π a few thoughts about why TV Listings lasted for so many decades, where the NYT (and others) are today, and what could be worth investing in going forward
to be clear:
it's Sunday and I'm waiting for water to boil so please note this is all stream of conscious and tbh not that urgent or important (esp not important) but I'm feeling nostalgic for the days when I'd stare at grids and tables in the paper
TIL: In 1938, the NYT ran TV listings as part of its recurring summary of radio listings!
For decades to come, the NYT would get broadcast schedules (lots of PR folks started off with this job) and go from producing lists to creating tables with succinct summaries of what's on
Since the NYT (and many other papers who produced/syndicated TV Listings) was as much an aggregator as a publisher... many people relied (in part) on their newspaper to tell them what to watch.
The paper structured + distributed data.
tbh - sounds more like Google > NYT
Now... well... the algorithm killed the TV listings star (woof, sorry!)
But kinda?
Streaming/on-demand + algorithmic suggestions + data aggregators (search, social) nullified the need for viewers to rely on their newspaper to tell them what's on tonight.
π all of the above is probably obvious (and tedious) to most people reading these tweets. I'll cut to it.
I find the NYT's pivot to "criticism" and "recommendations" as a last gasp effort to stay in a game they've already lost.
It was good business for the NYT (and other papers) to structure + package + distribute TV listing data.
- Cheap to produce
- Leveraged their distribution advantages
- Solved a core problem for subscribers
The NYT (and many others) have lost this part of their business.
How have publishers replaced their TV Listings?
- Episode recaps
- Critic's Reviews (solo or bundled into updated lists)
I personally love these (esp the AV Club & Vulture) but I also know they aren't exactly booming businesses (or even that cheap to sustain, sadly!)
If anything... the demise of NYT Watching (still a great newsletter, but the actual standalone investment didn't work out) helps provide some evidence that this is a hard business (at the moment)
I've got a 1/2 baked idea: publishers should try structuring data (again)!
Huh? WTF "publishers should try structuring data again?"
Well... I look at the growth of @presubscribe, Onlyfans/Cameo, Twtich, etc... and think about how an entire generation(s) is discovering + consuming media in entirely new ways.
How can a newsroom help navigate this?
I can squint and see an outcome where the successor of the TV Listing could be a...
- Leaderboard (with editorial oversight) for the thousands of creators all over the internets
- Schedule charting a creator's prior and upcoming work
- Map showing connections between creators
(clearly the water is already boiling and I'm feeling guilty... gonna end this)
I'm a huge fan of TV criticism, but I see the future business more in the hands of journalists like @loudmouthjulia & @Lucas_Shaw reporting out how the entertainment industry is constantly changing
also something something metaverse (does that get me some bot attention?)
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@nbashaw during the holiday break, I started to outline a novel idea in Bear and just took it to Lex.
A few notes:
1. The editor is great
2. Small issue (I'm using @browsercompany's Arc) is that as I get near the bottom of my screen, the scroll doesn't always catch-up
@nbashaw@browsercompany 3. Summarize + distill what I wrote into themes is pretty incredible! It's not earth shattering but it def was more succinct than my initial phrasing and helped me go back and narrow
@nbashaw@browsercompany 4. Typing +++ when I was either stuck or at a more natural pause was mixed.
I would often get feedback that was actually counter to what I was trying to explore (like... what if you just threw away the central plot device and used X plot device instead).
π to the team at Wired for their tireless efforts to sell more digital subscriptions. π to @nxthompson for sharing granular data + lessons learned wired.com/story/wired-paβ¦
(feel free to mute me... I'm gonna share a few thoughts based off of what was shared in that post!)
π that stood out to me was how much of a focus is on a funnel of individual articles --> sell subscriptions.
Especially this breakdown of the "top 10 articles" that sold subscriptions for us.
My π₯ π£οΈ ... I don't think its that valuable to think of selling subscriptions off of articles!
I don't think people pay for Netflix b/c of a single show/movie, pay for Spotify to listen to an album/song, etc, etc...
Lots of convos this week about Quartz, NY Mag, The Correspondent, etc, etc...
I want to take a moment to π one of my favorite publications of the last (approx) year: @cleantheglass (run by @bencfalk)
If you are a π fan or just someone who cares about publishing... <thread>
Backstory: Ben Falk is a former NBA executive who worked for the Portland Trailblazers and Philadelphia 76ers. He broke down film, produced new ways of looking at stats, and helped teams make decisions
Ben started Cleaning the Glass as a subscription product that offered: analysis of players, teams, and games. There were message boards too. It was a bit like Stratechery for NBA nerds.
+Ben let early customers know he'd be rolling out more advanced stats and features.