Every weekday in 2014, I'll be keeping an eye on what's happening in the media. My focus will be on some of my favorite subjects...the moguls, the pundits, the broadcast news biz, show business, and the publishing business. (Read "$everance" if you want a crystallization of my positions on those subjects.) And, of course, I'll also keep tabs on Chicago's media.
Chicago Media
~The Radio Producer's Handbook Goes West
Yesterday I talked to a professor at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. He told me that he uses "The Radio Producer's Handbook" to show his screenwriting students how to come up with ideas (we have a whole chapter in the book about that). Who knew?
~The Tribune News App
This sounds like an interesting development for Chicago news junkies. From the article...
The Newsbeat app aggregates content from hundreds of newspapers and websites, voicing some 7,000 national and local stories each day through announcers and text-to-speech technology. Available free for iOS and Android devices, the format includes local weather and traffic updates in real time.I'd like to hear more about this text-to-speech technology. My former-voice-over-talent radar just went off. That sounds like a very bad future trend for people who make money with their voices.
The Moguls
~Netflix CEO Admits Net Neutrality Is Already Dead
In this piece he complains about having to pay Comcast more to get higher speed internet (at a price that most companies or individuals can't afford--thereby giving big companies an even bigger edge). That's what Net Neutrality was supposed to prevent. The open internet as we've known it all these years is over. And Comcast wants even more control over the internet, with it's potential merger with Time Warner Cable. There are only a handful of people who benefit from that merger. The CEO of Time Warner Cable is one of them. He stands to personally make $80 million by screwing over his customers and clients. Nice work if you can get it.
~Liberty Media is the Most Profitable Media Company
They own a large stake in Sirius/XM radio, if you're wondering who they are. Their CEO is John Malone, and he's the one who forced Mel Karmazin to scram.
The Radio Biz
~This American Life Loses It's Distributor
The NPR show has been distributed by Public Radio International for nearly twenty years, but Variety reports at the link that the two sides couldn't come to an agreement to continue the relationship. This American Life says they will have a new distribuor in place soon...but at the moment, they don't have one.
