Fuzzy TV Future

The Wall Street Journal provided a great explanation of the shifting TV landscape in a front page article on Tuesday. "Local TV Stations Face a Fuzzy Future" describes the gradual shift in station-network relations and suggests a day when one or more networks may cut the distribution cord with local affiliates to provide programming directly to a cable channel. There are a number of issues at play, including: media conglomerates who need not share content with local stations, a surplus of over-the-air stations--that will expand further with the final shift to digital broadcasting, evolving devices for consuming content (think small and mobile), shifting consumer preferences--an entire generation versed in not only cable but broadband literate, and a changing production structure--the shift from expensive, scripted production to lower cost formats.

All of this changes the employment picture for college graduates. The bright spots: some sort of advertising sales need will exist--perhaps selling "spots" but maybe striking cross-platform and product tie-in deals. I'm sure there are other employment bright spots but I don't think traditional television production is one of them--not in an age of better, "smarter" production tools.

Here's the article link:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123422910357065971.html

And, some of the opening text:

LAS VEGAS -- Lisa Howfield, general manager of KVBC, the NBC affiliate here, watched last year as the broadcast-television business began to shrink. She started cutting. She combined departments. She made do with old equipment, and did away with luxuries like yearly sales getaways.

In December and January, she laid off 15 employees, or 6% of her staff. After the weatherman left last month, one of the morning news anchors took on both jobs. "It's like a bad roller-coaster ride," says Ms. Howfield. Her station's full-day viewership is down 7.7% this TV season from the same period last year, according to Nielsen Co., and Ms. Howfield expects her ad revenue in 2009 will be down 30% from 2008.

Local television stations like Ms. Howfield's dominated the TV business for more than half a century. They inspired the term "network": a web of Channel 7s and 11s that delivered shows from ABC, CBS, NBC -- and later, Fox -- plus local news, syndicated reruns and talk shows. Because the stations owned the licenses to the airwaves that broadcast TV signals, big networks couldn't distribute content without them. In turn, local stations became the vehicles for the greatest mass-market advertising blitz in history.

Click the link to read the full article.