Live From the LiveFronts

The LiveFronts offered an opportunity for a collection of producers and creators of live programming to fully explore the nature of their ecosystem and how it contributes and enriches and in some cases competes with the larger media environment through its use of established and expanding platforms such as Facebook Live Snapchat Twitter andamp160YouTube It is a growing and innovative sector of the industry and has the potential to change the way viewers interact with content and the way we valuate that interactionamp160Al Roker TV personality and weather forecaster for NBC39s Today show has become a force within the regularly scheduling live streaming marketplace and launched his own company called Roker Media to advance the cause He is excited by the immediacy and unpredictability of the live programming format quotWhat really seems to be resonating with viewers and consumers of video is live programmingquot Roker said quotAnd not just live for live39s sake but thoughtful engaging interesting programming with people that folks want to watch on a regularly scheduled basis with the spontaneity and unpredictability that live programming brings to the tablequotSome of the best moments that I39ve been involved with in my 40 years of television have happened livequot he continued quotThey can39t be planned they can39t be predicted But if you put the right ingredients together with the right people there39s a very good chance that good stuff happensquotMark McIntire CMO Roker Media noted that quotlive streaming regularly scheduled programming is comparatively new We are seeing that people are fascinated by the possibilities of interactivity and the opportunities it creates for brands and programmersquotJesse Redniss CoFounder BRaVe media noted that the reason for the LiveFronts was partly because the market is moving quickly after the Newfronts and the opportunity is there quotto take live streamed programming and make things happen monetize it track it and measure itquotSports Make for Premium Live Streaming Content amp8230 But TV is Still KingJim Bell Executive Producer of NBC Olympics is seeing a cultural shift in how viewers are consuming Olympics content amp160quotIt is a daunting and crazy moment in our futurequot he said The Rio Olympics had their share of challenges including the Zika virus politics crime and water pollution But the NBCU Rio coverage was a great success Bell declaredamp160quotIt was our most consumed Olympics ever There was more available content than ever they were the most dominant in terms ofamp160social mediaamp160everamp160and they were the most profitablequotThe amount of content available from an event like the Olympics has seen exponential growth amp160quotTwenty years ago in Atlanta there was a grand total 170 hours of the Olympicsquot Bell said quotFast forward 20 years and 170 hours has grown to nearly 7000 hours of content at the Rio Olympicsquotamp160amp160Curiously while 200 billion minutes of Olympic content were consumed from NBCU39s various platforms only 3 of the content was consumed onamp160digital according to Bell The rest was consumed on cable and broadcast quotDigital represents growth and our content will be focused on digital going forwardquot he said quotBut I was simultaneously confused and amused by the level of digital viewing for RioquotWhat About MeasurementThe issue of measurement looms large in this programming sector Unless we find ways of crediting viewing exposures engagement and other forms of consumption the ability to fully monetize the inventory is hampered amp160quotNielsen is still the standard by which things are measuredquot Bell admitted quotDoes it make sense all the time No but it is what we39ve got It is an accepted measurementquotDo we base audiences on social behaviors like shares and likes Some believe that this indicates engagement quotThe good thing about live programming is that it is easy to measurequot notedamp160David Wong Senior Vice Presidentamp160Digital Product Development at Nielsen amp160quotIt is consumed in a limited time frame while on demand can go on forever The number of views is a great measurement for live because views are an on demand type of measure Average view by minute is relevant for an advertiserquotConcentrate on Providing Great Content According to the PlatformWill Funk Executive Vice Presidentamp160Sales and Property Partnerships Turner noted that quotpeople will go to the best available screenquot to view content In the case of digital there are a range of platforms that viewers can utilize and content creation can be fluid and happily unexpected when it is liveClark Pierce Senior Vice President TV Everywhere at Fox Sports shared a moment of content serendipity Fox was interviewing Pete Rose for a digital video when according to Pierce quotPete Rose listed six things you can do when you are in a slump This went viral and it was a beautiful thingquotRich Greenfield Managing Director Media and Technology Analyst BTIG asked his panel if content owners should develop their own delivery platforms amp160quotThere is a difference between being a content provider and a platformquot replied Borja Perez Senior Vice Presidentamp160Digital and Social Media NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises quotWe are a content producer and we won39t be good at building platforms Our job is to create the content Platforms will come and go We should work with the available platforms and concentrate on how our content works on those platformsquotClick the social buttons above to share this story with your colleaguesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this commentary are exclusively the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc management or associated bloggers

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Charlene Weisler

Empowering Women in Media: Insights from Industry Leaders (Video) - By E.B. Moss

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