Category: media

“The number of digital music tracks legally downloaded from the Internet almost tripled in the first half of 2005 as the use of high-speed broadband connections surged around the world, the international recording industry said Thursday. The International Federation of Phonographic Industries said that 180 million single tracks were downloaded legally in the first six months of the year, compared to 57 million tracks in the first half of 2004 and 157 million for the whole of last year. The federation credited the increase to a 13 percent rise in the number of broadband lines installed around the world, along with an industry campaign to both prosecute and educate against illegal downloading.”

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s efforts to create a third national radio network aimed at young people and playing the hottest new music seemed to wither on the vine before it even began, but after several years and countless reimaginings (none of which included actual radio broadcasts,) the so-called “Radio 3” seems ready to take off on the wings of the new phenomenon known as podcasting. A partnership with Apple’s iTunes music store, which is driving the podcasting craze, and CBC’s own ability to cut deals with cutting-edge bands, add up to a potentially important new service. Radio 3 will even be getting an actual radio presence this fall, when it launches a channel on the Sirius satellite network.

What in the name of all that is holy has happened to summer movies? How can there be 14 screens in one place, and not a single watchable film? It’s enough to drive a critic to drink, and the public has already cast its vote by staying away in droves. But is it just possible that this summer’s cauldron of Hollywood dreck might actually be bad enough to convince the major studios to start putting out a better product?

“In 2004, the value of television product placements (a product or brand name inserted for marketing purposes into entertainment fare) increased by 46.4 per cent over the year before, to $1.88 billion, according to the research firm PQ Media. For the networks and producers raking it in, that’s quite a haul. Meanwhile, the audience is at the receiving end of a sales drive neatly tucked into the story line, whether it’s for the Buick touted by sexy Gabrielle on ABC’s Desperate Housewives or the Campbell’s Soup served up on NBC’s American Dreams.”

Big media ompanies are on the hunt for young filmmakers who have been working in short-form internet video. “There’s very little quality short-form video available. Outside of the music industry, movie studios and cable channels aren’t in the habit of producing short videos, so there isn’t much inventory. What’s more, creating short formats popular on the internet isn’t a talent many professional TV and film producers have developed, since it’s enormously difficult to tell a story in three minutes.” So studios are turning to “a new breed of internet video producers creating low-budget, short-form films and animations for websites and web video channels.”

What’s behind charges that American public broadcasting is biased towards the left? “Indeed, poll after poll shows that Americans consider PBS to be one of their most trusted and valued institutions… A poll of 6,000 Americans last month revealed 66 per cent believe PBS has no bias, while 21 per cent say it leans to the left and 13 per cent see a tilt to the right. So where do all the charges of liberal bias come from?”

“Cable’s programming system is more viewer-friendly. Rarely does a cable network introduce a series and then yank it off the schedule after a few weeks because of low audience ratings. Normally, 13 episodes are produced, aired and repeated. If a series doesn’t find an audience, it will go out of production. But at least viewers know they can make a 13-week investment. Contrast this to network television’s operations.”

Journalists are having a bad time in the movies these days. “The media’s image has taken a long downward slide from the 1976 film “All the President’s Men,” which (even more than the book) lionized Bob Woodward, Carl Bernstein and, by extension, all of journalism. The heroic reporters that followed, in movies like “The Killing Fields” (1984), now seem quaint. If a film depicts a serious reporter today, he is likely to be as ineffectual as the cameraman played by Joaquin Phoenix in “Hotel Rwanda,” desolate about his inability to draw attention to the genocide. It isn’t hard to spot what’s behind this erosion of the journalist’s image.”

“Advertising increased on the principle of creeping tolerance. If we put up with two commercials for a while, why not give us three? If we kept coming, try four. After the hissing in the theatres stopped, owners assumed that we had adapted to the new order. We hadn’t. We had simply fallen into a sullen silence. After all these years, some, like me, still grit our teeth and acknowledge that we’re so desperate to see movies on a big screen with an audience that we’ll tolerate almost any indignity. Other patrons apparently decided that enough was enough. They began staying home. Even if they saw movies on commercial TV, they at least had a mute button to protect themselves.”

“Lions Gate Entertainment Corp claims it doesn’t want to be the king of the Hollywood jungle. Instead, it wants to fill in the niche markets such as horror, urban and art-house genres. Considering its low production costs, the Vancouver based company’s strategy is a big time success.”