Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Thursday, June 22nd, 2023

It isn't often that I get to compare Warner Bros. Discovery to Sears Roebuck.

Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Thursday, June 22nd, 2023.

A COUPLE OF PROGRAMMING NOTES
* The Department of Corrections: As several of you pointed out to me, Project Greenlight aired on HBO, not Bravo. 

* My apologies for the lateness of today's newsletter. I have a couple of big interviews coming tomorrow (including a follow-up with the infamous Apple TV+ executive) and those discussions pushed back my daily workflow quite a bit.

CONTENT DISCOVERY AND FAST CHANNELS
It's no secret that content discovery on the average SVOD ranges from "passable" to "impossible." But assuming you know what streamer your favorite show might be on, there is a reasonable chance you can find it with a bit or work.

FAST channels are all the rage in streaming television, with nearly every content owner rolling out various themed free ad-supported channels (FAST) as well as one devoted to a specific series. And they are everywhere. I don't know that anyone has an accurate estimate of how many FAST channels are available somewhere right now. I attempted to figure that out and gave up once I got past 300. 

The thing about FAST channels is that they are the opposite of appointment television. They are primarily designed for people to randomly run across and decide "what the hell, I'll watch this for awhile."

And while that worked very well in the earliest days of the FAST revolution, we are now at a point where even some of the biggest streamers such as Peacock have a full lineup of FAST channels. There are stand-alone FAST aggregators such as Pluto TV, Tubi and Plex, which also include some amount of titles on demand. Various Smart TVs now com bundled with FAST channels and even some smaller vMVPD's like Philo have a small complement of them.

The general programming theory has seemed to be that you take a bunch of stuff that doesn't bring enough value to be part of a SVOD service, throw it into a FAST channel and see what happens. It's all basically the same, right? Sure, the costs of the programming might change from channel to channel (although many of them are essentially bartered out for a slice of the ad revenue), but the advertising is what matters, not so much where its seen.

But I suspect the next step in the growth of FAST channels is the addition of genre specific FAST aggregators. A classic TV and kids programming-only Pluto-like service would be able to super-serve these genre audiences. And while many current FAST channels are included as part of numerous services, there are many that still have limited distribution. A genre-specific FAST aggregator would be able to offer an super-engaged audience. And one that might make it worthwhile for content holders to create pop-up FAST channels just for that service. 

After speaking to a few people, the biggest challenge to this idea is one that will sound familiar to anyone who has ever tried to negotiate a carriage agreement between a MVPD and a large media company. In an increasing number of cases, the companies who hold the licensing rights have multiple existing FAST networks and are requiring FAST aggregators to take all of them or get nothing. That take-it-or-leave-it approach works great for the rights holder in the short run. But it also limits the amount of innovation that companies can make, because it limits their ability to create niche services.

Remember NBC's ill-fated comedy-oriented streaming service Seeso? A $3.99 per month subscription cost was unsustainable for several reasons. But imagine Seeso as a free, ad-supported streaming service that focused on nothing but comedy? Or Paramount rolling out a FAST aggregated MTV service, which included a healthy complement of streaming music channels as well as documentaries and concerts from across the decades? There is a lot of that material already streaming on the smaller services and they could be sublicensed into pop-up FAST channels for the MTV streamer. For instance, a "Crackle Music" FAST channel would aggregate a lot of the music content currently streaming on that service.

There are a lot of chances for innovation in the FAST world, and the best thing is that entry point is relatively modest. Which in 2023, is a solid selling point for any streaming video idea.

Do you work in the FAST universe? Have some thoughts or feedback? Respond directly to this newsletter or email me at rick@allyourscreens.com

'SELL IT AGAIN, SAM'
Hits Daily Double is reporting that Warner Bros. Discovery is negotiating to sell about half of the Warner film and TV music rights for about $500 million. Variety has a rundown of some of the music that might be involved and it is a truly insane list of assets:

While it is unclear exactly which assets are on the table, one source says that the rights to “slightly less than half” of the catalog, with a price of around $500 million, are likely to go to a major label, with Sony said to be in the lead. The catalog is believed to include music from such films as “Purple Rain,” “Evita,” “Sweeney Todd,” “Rent” several “Batman” films and many more titles, as well as songs included in films such as “As Time Goes By” from “Casablanca” — iconic titles to be sure, but again, it is unclear exactly which rights are in play. Top attorney Allen Grubman is said to be overseeing the deal for Warner Discovery CEO David Zaslav.

If you are running Warner Bros. Discovery and have such little understanding of what Warner Brothers means that you think selling off the rights to "As Time Goes By" is a good idea....well, that certainly tells me you don't have a management team in place that I would want to invest it.

As I have been arguing since before the Discovery/Warner Media merger, this entire process is very familiar to those of us who have followed the exploits of big private equity firms. They operate not to build the long-term value of the company or even to ensure that the company survives past their run as owners. They are almost entirely interested in cutting costs to boost stock prices long enough to cash in their shares. If that requires selling off assets that most people would consider essential, then so be it. It's nothing personal. It's all about the money and every decision made by the Warner Bros. Discovery management seems to follow that plan.

I recently read a piece about the decline of Sears and was reminded that despite the way most people remember it, what killed Sears wasn't so much Amazon or a changing marketplace but equity fund owners who combined bad business decisions with a desire to strip-mine the company of every valuable asset in order to line their own pockets:

Finally, Lampert also had Sears sell off $3 billion of its physical properties in 2015 to a fund called Seritage Growth Properties. Lampert was chairman of Seritage's board of trustees. Sears went from owning its storefronts outright to often having to pay rent to stay in them — rent that, once again, Lampert benefited from.

This is not the way to operate a healthy business. This is the way to extract value. This is a story of corporate spinoffs and financial engineering to suck money out of Sears and into the pockets of Lampert and his fellows. The whole thing bears a striking resemblance to how Bain Capital and other private equity funds cannibalized Toys 'R' Us.

Now I am not arguing that David Zaslav is financially self-dealing at that level. But all of his decisions are based around needing as much freed capital as possible in order to pay down the debt that resulted from the merger. An independent Warner Media would likely have its own challenges right now. But it wouldn't be considering a sale of some of the very assets that makes it a major media company.

ODDS AND SODS
* I have to admit that I disagree with about 95% of his newsletter today, but David Poland is a smart guy. So even when he has a wildly different take on David Zaslav than I do, he is well worth reading.

* Vulture's Joe Adalian has an update on the goings-on at TCM and one of the things he's reporting is that the network recently considered ending the practice of producing outros for its feature presentations. Which just sounds so-short-sighted and an idea that will burn through much more goodwill while not saving all that much money.

* Today's 70s Song You Should Know is"Dancing In The Moonlight" by Boffalongo.

TWEET OF THE DAY

NO, WAIT MAYBE *THIS* IS THE TWEET OF THE DAY

WHAT'S NEW FOR FRIDAY:
* An Unforgettable Year - Spring (Um Ano Inesquecível - Primavera) (Prime Video)
* At Home With Genevieve Series Premiere (Crackle)
* Carpool Karaoke: The Series (Apple TV+)
* Catching Killers Season Premiere (Netflix)
* Gold Rush: Mine Rescue With Freddy And Juan Season Premiere (Discovery)
* I'm A Virgo Series Premiere (Prime Video)
* iNumber Number: Jozi Gold (Netflix)
* King Of Clones (Netflix)
* Make Me Believe (Netflix)
* Pokémon Ultimate Journeys: The Series (Netflix)
* Quicksand (Shudder)
* Swagger Season Two Premiere (Apple TV+)
* The Last Drive-in With Joe Bob Briggs Season Premiere (Shudder)
* The Perfect Find (Netflix)
* Through My Window: Across The Sea (Netflix)
* World's Best (Disney+)

Click Here to see the list of all of the upcoming premiere dates for the next few months.

SEE YOU FRIDAY!

If you have any feedback, send it along to Rick@AllYourScreens.com and follow me on Twitter @aysrick.