Broadcast letters: issue 20 June 2008

Burnham fails to understand TV today

Andy Burnham's desire to prevent any form of product placement on TV in the UK shows a total lack of understanding of the changing relationship between brands and viewers.

Online, where the viewing experience is increasingly made up of video, brands have become so integrated into the fabric of shows that they have become the IP creators themselves.

Kate Modern was created specifically by social network Bebo (using the people behind YouTube's LonelyGirl15) as an advertising vehicle. Before being killed off, Kate featured in more than 155 episodes and attracted 27 million views.

In the US In the Motherhood, which started as a web show funded by mobile company Sprint and Unilever hair brand Suave, is now being made into a mid-season comedy by ABC, taking the online stars of the show back onto the big screen after gaining an audience of 21 million online.

Hit NBC show Heroes may not even have been made had it not been for Nissan's early involvement. The car manufacturer funded a longer than normal 54-minute pilot as it believed in the concept so much.

As the TV experience migrates online and vice versa, Burnham's inability to move with the times is worrying in the extreme. He needs to look past the Coke cups on the American Idol judges' desk and see the bigger picture for the future health of the industry.
Name and address withheld

Dyke's ITV sums just don't add up
I am writing in reply to Greg Dyke's comments that ITV needs to slash its programming budget by £150m (Broadcast, 30/05/08).

He is using the budget as an easy target to argue that ITV underperforms financially in the eyes of the market. Anyone who produces content for ITV will agree that the network is not overly generous with its budgets. They will also attest that ITV seeks to mitigate its costs through the use of co-productions on many of its larger programmes, including the dramas Dyke is hesitant to encourage.

Quick-fix cost-cutting solutions are not the way to future-proof ITV in the digital age. Dyke should accept that quality content, in particular drama, has its place in any broadcaster's arsenal of assets and should not be excluded or marginalised owing to its higher production cost.

Compared with its peers in the top 10 non-state-run broadcasters in Europe, ITV's 2007 financial performance (using EBITDA) compares well to RTL, Prosieben and TF1, who are all around the 15% to 20% mark.

The path ITV should follow is to exploit its content on all available media, including digital, and operate its advertiser funded model more profitably. Greater investment should be made in choosing high quality content, and ITV should work more closely with the independent sector to tap into its creativity and knowledge of the consumer. 
Sarf Malik
Partner, Media Group, Vantis