“People want content when they want it and wherever they are,” affirmed Jonathan Miller, the former chairman/CEO of AOL who is now a founding partner in new media firm Velocity Interactive Group. For example, Miller noted that if a person initially caught a video on a cell phone, he or she expects to be able to see it again on the big screen if they so desire once they get home. “The companies who can accommodate that kind of expectation are the ones who will be rewarded,” he said.
In this cross-platform era where viewers are flitting from one medium toanother, reward enough for Patrick Keane, VP/chief marketing officer for CBS Interactive, would be aggregate ratings that combine TV audience with online video viewership. This, he contended, would give a more accurate measure of content’s reach. He cited as an example the CBS primetime series Jericho. For one recent episode, when accounting for the online audience, Jericho saw its TV ratings go up a nearly a point from 4.2 to 5.1. For a fledgling show like this, that one point could mean the difference between cancellation and survival
Both Miller’s and Keane’s remarks came during the course of the Online Media, Marketing & Advertising (OMMA) Conference & Expo held earlier this week in Hollywood.
Just as ratings need to keep up with emerging marketplace realities, so too does advertising and marketing. For instance, while branded entertainment is all the buzz, the fact is that viewers are savvy to so-called seamless integration of brands into long-form content. OMMA event speaker Chuck Porter, co-chairman of Crispin Porter+Bogusky, Miami and Boulder, Colo., observed, “Audiences are way more sophisticated than advertisers and agencies give them credit for. You can’t trick them.” He noted that viewers can see right through glorified product placement and don’t much care for it. They want entertaining, engaging and relevant stories, affirmed Porter.
And with audience fragmentation, stories don’t always have to live up to high Nielsen expectations in order to thrive. OMMA panelist Larry Kramer, senior adviser, Polaris Venture Partners, explained that the old norm was that a show reaching just a three million viewer threshold would be doomed by major network television standards. But that kind of following on the web today would be more than enough to maintain that show for its viewership.
Indeed opportunities abound in the new media landscape, even in areas one wouldn’t regard as holding all that much promise. Velocity’s Miller cited as an example ring tone sales. He said that a few years ago if someone had told him that cell phone ring tone sales would generate more revenue than CD singles, he would have thought that prognosticator was deluded. But sure enough, that’s the reality today as ring tones represent a significant source of business. In the ever changing new media world, noted Miller, it’s risky to predict how things will shake out.
For more observations from the OMMA confab, see next week’s SHOOT, which will include Porter’s take on the rising value of creativity in a multi-platform world.
Bill Condon, Jennifer Lopez Unveil “Kiss of the Spider Woman” At Sundance
A lavish, MGM-style musical is not typical Sundance Film Festival fare. But Sunday night Bill Condon brought such a creation—well, part of one—to Park City, Utah, with his adaptation of "Kiss of the Spider Woman," starring Jennifer Lopez.
Audiences broke out in spontaneous applause during the screening for Lopez's song and dance numbers. She plays an old Hollywood screen siren in a movie-within-the movie. The packed Eccles Theater also gave Lopez, wearing a glittery spiderweb themed frock, a standing ovation after the show.
"I've been waiting for this moment my whole life," Lopez said.
The story, which revolves around the conversations between two cellmates in an Argentine prison, was first a novel by Manuel Puig in 1976 and has been adapted for stage and screen over the years. A 1985 film adaptation starred William Hurt and Raul Julia. Hurt won an Oscar for his performance. On Broadway, it won multiple Tony Awards.
Condon wrote and directed this new version, which is seeking a distributor. Diego Luna plays an imprisoned revolutionary Valentin Arregui, whose new cellmate Luis Molina (Tonatiuh) loves movies, celebrity and glamour and enthusiastically recounts the story of a favorite movie musical, called "Kiss of the Spider Woman" to Valentin, giving them and the audience a break from their bleak reality.
While the film has memorable moments of escapist spectacle, it also delves into serious topics of gender identity. Molina tells Valentin that they don't feel like a man or a woman—which Valentin finds odd at first but grows to understand.
Before the screening, Condon said that one of the things the movie is about is "the attempt to bridge the incredible differences that separate us so often." He quoted President... Read More