Though Jennifer Holt wrote her "Vertical Vision: Deregulation, Industrial Economy, and Prime-Time Design" article in 2003, things like media consolidation and industrial interests are definitely still around. Within the last year alone we’ve seen 20th Century Fox’s holdings recede into the “Disney Vault” as part of a merger between the two behemoths. Self-dealing continues to be the subject of many of lawsuits, not least of which with the highest rated show on TV, in the case of AMC with The Walking Dead.
But in the years since her article came out, our understanding of what constitutes “network” and “ownership” has drastically shifted. Now that the industry is more awake to the online/streaming preference of most consumers, we are now going to perhaps better understand where our content is actually coming from. As Holt note in her piece, it wasn’t (and, probably, isn’t) uncommon for viewers to be unaware how many corporations have their hands in a single show:
For example, currently Warner Bros. (or a subsidiary) is producing ER, Friends and The West Wing for NBC rather than funneling these programmes directly to their own WB Network. Fox Television produces two of ABC’s most popular programmes, Dharma & Greg and The Practice, CBS’s Judging Amy, as well as one of WB’s flagship hits: buggy the Vampire Slayer.
… Disney still sells Felicity and Popular to WB instead of to their subsidiary ABC, and Paramount Television is producing two hits for CBS rivals — Frasier for NBC and Sabrina for WB.
But it’s become something that those behind the scenes are increasingly paying attention to, especially as the “willed affinity” that John Caldwell alludes to in his article “Convergence Television.”
Far from monolithic, the television industry is actually comprised of many very different local industries locked into a world of ‘willed affinity.’ This affinity stands as a convenient common front for ‘the industry’ only as long as business relations can guarantee stable markets and economies of scale.
At first, networks were fine seeing streaming platforms (then mostly Hulu, Netflix, and maybe Amazon Prime) as an extension of themselves for the sake of willed affinity. Television had always been done on the cheap, always looking for easy ways to repurpose and recycle. Why not see if your show could find an audience on a streaming platform — heck, you might even hit it big and see a boost in ratings/notoriety, as is the case with the likes of Breaking Bad, Riverdale, and The Good Place.
I thought of this 30 Rock clip many times during this week's readings, not only because they discuss vertical integration in detail, but because it shows what networks were preoccupied with around the time (shortly after) that both Caldwell and Holt were writing.
But because of the ease that came with utilizing online sites as an outlet, many “established” networks were caught behind on the streaming game. It took until the late aughts for them to wake up and smell the accessibility that emphasizing online platforms gave them. And during that time Netflix had actually successfully built a platform akin to “something for everyone,” if such a thing was possible. Sure they lacked a lot, but in terms of TV they made it simple, intuitive, and easy to watch on and on and on.
Everything about Netflix’s strategy seemed intent on building off of what they’d learned from years of audiences bingeing television on their service, flouting the established rules of television. They dropped TV shows in the traditional off-periods, like Fridays, holiday seasons, or summertime. Their productions were alternately grand and specific, focusing on communities not often seen on TV. And though Slate’s Willa Paskin commented at the time that AMC’s careful eking out of Breaking Bad over several years contributed to the “pent-up demand for more episodes” that Netflix could harness — a demand the platform “can never quite foster for itself” because of its release structure — Netflix leaned into binge mode, dropping every show all at once. Netflix had genericized show after show, all while building up a legitimate competition to the brands in question.
So networks started to built within, not just out. And what we’re faced with now is a shift in how audiences and providers alike will think of their content as a “brand.” Audience may have to understand better where they’ll be able to find their favorite shows, since now they’re being brought to “in-house” streaming services rather than just farmed out to the highest bidder.* By having their own streaming service, companies can further develop their “brand,” while cashing in on the viewers who want to be endlessly streaming (and restreaming) their shows, but they need to think strategically about how to actually make that service appealing in a period with a glut of streaming platforms all clamoring for our money and eyeballs. (Or, at least, we hope.)
Some services have already started doing this: Disney, never one to miss out on opportunity to really underscore their brand, now strategizes its content across Disney+ (with a focus of: family-friendly) and Hulu (more adult, established, shows, especially from the Fox side of the productions). Others are banking on the IP that has already proved to be a lucrative commodity in the streaming landscape to be enough of a brand name for them: NBC’s Peacock will get exclusive rights to The Office, which has found a second life among streaming.
Creators aren’t immune either. In the 17 years since Holt’s article came out, more and more networks have brought their production in-house. While it may have been done in some cases out of sheer necessity (the aforementioned AMC started making shows because they couldn’t find people to partner with) it’s also because by creating a studio to produce original series, networks were benefitting from a multi-revenue stream business for each show. With AMC Productions responsible for The Walking Dead, AMC could benefit from:
- Increased advertising rates (from the massive ratings it raked in)
- The sale of The Walking Dead to any “syndication” offers, whether overseas (like Lovefilm in the U.K.) or online (Netflix’s Canada and U.S. libraries)
Even services like Netflix have to move on to a new phase of being — after all, a different sort of “willed affinity” is on the parts of all of us, who think of it as just an extension of what we understand a network/production house/entertainment conglomerate. Over the next few years we’re going to get a better understanding of what is a viable business and what isn’t in this new format of television. The answer to that isn’t consistent for Netflix, in the same way it isn’t (and certainly hasn’t been) for the networks themselves.
As brands shift, perhaps the most interesting thing will be how we value a single television show. It’s no longer enough to make up a certain amount of ad or syndication revenue, the lines that used to clearly demarcate appropriate and inappropriate vertical and horizontal integration are increasingly blurring. As Amanda Lotz writes in We Now Disrupt this Broadcast: “Did it matter how many viewed it in the days, weeks, or months immediately following its release? How do we assess the value of a show that becomes part of a library in perpetuity?”
*For fun: here’s a quiz about where your shows are headed in the next year as streaming services continue to open their digital doors. Can you pass? Click to expand if you want to just take it here on the site (assuming I posted this right).
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