the union, which has nearly 12,000 members.”

“What do most Americans picture when they think of a gamer? A child? A loner? Someone with weak social skills? An addict who ignores life’s problems because of too much time spent with a game? A shut-in? An introvert? The truth is, the American public’s view of video games and gamers as a whole is grossly outdated.”

Hollywood studios are backing off from pushing their releases as Oscar contenders this year. “There’s never an upside to positioning a big film as an Oscar contender. The media does that for them anyway.”

“The music-industry lobbying-and-litigation arm is protesting a federal magistrate’s recommendation that it cough up hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees for an Oregon woman. Tanya Andersen, 42, says she racked up the expenses defending against an RIAA infringement lawsuit that was ultimately dismissed for lack of evidence… The RIAA is arguing in court documents that the association shouldn’t have to pay defense counsel fees, because Andersen is probably guilty anyway.”

TV networks may still covet the 18-to-49-year-old demographic, but the latest ratings show that huge numbers of Americans of all demographics are simply watching a lot less network TV, and that bodes ill for the traditional network model. “If you’re simply standing at the top of a boat that’s sinking, it might not be worth crowing too loudly.”

With a writers’ strike a very real possibility in Hollywood this fall, observers say that TV has a lot more at stake than the movies. “Movie executives generally consider screenwriters to be expendable. But television writers — and particularly the writer-producers who serve as show runners — wield considerable power over a television show, so much so that it often is not clear where their writing duties end and their producing duties begin.”

“A scientist has unveiled a working radio built from carbon nanotubes that are only a few atoms across, or almost 1,000 times smaller than today’s radio technology. The nanotech device is a demodulator, a simple circuit that decodes radio waves and turns them into audio signals… Nanoelectronic systems are considered crucial to the continued miniaturization of electronic devices. Many companies are interested in the long-term potential of the technology.”

TV networks have their ups and downs, but NBC has been in a years-long slump that has confounded even the most jaded observers. Matthew Gilbert says that the incompetence of the network’s leaders borders on infuriating, and the mistakes they are currently making could have been avoided with the briefest of refresher courses on network mistakes of the past.

“Everybody knows that fewer people are watching network TV with every passing year. This year, the networks have mounted their first counterattack. In addition to short mini-videos for the short-attention-span generation, they’re putting full-length free on-demand episodes online.”