Friday media highlights
Here are some of the day’s top stories in the media industry:
TV Networks Fight Drug-Ad Measure (WSJ) “Advertising costs are deductible to any company as a business expense. The plan being considered by Rep. Rangel’s Ways and Means committee would eliminate the deduction with respect to prescription drug advertising,” writes Martin Vaughan.
Big media seek 21st century business models (Reuters) “Media moguls at this week’s Sun Valley conference have spent as much time discussing how to reconfigure business models disrupted by the Web as they have worrying about the weak economy,” reports Yinka Adegoke.
Zucker Says Marketplace Has Reached Bottom (B&C) Ben Grossman writes: “NBC Universal chief Jeff Zucker said Thursday that while the overall marketplace is still challenged, he thinks it may have bottomed out. ‘It’s still quite uncertain and we don’t really see the full recovery we are all hoping for,’ he said. ’It’s still tough out there, but I think we have seen a bottom.’”
The Financial Times and New York Times make further syndication deals (Editors Weblog) “Both the Financial Times and the New York Times have announced their international syndications will include additional countries. The FT has confirmed content sharing arrangements with publications based in Turkey, France, and South Korea,” writes Christie Silk.
NBC Reveals Displeasure as U.S.O.C. Unveils Plan (NYT) Richard Sandomir writes: “The head of NBC Sports said Thursday that he broke off talks in April about combining the Olympic channel that it partly owns with the one being planned by the United States Olympic Committee.”
AP Works Toward Universal Online News Format (Mediapost) Gavin O’Malley writes: “The Associated Press, along with fellow non-profit The Media Standards Trust, on Friday unveiled a digital news “microformat” to effectively encapsulate the content and key meta-data of every news story online.”
Now showing: The cable show
The big story in the media for the rest of the week is the annual National Cable Telecommunications Association Show, or “the cable show,” as its commonly called.
This year’s primary topic looks like it will be how the big, traditional operators in the business will adapt to an age when the Internet is giving people more options to watch shows, and not always in a way that feeds the bank.
Here is our own take on the show from the Reuters wire:
Both sets of companies will be brainstorming on how to cope with or benefit from disintermediation: consumers can now watch decent-quality video online whenever they want, and often for free.
“Last year, cable companies were in a more probelgradetectionist mode but now they’re facing up to the inevitable trend, because online video is really here to stay,” said Tuna Amobi, equity analyst at Standard & Poor’s.
Executives will also have the economy on their minds.
“The current recession has cut into consumer spending for household TV and telecommunications, while also causing most marketers to reduce their advertising budgets,” said Collins Stewart analyst Thomas Eagan.
