Dawn Osteroff Is Galactically Stupid
Apr. 24th, 2008 01:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
heidiAnd yes, I know the risks involved in my criticizing a WB exec, but given the issues between the CW and WB itself these days, I hope nobody will get too irked at me.
Wired has an article today about Ms Osteroff's recent decision about Gossip Girl:
As Wired says, "hundreds of thousands of viewers who were watching directly on the CW's site will either have to tune in or turn to P2P networks to download the show illegally...." This Monday's episode drew in 2.44 million viewers, which is only 1% higher than the last pre-strike episode, although the 18 - 49 demo did go up by 7% from the pre-strike average.
Dawn herself told TV guide in an interview that ran last week, "The streaming numbers are quite large." But she doesn't seem to care, or she only thinks of iTunes in terms of streaming, perhaps. TVByTheNumbers said, "People watch on the web so they can watch it if they missed it on TV or just so they can watch whenever they want. With those people, for the most part, if you make it inconvenient? They just won’t watch at all."
They're right; most of us self-select our tv-watching times by time-shifting the programs we want to see.
It's long seemed that Dawn either doesn't care about certain (large) segments of the audience, or doesn't understand certain (large) segments of the audience. And I'm curious as to what is going into her business decisions.
Wired has an article today about Ms Osteroff's recent decision about Gossip Girl:
She's shutting down streams. From now until the end of the season, all new episodes can only be seen on Monday nights at 9 p.m. in front of the TV, recorded on DVR or via iTunes.
As Wired says, "hundreds of thousands of viewers who were watching directly on the CW's site will either have to tune in or turn to P2P networks to download the show illegally...." This Monday's episode drew in 2.44 million viewers, which is only 1% higher than the last pre-strike episode, although the 18 - 49 demo did go up by 7% from the pre-strike average.
Dawn herself told TV guide in an interview that ran last week, "The streaming numbers are quite large." But she doesn't seem to care, or she only thinks of iTunes in terms of streaming, perhaps. TVByTheNumbers said, "People watch on the web so they can watch it if they missed it on TV or just so they can watch whenever they want. With those people, for the most part, if you make it inconvenient? They just won’t watch at all."
They're right; most of us self-select our tv-watching times by time-shifting the programs we want to see.
It's long seemed that Dawn either doesn't care about certain (large) segments of the audience, or doesn't understand certain (large) segments of the audience. And I'm curious as to what is going into her business decisions.
Re: Dawn Osteroff Is Galactically Stupid
Date: 2008-04-24 07:09 pm (UTC)Hm, I'd wonder about 'new media' costs now being figured into paying writers where iTunes is paid downloads and CW is 'free' downloads. After all, Supernatural also got a budget cut for S4 and Smallville... Heh, the actors want out and even the writers dumped it.
Re: Dawn Osteroff Is Galactically Stupid
Date: 2008-04-26 12:21 am (UTC)Why?
Re: Dawn Osteroff Is Galactically Stupid
Date: 2008-04-28 03:30 pm (UTC)Bandwidth costs money and I thought they were budgeting to cover more writer costs. Also, where did you gather streaming for a week or three afterwards wouldn't equate to extra payments? Streaming is still 'repeating' and advertising revenue is incorporated into these online eps. Just curious because that's how I initially translated some of the early proposals.