Posted by chicagomedia.org on February 10, 2009 at 10:13:42:
My Network TV says it's 'blowing up traditional network model,' becoming program service
by Phil Rosenthal, Chicago Tribune
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News Corp.'s My Network TV said Monday it won't be a network come fall. With the beginning of the 2009-10 TV season, it's embracing a programming service business model instead.
There will be no name change because, let's face it, My Network TV is much catchier than My Programming Service.
"We're blowing up that traditional network model and we do have an innovative approach," Greg Meidel, president of My Network TV, said by phone. "Other networks may look at what we're doing and follow us."
Exploded models notwithstanding, viewers may not notice any change at all with the cost-saving efficiencies the change provides, save perhaps for the fact the new arrangement only covers programming two hours per weeknight, while My Network TV has provided content Monday-through-Saturday.
The new My Network TV will continue to include pro wrestling's "WWE Friday Night Smackdown" and a movie night. A complete schedule has not yet been determined, but it also will include two “Law & Order: Criminal Intent” reruns per week from NBC Universal Domestic Television Distribution.
The bottom line is My Network will continue to provide programming to its lineup of stations covering more than 97 percent of the country, including News Corp.-owned WPWR-Ch. 50 in Chicago and Chicago Tribune parent Tribune Co.-owned WPHL-TV in Philadelphia and KMYQ-TV in Seattle. Meidel said the move, however, greatly reduces overhead and eliminates risks a network traditionally incurs. He would not say exactly how much.
"To the viewer it will be seamless," Meidel said. "What we have done is go back and created a hybrid national program-distribution service. We're going to get out of the network model where we pay a license fee to acquire the program, put it on the air, sell all the advertising time and hope we generate more revenue than we have in cost.
"Unfortunately, due to these economic times, it's been difficult to do this -- not just for us, but every network," he said. "So we have blown up that traditional model and come up with an innovative approach that is basically an advertiser-supported model, almost like syndication, where we acquire programs from various suppliers on an advertiser-supported basis."
The barter arrangement will have a program supplier, such as NBC Universal, selling the national ads for the programming it provides while leaving a portion of the commercial inventory available for stations to sell locally.
This shift enables My Network TV to make significant reductions in costs and staffing. Its ad sales staff, for example, will be folded into that of Twentieth Century Fox Television, News Corp.'s TV studio and syndication operation, which will then sell the ads for programs that studio provides as well as "Smackdown."
"We really reduce our [financial] exposure on shows that don't work," Meidel said. "A lot of time our license fees exceed the amount we can bring in."
My Network was born out of desperation in 2006 to serve the former UPN and WB affiliates left behind with nothing to air in prime time -- including WPWR and nine other stations in News Corp.'s stable -- when CBS and Warner Bros. abruptly moved to shuttered those networks and launch the CW from their remnants. Those stations still have the same needs.
"It's critical they stay in the prime-time programming business and not end up as pure independents," Meidel said. "It's difficult to cut and paste these schedules together. We want to have the continuity [My Network TV provides]. We've spent three years building that brand awareness and we want to continue to take advantage of that."
From the very start, My Network TV has improvised its playbook. Its first trick play was to rely on sudsy serials in the style of Spanish TV's telenovelas. When that didn't work, it swung heavily to reality series and movies. Its biggest break came when "World Wrestling Entertainment's "Smackdown," a UPN staple that had wound up with the CW, moved to My Network TV for the 2008-09 television season.
Since then, My Network TV has realized considerable audience growth in both households and among advertiser-coveted viewers age 18 to 49. In that demographic. It is now the 10th most-popular network, across broadcast and cable, with that key demographic. "We're up every night across the board and I think you'll continue to see ratings growth across the board next year," Meidel said.
The CW, seen locally on Tribune Co.'s WGN-Ch. 9, had its own attempt to blow up the network business model this season with an experiment in which it outsourced Sunday-night programming to an outfit called Media Rights Capital. MRC's shows, and the arrangement, proved a bust. The CW had to repossessed the night, deploying movies and reruns to plug the gaping hole left behind.