New research confirms the belief that the large shift of men 18-34 from television to the Internet is true. BIGresearch's latest Simultaneous Media Usage Survey of 13,000 men confirmed Nielsen's claim that the drop in television rating was due to shift in media usage from television to the Internet and other electronic media.
The survey found from August 2002 to October 2003, television viewership dropped 8.8 percent for men 18-24 and 12.2 percent for men 25-34. During the same period of time, BIGresearch found Internet usage among men 18-34 shot up about 7 percent and video game usage rose 5 percent.
It's time for network executives to stop squabbling and realize their long cherished model is changing. Television won't die but it will become something vastly different from what it is today. Execs can either roll with the changes and survive or continue to be stubborn and end up strolling the sidewalks with "Hire me" sandwich boards.
Dribbleglass has added to it's collection of "Billboards We'd Like to See." This billboard spoof for Hooters alludes to the real reason the restaurant chain is so popular and why it took the gamble and launched an airline.
Recently released figures from Siruis Satellite Radio and XM Satellite show subscriptions reached 1.6 million in 2003. XM, which launched earlier than Sirius, has 1.36 million subscribers. Sirius has 261,000. In the fourth quarter alone, XM added 430,000.
With radio having been free since its inception, it will take a while for consumers to realize the benefits (vastly improved sound quality, national coverage for every station and minimal commercials) of satellite radio and pony up the ten to twelve dollar per month subscription fee. Perhaps the single biggest boost, though, to satellite radio will be when, in two years, Howard Stern's contract ends and he leaves broadcast radio.
On his show today, he railed against station manager Tom Chiusano and the FCC for their continued censorship that sometimes, he claims, is quite illogical. Today, during a Benji bit that used the word Bukkake, much of the bit was bleeped which made the punch line of bit incoherent and un-funny. And the supposedly offending word, Bukkake, wasn't even what was bleeped.
If Stern moves from broadcast to satellite radio, that is when satellite will see an enormous jump in subscribers and broadcast will begin to feel serious competition from and financial loss to satellite radio.
Just when you think nothing could be more ridiculous that a person suing a fast food company for forcing them to eat their food and, thusly, making them fat, we now have a man who is suing his cable company for making his wife fat and his kids lazy. Timothy Dumouchel of West Bend, WI claims Charter Communications made his wife gain 50 pounds and his kids become lazy because Charter didn't turn his cable TV feed off after he cancelled his service allowing the family continued access to programming.
"I believe that the reason I smoke and drink every day and my wife is overweight is because we watched TV every day for the last four years," Dumouchel said in a written complaint against Charter.
Perhaps he hasn't heard today's televisions have advanced to the stage where they now have off buttons.
Comcast has been running an ad campaign that pokes fun at various TV shows one of which is "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy." The spoof has not been well received by the Pennsylvania Lesbian and Gay Task Force claiming the ads stereotype gay men as being effeminate and caring only about fashion. The groups also faults "Queer Eye" for pepetuating a narrow view of gay men. Perhaps a show about gay men sitting around staring at each other and talking about football might be more exciting?
Prior to her Las Vegas wedding dalliance with English language challenged Jason Allen Alexander, Britney was originally scheduled to appear in a different Vegas. Producers of the NBC drama, "Las Vegas" had been wooing Spears to appear on an episode as herself. Now, there's a lot of second guessing going on. Executive Producer Gary Scott Thompson was interested then "her little weekend [wedding] happened and we kind of went, 'I don't know if she's gonna want to do Vegas anymore."
My agency is promoting a concert which will benefit Rhode Island Station fire victims' families. For those of you who don't know, 100 lives were lost when pyrotechnics caught fire to sound insulation which then burned the Station nightclub to the ground in a matter of minutes.
The concert, on January 22nd at 7PM at the Dunkin Donuts Center in Providence, will feature the old rocker bands Foreigner, Starship and John Cafferty of the Beaver Brown Band. If would like to support this cause or just to come to a concert featuring some good old rockers, visit TicketMaster or call 401-331-2211 or 617-931-2000.
Jon Bon Jove and John Elway, who both own Arena Football Teams, are appearing together in a new two minute commercial which will promote the league and air in 400 Regal Entertainment Group theaters. In the spot, Bon Jovi and Elway pit their teams against each other in an in-house football game that reults in mayhem. Thanks to Adrants reader Jeff for submitting this.
Two new weekly magazines, "Nuts" from IPC and "Zoo Weekly" from Emap, focusing on sports and humor are launching this month in England. In typical U.S. fashion, the idea will be stolen and imported to America but U.S. publishers and analysts think the effort will fail.
"In Britain, the actual exposure to magazines is so great. Everybody kind of walks past stacks of magazines several times a day, said Ed Needham, a Brit who launched FHM in the U.S. and now edits Rolling Stone. "Weekly magazines here are very much bought by women at supermarket checkouts."
"The issue is where do you put the magazines," agrees consultant Steve Rosenfield of Media Resource Group. "Twenty-year-old guys dont frequent anywhere that they come into contact with magazines."
Besides, with "Cargo" and "Vitals" and "Stuff" andMaximin" and "FHM" and "Razor" and "GQ" and "Esquire" and "Sports Illustrated" and "Men's Health" and "Details" and "Ramp" and the countless other male-focused magazines combined with a drop in magazine readership, success looks far from a sure thing.
Like the cheap looking ads you see in the back of obscure business to business magazines, San Diego web hosting company, cari.net, has, knowing its target audience, capitalized on the male obsession with the female breast in its own equally cheap looking ad in ComputerUser Atlanta Magazine. The ad carries the headline, "Our Software is so Powerful...even Stay-at-Home Moms can run a profitable Web Hosting Business," and is accompanied by a picture of a mom breastfeeding her baby while working on her laptop.
While one might categorize this sort of ad as trashy, I can guarantee you there or Moms out there who have done this and more while breastfeeding to get through their busy day. It does speak to a certain life-reality that is mundane, sexy, awkward voyeuristic, beautiful, embarrassing to see and normal all at the same time. Thanks to Adrants reader Anthony for submitting this.
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