Posts for 'Oscars'

I’m pleased to present the 410th edition of the VideoNuze podcast, with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.

Our first topic this week is data from a new Vimeo report showing that 60% of people who sign up for a free trial with an OTT service convert to become a paying subscriber (with an app, the rate jumps to 72%). As Colin and I discuss, these rates seem incredibly high, especially in the context of “freemium” service conversion rates which are often less than 10%. Granted, it’s not a pure apples-to-apples comparison, but still, the Vimeo data makes a compelling case for OTT services to offer free trials.

We then switch gears to discuss the Oscars which notched its lowest-ever broadcast audience this past Sunday night, with 26.5 million viewers. We explore the range of issues affecting the Oscars, some of which relate to the divergence between box office hits and award winners while some are more about changing viewers’ behaviors and fragmentation. The Oscars ratings reflect an industry in the midst of a huge change.

Listen in to learn more!

 
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Preliminary overnight numbers for the Oscars show an 18.9 rating in prime time, down 16% vs. 2017’s 22.4 rating. The overnight rating is a new record low for the Oscars, and importantly continues the dismal showing for 2018’s marquee TV events: Golden Globes (-5% vs. 2017), Super Bowl (-7% vs. 2017, worst in 9 years), Olympics (-7% vs. 2014, worst ever) and Grammys (-24% vs. 2017, worst in 9 years). Clearly TV’s biggest events are losing their luster.

There are always challenges particular to each event (e.g. Olympics time zone issues, Patriots fatigue, etc.). In the case of the Oscars, an ongoing problem is the disconnect between best picture winners and box office performance. A fascinating WSJ article on Friday detailed how only 4 best picture winners in the past 12 years have been among their year’s 25 highest-grossing movies, with none cracking the top 15. In the current era of superheroes, animation and franchise movies, thoughtful best picture nominees simply don’t draw the biggest audiences, in turn diminishing the Oscars’ relevance (2018 could be a quasi-exception with “Black Panther”).

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Lots of scorn flying around the net this week criticizing Oscar's takedown notices to YouTube combined with their miserly video offering at their own site. I'm just going to pile on here. What's happening is totally consistent with the findings of our Q4 '06 report on the broadcast industry and broadband video. A key conclusion of that report was that today networks look at broadband as essentially a new distribution path for existing shows. The 2 options are consumer paid downloads (dominated by iTunes) and free streaming episodes.

What they haven't done yet is create robust clip areas complete with interactivity. This area has been dominated by YouTube and others. As I said in Variety, as a result of networks' inactivity, a vacuum has been created which YouTube is filling. Consumers want clips and they want to interact. The networks should be creating these offerings on their own sites. And they should be working with YouTube. But to do neither is ostrich-like. Their inactions suggest they just wish this whole broadband/community thing would just pass already.