Leno, Late Night

There's been a huge amount of media covering NBC's late night fracas over their rescheduling of Jay Leno. His Tonight Show, which was #1 in the ratings, was given to Conan O'Brien in Sept of 09 and the ratings plummeted. Leno was moved to 10pm, normally a time spot for one hour dramas on network tv, and the ratings plummeted for both time slots. So NBC tries to compromise by putting Leno back in the tonight show slot and moving O'Brien after him--as it was before. O'Brian refused, and now has received a 30 million dollar severance from NBC.

This shows not only why NBC was sold to Comcast (cable nets have a much less expensive cost model than broadcast tv), but also the archaic state of broadcast. The local stations need a strong lead in at 10 for their profitable 11pm local news (tho I must admit I never watch any of these shows).

It's not that there isn't good content--look at 30 Rock, The Office, etc...it's just that it doesn't need to be scheduled in the same way as before. As I point out in my lecture "From 3 to 3 Million"-when there were only 3 networks, they could control what and when shows were watched. People built habits and had destinations to go to for viewing. This largely continued through cable's glory years as well--viewing against broadcast went down; but the model was essentially the same.

Then along came the DVR, best exemplified by Tivo, and then of course You Tube and Internet Video. Facebook, twittter, etc.

NBC's lessons are many--while broadcast tv is changing--don't make too many changes. It won't be like this much longer in a world which is increasingly "on-demand". Don't try to save money by going against the wind . And by all means keep focused on your content, cable channels, and web video.

And, as a final note--can late night ever be the same in the era of consumer choice, billions of hours of online video and easy to use time shifting devices? As late night changes, so will other time slots.

So much viewing throughout the day goes to You Tube, etc. Can topical humor be scheduled anymore, or is it, once again, on-demand and available 24-7?

Keep your talent focused on its targeted demos at the right time (Leno-older audience, etc).

Broadcast TV still draws the largest share of household viewing. Hold onto your slots!