Comments on: The New Business Model - The day of reckoning is here http://www.fastforwardblog.com/2007/09/20/the-new-business-model-the-day-of-reckoning-is-here/ Wed, 07 Jan 2009 03:26:49 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7 hourly 1 By: John Proffitt http://www.fastforwardblog.com/2007/09/20/the-new-business-model-the-day-of-reckoning-is-here/comment-page-1/#comment-51023 John Proffitt Thu, 20 Sep 2007 18:14:27 +0000 http://www.fastforwardblog.com/2007/09/20/the-new-business-model-the-day-of-reckoning-is-here/#comment-51023 One twist I'd add to the mix... I think NPR and PBS need to wise up and give their content away to the stations for free. They need to raise their own money via major donors, ad revenue, direct subscription and transaction fees, and more. Then give away the content to the local distributors. There's more value in simultaneous national mass distribution than there is in subscription revenue from stations. Can you say Times Select? ;-) If the local station goes dark in my area, how will the national content get to that portion of the market that is either too distracted or too uninterested to bother with the new "downloadable" or direct-distribution versions of PBS and NPR? We're talking about a generational shift here that will likely take at least 15 years to play out as the older generations die and the technology gradually gets simpler and is made more accessible. So come on, NPR and PBS (and others) -- give stations the content for free and release us to produce media in our local markets. Some consider this an impossible idea. But the main reason why local affiliates have virtually no power to create content locally are the soul-crushingly huge fees that NPR and PBS (and the like) charge for content access. There's literally no money left to produce even low-end amateurish media in the local community. All our money is given to the nationals, and all we can do is maintain the local engineering infrastructure to distribute it. We're just a shell. Fact is, we'd be better off if the nationals simply owned us outright. Shoot -- we'd sell if they'd buy. The value of having a local distribution infrastructure will not go to zero in a matter of years -- there's still a lot to be said for terrestrial transmitters and local origination of some content. And it would be worth real money to the NPR and PBS sales staffs to be able to tell buyers that "your ad will be distributed directly to millions of viewers/listeners nationwide via podcast, download, cell stream AND direct broadcast on 600 local stations nationwide and our listeners/viewers are your desired demographic." Getting immediate and ubiquitous multiplatform real-time and asynchronous distribution is pretty compelling to ad buyers and major sponsors. Here's the catch in all this, and you pointed it out Rob... Can either the national networks or the local affiliates come to grips with this in time to preserve the local/national partnership? Is the leadership in place to a) see this, and b) act on it? One twist I’d add to the mix… I think NPR and PBS need to wise up and give their content away to the stations for free. They need to raise their own money via major donors, ad revenue, direct subscription and transaction fees, and more. Then give away the content to the local distributors. There’s more value in simultaneous national mass distribution than there is in subscription revenue from stations. Can you say Times Select? ;-)

If the local station goes dark in my area, how will the national content get to that portion of the market that is either too distracted or too uninterested to bother with the new “downloadable” or direct-distribution versions of PBS and NPR? We’re talking about a generational shift here that will likely take at least 15 years to play out as the older generations die and the technology gradually gets simpler and is made more accessible.

So come on, NPR and PBS (and others) — give stations the content for free and release us to produce media in our local markets. Some consider this an impossible idea. But the main reason why local affiliates have virtually no power to create content locally are the soul-crushingly huge fees that NPR and PBS (and the like) charge for content access. There’s literally no money left to produce even low-end amateurish media in the local community. All our money is given to the nationals, and all we can do is maintain the local engineering infrastructure to distribute it. We’re just a shell. Fact is, we’d be better off if the nationals simply owned us outright. Shoot — we’d sell if they’d buy.

The value of having a local distribution infrastructure will not go to zero in a matter of years — there’s still a lot to be said for terrestrial transmitters and local origination of some content. And it would be worth real money to the NPR and PBS sales staffs to be able to tell buyers that “your ad will be distributed directly to millions of viewers/listeners nationwide via podcast, download, cell stream AND direct broadcast on 600 local stations nationwide and our listeners/viewers are your desired demographic.” Getting immediate and ubiquitous multiplatform real-time and asynchronous distribution is pretty compelling to ad buyers and major sponsors.

Here’s the catch in all this, and you pointed it out Rob… Can either the national networks or the local affiliates come to grips with this in time to preserve the local/national partnership? Is the leadership in place to a) see this, and b) act on it?

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