(Subscriber Report) Ed Martin Live at TCA: The CW at TCA: Ashton Kutcher Explains the Future of Advertising in the Digital Era

The CWenjoyed a quiet, controversy free day at the Television Critics Associationtour yesterday, with a largely warm and fuzzy reception from reporters for two of its fall shows, the high-school vampire drama The Vampire Diaries and the revival of Melrose Place; and its feel-good midseason drama Life UneXpected. I would argue that Life – the story of a 16 year old girl given up for adoption at birth who reconnects with her birth parents, both of whom were in high school when she was conceived -- is the best of The CW's upcoming new series and deserving of a high profile fall launch rather than a riskier midseason birth. Unfortunately, Life won't land on the schedule until a show on The CW tanks or goes away for a long rest, probably in early 2010.

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Twittering has been huge during this TCA tour, so it was only fitting that The CW's morning would be significantly energized by the arrival of Twitter King Ashton Kutcher, one of the executive producers of the network's new series The Beautiful Life: TBL, about young and not-so-young models struggling to survive in New York City. This is the one new CW show that hasn't received instant love from the TCA, in part because members have seen only a half-hour presentation rather than a full pilot, in part because it counts among its stars the talent-challenged tabloid queen Mischa Barton, and also because critics aren't wild about the title. Yes, the redundant TBL really does belong at the end of it. Kutcher said this is "a reflection of the digital era, because you write e-mails and it's like, I don't want to write the whole The Beautiful Life, so we just head them TBL."

The session for TBL would have been nothing special at all, especially since Barton and the show's male lead, Ben Hollingsworth, were busy shooting in NYC and could not attend. (Hollingsworth is featured in two of the presentation's most memorable scenes, one in which he is made to strip in the middle of an office and another in which he is fondled by a lecherous male modeling executive.) But Kutcher and his long-time producing partner Jason Goldbergalways liven up an event.

One giggling critic, trying to compose a question for Kutcher, admitted that she was "trying to tweet as we talk."

"How is that going?" Kutcher asked, turning on the charm.

"Not very well," the critic giggled.

"Do you want me to do it for you?" Kutcher asked.

"You actually could?" the critic squealed.

He didn't.

Another critic asked, given the fact that the number of people who follow Kutcher on Twitter is greater than the audience for many television programs, might the day come when he decides to turn away from the networks and studios and just produce content for his Twitter feed?

"I don't think I'll ever have to say 'enough TV' because I think the two mediums will eventually merge into one," the suddenly very serious Kutcher replied. "I don't think it's one or the other. I think it's both, and I think our goal is to be there when they merge and already have an established understanding [and] awareness of that space. We have a Web show that we produced called Katalyst HQ that actually had an audience of 9 million on the Web, which is more than a lot of cable shows, a lot of shows. Networks would actually love to have that number. So we have 9 million viewers on a Web show that we syndicated through social networks."

"I do think there is a certain point in time when we as an industry figure out the economics of digital media and advertisers start to understand the digital landscape and the impact that it can have on an audience and the engagement that the audience has on that platform," Kutcher continued. "The ad dollars will gradually shift over into that medium, at which point in time we as a business can become more financially sound. Then we can start to figure out how the unions are going to cut up the pie. Then we can actually start an industry of digital media that will converge with television."

That's all well and good for the future, but for now, if the TCA's response is any indication, Kutcher's going to have to learn to make a better show for television. Either that or allow TBL to become so cheesy bad it will be too good to miss. It's halfway there already.

CW Entertainment President Dawn Ostroff(photo) didn't have very much to say about her new and returning series that TCA members hadn't heard before, but she offered an interesting factoid about Twitter. "People are tweeting about The CW once a minute, and that's not me sitting in my office tweeting alone," she said. The network's signature show, Gossip Girl, has "nearly one and a half million fans on Facebook," Ostroff beamed, adding that the aging One Tree Hill has "more than 1 million."

The CW/TCA love fest was so happy and relaxed nobody even griped about some of the promotional taglines for the network's new Tuesday lineup, comprised of 90210 and Melrose. They include "Tuesdays are a Bitch" and "Tuesday's the New Humpday," potentially offensive choices for a network that aggressively targets women 18-34, the younger the better. Somebody somewhere is apt to complain about one or both of these slogans, especially the "Humpday" thing, but such complaints won't be coming from members of the TCA. This group has definitely mellowed with the recent influx of anything goes dot-com kids, many of whom appear to be here primarily to tweet the catchiest comments from each press conference. They keep very busy sending them to each other during sessions. Seriously.