The Daytime Emmys aired last night. This was an unusual year. The major broadcast networks didn't want to air the show, so a production firm (ATI) cobbled together a deal that used an "available" night owned by MGM on the CW (which is owned by CBS). The show was shipped to smaller venue (The Orpheum in Los Angeles).
Production wise, others with more inside knowledge have far more knowledgeable stuff to say than I. I will say I personally thought the show elevated the game over previous years, without screeching fans who drowned out the actors, and comedians dashing through banquet-style dinner tables screeching about the show. The CW broadcast was carefully constructed to promote CW fall shows (which should appeal to soap fans).
The only weakness of the show was that too much time was allocated to early awards, and Vanessa Williams (beautiful, talented) got one song too many to sing (to promote her forthcoming album)...and this led to a tribute for 72-year old Guiding Light be cut off, omitted 10-second clip packages for the final (big) awards, and the best show winner not having time for a speech.
Errol at Soap Opera Network (via Twitter) has said that, on this little network, smaller viewership numbers are expected. He has also said that if the show didn't pull in 2 million viewers, it may be toast in the future.
Emmy Ratings: Telecast pulls in 2.4 HH Rating with approximately 3 million viewiers! Highest Ratings on The CW in many months!)
But my main point is that, more fully than ever before, this broadcast showed that the BLOGOSPHERE has emerged as the "journalists of record" at the Daytime Emmys.
Evidence:
1. On the CW pre-show, "expert panelists" handicapped the awards. Two of the three panelists (Jamey Giddens of DaytimeConfidential.com; Nelson Branco of TVGuide.ca) have mostly on-line followings. Only SOD's Stephanie Sloane was the lone print refugee. (Did anyone think she lost some credibility by arguing that Peter Reckell and Days of our Lives should win, when her Days-love was roundly criticized last summer?)
5. Twittering stars provided real-time "you are there" perspectives. Michael Muhney wins top prize for showing his co-stars in the Orpheum seats, but Christian Leblanc wins "artistic merit" for showing the red carpet from an actor's POV!
Is there really any relevance left for the print press in this situation?
It's hard to know what this all means? Does it mean that (like many niche genres) "buzz" for soaps has now really left mainstream press, and moved to the blogosphere? And that a movement to the media-of-the-future bodes well for the future of the genre?
Or is it that, in the last gasp of a dying industry, "free" media is the only one that will still cover the industry?
As a soap fan whose love of daytime is DNA-coded, I hope it is the former!
Friends, thanks to those who have emailed and wondered if I abandoned blogging. No. Four things have kept me away: (a) Work, work and more work, (b) A spate of family illnesses and deaths, (c) I made an email switch, and thus missed many of your comments (they should have been forwarded, but were not), and (d) I felt like I was beginning to repeat myself. So, it felt like a good time to let things gestate. The advantage of doing a blog simply as a diary of my own thoughts, rather than as a job or on an externally imposed deadline is that the timing of things can be more natural and organic to the writer.
I have a few things to talk about though, in the next little while:
1. Soapnet ratings, and Soapnet critical response, and Soapnet's new deal for internet distribution of DOOL.
2. The gathering storm over Guiding Light.
3. The new role of the Internet, with a specific reference to the Jess Walton/Y&R situation.
4. My growing love for Nelson Branco at Canadian TV Guide, and why I think he is good for soaps. Also, an ever-growing appreciation for what Roger Newcomb is catalyzing -- both with his site, and with the new blogger coalition he is a part of.
5. SciFi becoming SyFy...yes, I think there is a soap tie-in here.
6. Damon Jacobs and "Shouldless". That is only tangentially related to soaps, and yet I really think he has an awful lot to tell us all.
In the meantime, I find that soap operas are flourishing on the internet (in terms of what is being written and talked about), and that is a very enjoyable way to extend the soap opera experience for those of us who don't get enough from our daily fix.
Some of you have surely seen the hilarious (I mean, for me, LITERALLY tear-inducing) viral video Soaps in The Bunker. At a site called Overstream.net, lots of users have apparently been taking a popular German clip (Hitler confronting the reality of his defeat during his final hours in Berlin) and imposing subtitles over it to reflect...whatever. A user named Chris Dunn has done this with soaps...specifically, the inability for the Daytime Emmys to find a network home, which leads to a greater disappointment about the state of the genre. If you haven't seen it, I embedded it at bottom. (If you need any of the "inside" jokes explained, check out this link).
Like all good satire, the best of this video is that has an insider's knowledge, and skewers much (the networks for not showing the Emmys--especially ABC's Brian Frons; columnists Michael Logan and Carolyn Hinsey, bloggers, and the creative state of daytime itself). So, there is a line, during Hitler's final reflections, that tries to be a little serious. It says:
What am I talking about? We brought this on ourselves. We forgot the cardinal rule of daytime. A little hope. A little romance. And a big fat bulge in the hero's pants. Bold and the Beautiful does the same story twelve years running. Did they think no one would notice? All My Kids does a tornado. A tornado! What do they think it is? 1985! They are killing us!
The piece is especially effective because of the use of the quiet tone of the end, and the overlay of this killer nostalgic irony.
Maybe all isn't lost. ... When I turn on my television, just seeing John and Marlena makes me know everything will be alright. Everything will be alright.
In succinct form, the video identifies the chief causes of decline: Redundancy and lack of originality, emphasis on sensations and events rather than real storytelling, overemphasis on prurient interests, and disregard for history and veterans. (Goodbye, John and Marlena)
I have argued repeatedly in this blog that the ratings status of daytime would have happened no matter what--that we're at the mercy of demographic changes and changes in viewing trends. What is happening to daytime is, in many ways, nothing but a microcosm of what is happening to all of the last generation of media. I also believe that at least some of what has happened to soaps creatively has been a reaction to (and perhaps a secondary cause of) this viewership loss. We're seeing the consequences of budget cuts on screen. We're seeing desperation moves (ultimately futile) to stem the demographic tide.
I still stand by that. But there is no denying that daytime is -- creatively -- at a low ebb. We now measure great "moments" on shows, rather than great shows. There are likely differences of opinion about this last statement. Which makes the video--after the tears and stomach pains from the laughing have passed--so effective. I am left, in the end, with the quietness of the end of the Hitler scene. Hope is a delusion. Where we are now is the final chapter of a myriad of earlier strategic missteps. I hope that endnote is wrong.
2. Casiello rejoins the creative side
Congratulations are due to Tom Casiello, who announced that he will begin a trial period as a breakdown writer for The Young and the Restless. I am among the legions of his readers who ardently hope that this is an excellent fit, that he meshes well with his bosses, and enjoys a good long run in the position.
At the same time, it means that Tom will have to leave the blogosphere (he has announced, more or less, that he is doing so). Way back, on his myspace blog (now deleted), he mentioned that there needed to be a firewall of sorts between the creative and fandom sides.
Tom (along with Sara Bibel) has occupied a unique niche in daytime writing. He has been an insider-outsider bridge. He went into daytime writing as a fan, and he has remained one. But he has done a careful job, during these fourteen months of unemployment, at studying the genre and the form. We have explored Douglas Marland's bible with him. He did detailed fan focus groups of every show still on the air (lost, I fear, to Myspace). He explained things to the viewers (e.g., limited use of sets). With his departure from the scene, we lose that soap scholar with an inside view.
The internet message boards have been, strangely, filled with mixed opinions about Tom's move. Those who have enjoyed him and his blogs are congratulatory. Grinches (my word), on the other hand, argue that he has become a cause celebre solely because he "spoke to the fans", and so the joy at his promotion are more about his accessibility to fans than his writing skill. Others emphasize that the breakdown writer has limited creative control over a show (and nowhere is that likely truer than a Bell soap), so his impact is unlikely to be felt.
I think this misses the point! Tom has humanized the soap writer. He has offered glimpses through the keyhole (or maybe, through the keyboard). The fact that fans lapped up his blog (tens of thousands of hits, he told us) shows that he filled an unmet need. The shows and the soap press have pretty systematically refused to try to address the deep fan hunger for "meta" content. They don't realize that part of the fun of soap fandom is a peculiar version of "fantasy football". Tom, however, understood it.
Daytime's refusal to acknowledge fandom as co-owners of the creative product is quite in contrast to primetime, I think. Some of the real buzz shows (Heroes, Friday Night Lights, Lost, Gossip Girl, etc) have writers and producers who regularly speak to the fans. They do so directly (e.g., ComicCon) and indirectly (through regular and frequently interviews with folks like Michael Ausiello). Marceline at SON emphasizes that these writers are simply treating the audience as customers, and the customers reward them with loyalty. Presumably, though, this dialogue also opens up a two-way street. Fans feel heard! And, sometimes, shows can improve in response.
This interactive model of creative-fan interactions is definitely in counterpart to the "auteur theory". Bill Bell, for example, was ostensibly legendary in not really listening to fan feedback or network notes. (There were exceptions. As Sara Bibel has told us, when ratings began to plummet after Y&R's Katherine Chancellor appeared to dally with lesbianism, the story was instantly ended. And, when there was a huge negative fan reaction to a baby's death on Days of Our Lives, Bill Bell reportedly vowed never to do it again...although he finally reluctantly did it with Lauren's faux-child Dylan on Y&R in the early 90s). And that worked. Bill Bell was left unimpeded, and so the viewers just needed to go along for the ride on his creative vision. And what an enjoyable ride it usually was.
But most of daytime is not like that now. For the most part, daytime has lost sight of what the customer wants. I take this less from the plummeting ratings (because I think that has more macro-structural causes), but from the universally negative theme in fan internet boards, letters to the soap mags, and critical opinions.
So, it is kind of ironic that Tom is going to the best show on daytime -- and, arguably, only one of two shows that are still auteur-driven. His fourteen months of study, his "open mike" to the fans...the very things that could potentially have made him a kind of "Damon Lindelof of daytime"...are the very things that Y&R probably needs to avoid.
It is GH or ATWT or GL or AMC or DOOL that need to listen to an educated writer with his finger on the pulse of fandom. Sadly, most of those shows don't employ breakdown writers anymore.
So, I salute Tom and thank him for the gifts he has shared with us these past 14 months. I wish him great luck, satisfaction and longevity at Y&R. I hope this trial turns into a long deal. I suspect he'll still take his lessons of the last year and build them into his outlines. Maybe, in some small way, even on his strongly written show, he'll be able to inject his obvious love for the fans in small ways. This is a good passage, but I will surely miss him.
An interesting thing happened yesterday. Eric Braeden did his 9,000th interview for The Man Who Came Back. (Just kidding...but he has generated terrific press. Publicist Charles Sherman should be pleased that even the New York Times covered the story. *I stuck a mini-review at the bottom of this post).
New, fan-driven media are on the rise. It seems the old soap (print) press may be left behind in the dust?
Eric Braeden is a sharp businessman. His decision to do an interview with a blogger suggests, to me, that the worm has turned. Moreover, it isn't just Braeden. If you look at the major fan-driven internet radio shows, like Buzzworthy Radio or In The Zone or Stardish Radio or Daytime Confidential, each of them have had major and minor soap stars...in spades!...during this last year. It is not just actors. These radio shows have also featured some top writers, giving die-hard fans FINALLY some insight into the creative process. (My only quibble about the radio stuff is that it is very hard for hearing impaired people like me, especially since mostly telephones are used for the interviews. I wish wish wish there could be transcripts. Indeed, if that were to happen, there would be widespread forwarding...and the impact of these interviews would be greater. Look at what happened with Victoria Rowell!).
And, if we want to talk about the ascendancy of soap blogs (and, I believe, the decline of soap magazines), we need only look at the Guiding Light Blogger-experiment. Someone is paying attention!
That this all ties in to the concept of new media, and finding new ways of having active, engaged fans promote the genre to their peers...something Sam Ford and Tom Casiello have talked to us about...is even more engaging!
In addition, there is the emergence of two new classes of websites that, I think, attract many eyeballs. The first is the rise of the just-in-time news site! Week after week, Nelson Branco breaks major news and gossip, and he also consolidates other news in an unrivalled way. Daily, Daytime Confidential does the same thing, with a mix of opinion and spoilers that is unrivalled. And Roger Newcomb consolidates news, globally, several times a day.
The poor old print outlets, with their delayed release and poor mailing times by their fulfillment houses end up giving us old, cold news. When you take what they offer wrapped up in ads for psychics and collector plates and "fashion spreads" that have little interest for most readers...the days of the clunking magazine dinosaurs seem, sadly, nigh.
There was a time when the mags were the only game in town. What a blessing! But that era seems to have passed.
Also emerging is the "opinion columnist". Now, opinions are never in short supply on the internet (heck, look at me!), but there are a few columnists with genuine street cred! From soap writers Sara Bibel and Tom Casiello to soap-mag-pioneers like Marlena Delacroix, we get opinions based on experience. The insights are truly breathtaking sometimes!
Roger Newcomb and Tom Casiello, in particular, have further been doing something that the magazines fail to do: Embrace history! Roger has shared excerpts from many historical clippings (e.g., Time, Newsweek) on the soaps. Tom has also shared some truly amazing historical documents. SteveFrame's SoapsWEB is a treasure trove of archived historical material. No magazine...no "professional" site...can touch that!
More and more, if I want to look for good criticism, insider insight into the creative and marketing process, breaking soaps "news", or historical documents and perspectives, I look to the Superblogs. Can the soap magazines survive?
On the other hand, can the bloggers survive? For the most part, I suspect, we are seeing "labors of love". If they don't pay the rent too, are they sustainable? Maybe...because they are written for love, not money.
== * Mini-review:
(By the way, I saw the film. You know...for what it was billed as...a Western revenge picture...it's a fine movie. It is really terrific, as a long-time Braeden fan, to see him bring his particular intensity to this genre. The film is genuinely discomfiting in places -- which it is meant to be. The only sad part is that the film was originally meant to be centered around a large African American labor action in the Reconstruction era. There are still threads of that story in the film, but most of it ended up in the "deleted scenes" part of the DVD. Clearly, they decided to tighten the narrative, and to focus on the more dramatically interesting violation-and-revenge arc. I'd recommend the film to anyone who enjoys Braeden, and wants to see him in a different milieu. Since he had total creative control over the project, the film also offers insights into the kinds of stories that Braeden likes to tell.)
Regardless, it was only recently that Tom Casiello reminded us of the SuperFan (my word), and the use of social networking and devoted fans to "spread the word" about media properties. Sam Ford (sample blog here) has often talked about this whole area of "convergence culture", and is basically single-handedly introducing the concept to "thinking fans" who care about soaps.
There can be no clearer sign that the GL team remains committed to moving the show into the new world. I give much credit to that team. Even though I don't know how long the GL experiment can last in this economy, and I'm not sure they're doing everything right, I want to kiss them all for trying. I can't wait to hear the many insights that will flow from this.
Sara Bibel mentions that it is daring and innovative (I think that was her phrase) for GL to invite all these bloggers. True. Bloggers are a fiercely independent lot, and surely not part of the publicist-controlled media.
More importantly, I think it speaks volumes about the declining (last gasp?) influence of the soap opera magazines. As Roger Newcomb has railed for a while now, GL can't even get a COVER of SOD. So, how clever for GL to bypass the old media, and go straight to the new! This can not only help GL...it further helps establish the legitimacy of this newer form of disseminating information and publicity.
How did we get here? I have shared my obsession with ratings charts, and I hope I have been slightly convincing to at least some folks that the linear ratings decline we have experienced in the US since at least the late 1980s is trans-genre, and not really related to any particular show or creative team.
Some good skeptics have written me to say "But some of this decline has been due to VCRs and then DVRs, which never got counted". That is totally true! Indeed, I have argued elsewhere that when you add Y&R's CBS broadcast plus 7-day DVR numbers plus Soapnet plus legal online streaming (fancast, msn, youtube, globaltv.com) it is actually plausible that Y&R might have 8-10 million US viewers per episode.
Still, that monolithic decline can't be ignored. One irate correspondent wrote me privately to ask (I'm paraphrasing) what I was smoking, and if I was twelve years old and completely unwise. OBVIOUSLY, it is the decline in QUALITY (which may be attributed in part to the youth-grab...the desire to tell quick stories with young newbies, and to chase a more juvenile taste) that caused soap decline. Honestly, I'm not so sure. I'll accept the quality decline, but I remind myself that correlation is not causation. We don't know what is chicken, and what is egg. I'm inclined to think that some of the quality decline is due to REACTIONS to declining viewership and loss of dollars. Newbies are cheaper, for example.
In the end, it is probably non-sensical to have the quality-ratings debate. Clearly, ratings loss has many factors (viewing choices, women out of the home, overall decline of TV, loss of intergenerational viewing, social perception of soaps as 'dated' and 'uncool', etc.). Quality may be a part of that, but the direction of causation is undoubtedly reciprocal. Quality never really reflects ratings...otherwise, shows like St. Elsewhere and Boomtown would have been top-rated (or Masterpiece Theater), and shows like According to Jim would only have lasted a single season.
Anyway, the point of this post is something different. On some soap boards, I (and others) have expressed the idea that a key problem with modern soaps is that they are often 30-70 years old! As much as I love my 35 year old Y&R (and would mourn if it disappeared), I'm also 43...and not the desirable demographic. It would be fine if my Y&R could continue, but there need to be new soaps for the new generation.
As a cultural referent, I mention music, movies and primetime. In none of these genres do we expect the young (desirable demographic) consumers to be enjoying the stuff of their parents and grandparents. Each new generation needs its own music (rock and roll, folk, progressive rock, disco, rap/hip-hop, punk...each was new music for a new generation). The 80s saw St. Elsewhere, the 90s ER, and the 2000s House/Grey's Anatomy. This is natural.
Note, I'm not just parroting Madison Avenue's preference for young eyeballs. For any organization/entity to be viable, it needs REPLACEMENT. As people die, others must be born. This requires that pop culture constantly evolve to be relevant.
Now, I know that some people claim that our chestnut soaps can evolve and be relevant. But honestly, I don't think so. Marceline at SON has called this the over-reliance on nostalgia. AMC shifts to film look, and the viewers complain. GL shifts to the new production model (I realize that show has other problems) and people call it cheap. Y&R shifts to a more primetime feel (thanks, LML!) and viewers call it sacrilege. Part of the reason there is an ENDURING audience for soaps is the familiarity of our soap worlds. Familiar characters, actors, sets, stories...
What this means, I think, is that we need a regular sequence of retiring old soaps, and building new ones. Indeed, during the salad days of soaps, the networks agreed! Of course, making new soaps is a financially risk endeavor. There is a lot of startup cost. And history shows that MOST soaps don't survive very long. The long-term survivors are quite few and far apart. But without that constant new investment, the chance for a new show to "stick" and become relevant is nil.
The consequence of that is what we are seeing now: More deaths than births. Eventually, the genre dies off.
This is not a new argument. The incomparable Irna Phillips said this in a Time Magazine article in 1940, archived by the equally incomparable SteveFramehere:
Today's Children ran for six and a half years. It was still number one with Crossley when Irna stopped writing it. She based her move on the belief that her characters had run through all possible logical situations.
"When you have saturated logic," she says, "you should take your show off the air."
The chart below illustrates the problem.
Look at the 60s and 70s. There was a huge number of premieres (blue), and a huge number of cancellations (purple).
"You can't succeed if you don't try".
I realize that even a decade ago the networks were still trying. Not much--purple begins to outweigh blue by the 80s. Now, we're in a solid purple stage. Maybe I should have colored that red...the bleeding out of the genre.
How do I end this with hope? It's hard. I do note that new forms of soaps (e.g., Roger Newcomb's Scripts and Scruples, all the remarkable fanfic that SteveFrame's SoapsWeb is now honoring--at places like Soapoperanetwork and DaytimeRoyalty) is emerging. But that form is labor-of-love, not labor-of-profit.
I hope, someday soon, the financials might change...and broadcasters might again try. We need more blue on this chart!
Tom Casiello really has me thinking with a recent blog post, prompted by some recent scathing revelations by Victoria Rowell (in an interview with Daytime Confidential).
In it, he says, in part, "But here's what's interesting... after the strike, and the Days firings, and the "Real Greenlee" and Guiding-Light-Wants-to-Be-The-Hills, and the Bryce/McClain/Byrne firings, and the Nuke Ban, and the Higley/Scott/Corday debacle, and the Y&R Is-He-Or-Isn't-He-Still-EP mess, and then the Carolyn Hinsey firing... honestly I hear a scathing interview like Ms. Rowell's? And all I can do is shrug."
He goes on to say, "And I think a lot of people finally see that it's time to just come clean. To be upfront and honest and the hell with where it leaves them. Because there's a good possibility that everyone who even has a job now will be looking for a new career before the next decade is over....Cheerful, isn't it?...Actually, yes. It very well could be. If history has taught us anything, it's that eventually, you get that Renaissance. You get the Roaring Twenties, the Summer of Love, so to speak....Somewhere out there, there must be another William Bell - a man who can take all of these artists, all of these differences of opinion and creative disagreements, and channel them - funnel them into one driving force that can create the number one daytime drama for over two decades without compromising anyone's artistic integrity. I wish he or she would show up - we're long overdue."
Casiello concludes with this: "Because from what I've seen of this calendar year, I'm not so sure 2009 will be the saving grace we all want it to be. But they say it's always darkest before the dawn, and I truly wish that if the events of the last nine months have taught us anything, it's that if you push enough people down, they will eventually find each other, and rise up again."
So, I'm focused on this apocalyptic vision. Heck, I have shared it. I have (somewhat tongue in cheek) predicted (by similar linear interpolation of the falling ratings trends, across all soaps, and by the assumption that once ratings fall below 1.0 soaps are not viable) that the last soap (Y&R) will leave us in 2016.
At the same time, I don't think "the strike, and the Days firings, and the "Real Greenlee" and Guiding-Light-Wants-to-Be-The-Hills, and the Bryce/McClain/Byrne firings, and the Nuke Ban, and the Higley/Scott/Corday debacle, and the Y&R Is-He-Or-Isn't-He-Still-EP mess, and then the Carolyn Hinsey firing" or the Rowell interview are AT ALL symptomatic of the death of soaps.
Let me explain.
I think soaps are dying for myriad reasons that have relatively little to do with their creative state. These include (and have been mentioned many times before) - women out of home - lack of intergenerational viewing - failure to move soaps to a time when people are home - lack of off-network and out-of-daypart promotion - general perception (from their beginnings, on radio) as soaps as uncool and for "ladies" with little better to do (the stimga phenomenon) - growing cultural distaste (in all dayparts) for the commitment that serials require (look at the viewer attrition in Lost or ER) - general decline of passive TV viewership in favor of video games, internet - movement of TV viewership to downloaded torrents and youtube (which doesn't count in the ratings).
Many of these problems extend beyond daytime. Each of them (and others) contributes to the decline of soaps. I also think the magazines (revealing spoilers) kills soaps.
It is tempting to think that "the strike, and the Days firings, and the "Real Greenlee" and Guiding-Light-Wants-to-Be-The-Hills, and the Bryce/McClain/Byrne firings, and the Nuke Ban, and the Higley/Scott/Corday debacle, and the Y&R Is-He-Or-Isn't-He-Still-EP mess, and then the Carolyn Hinsey firing" represents some kind of Lord of the Flies...the abandoned islanders feeding off each other, driven to bloodlust.
But, honestly, I think the REAL issue in these events is "new media" and "the Perez Hilton effect" (these two are related). New media means that "news" is released INSTANTLY, unfiltered, around the protective walls of publicists. This sh*t ALWAYS happened...we just didn't know it because SOD/SOW etc. protected the industry.
Now, though, as the Hinsey Jossip thread shows, the stuff gets out there INSTANTLY. Under clever nom-de-plumes, SOD/SOW staffers allegedly got on the internet and told everyone what they were experiencing.
Think about it:
- Days firings. Many of us found out about that on a SUNDAY thanks to Toups at Soap Opera Network. In the old days, the magazines might not even have REPORTED this.
- Real Greenlee. Horrible, horrible, horrible. BUT...it was internet disgust--shared animus against that mean-spirited promotion...that made public rancor spread. I might have thought it was horrible...but it was only when an online community convinced me that I was not alone that my disgust grew...it wasn't just me
- Guiding Light. Well...that one doesn't have much to do directly with the internet. That is just bad :). (Sorry DonnaB...I know you love the show. But actually, I APPLAUD the experiment. Indeed, I think if the writing can become 'soapier' (something EP Ellen Wheeler apparently doesn't want) the new production model could work
- Bryce/McClain/Byrne firings...those would have been quickly forgotten "Comings and Goings" if internet communities hadn't brewed them into shared outrage. I say this EVEN THOUGH these were stellar veterans. It takes a community to create communal outrage.
- Nuke ban. Well, the no kissing was outrageous. BUT, let us not forget Roger Newcomb's campaign. He was masterful, with his colleagues, in exposing light on it via...the internet (and every print publication in the WORLD, it seemed). But I don't see how this one is a BAD thing. Fan outrage got us kisses. LOTS of them. I see no problems here.
- Higley/Scott. Internet. AGAIN, an internet venue (Canadian TV Guide) released the news on a Friday, with weekend updates. And ever message board in soapdom glowed red with outrage for a long weekend. The print media poo-poo'ed it.
- Hinsey firing. That is news ONLY on Jossip, and with the 2000 posters who went there.
My point is this: These events all seem more apocalyptic...but they really were only disseminated, promulgated, and reacted to in a narrow blogosphere. (Well blogosphere + message boards + a few online publications). To the broad "laiety" of soap viewership, they didn't even know it happened. To the passionate few hundred who haunt this soap-world, it was a big deal.
I am convinced this kind of chaos always happened (look at the headwriter parade at Another World)...but the "fan revolt" that surrounds it is localized to this weird internet community we are all in.
If I am right, then all this "chaos" is a chronic state (in most industries), and has few implications for the death of soaps.
The death of soaps, when it comes, will have to do with those plummeting numbers and that huge list of factors up above that nobody is attending to.
In case you missed it, soap magazines are dying. (Judging by the vitriol in the Jossip Hinsey thread, they are already dead). Circulations have been falling for years, in part due to the decline of soap viewership, and in part due to the general decline in many print media). SOD/SOW were sold from Primedia to Source Interlink...and somehow I don't think companies sell off highly profitable ventures.
Now, Roger Newcomb points us to the fact that Source Interlink has experienced particularly stunning ad page losses lately--20% This pretty much is the highest of the losses.
Couple that with news that SOW is not replacing (cannot afford to replace??) Carolyn Hinsey...and you get the idea that the red ink may soon bleed off the page.
I think there are a few other problems with SOD/SOW that are hastening their demise--and I say this NOT with Schadenfreude, but as a reader (of SOD) since 1979 who LOVED those magazines and wishes they would thrive.
1. They have not adequately cultivated their subscriber base. Thus, they rely on fickle newsstand sales.
2. Newsstand sales forces sensationalistic covers. How many "Sonny leaving!" covers can you read (only to learn the ACTOR is taking a two week vacation that you won't even notice due to pre- and post-taping) before losing trust in the mag?
3. Subscriptions are further harmed by the WORST fulfillment house ON THE PLANET (Palm Coast). Most of use SOD subscribers get the mag a week after it appears on newsstands.
4. SOD is experimenting with an online version, but when I wrote to the fulfillment house about it, they said I had to UNSUBSCRIBE from the print version to get the online version. Or I had to pay double? Huh??? Where does that make business sense. A smart venture would have been to give all print subscribers free online content (it is the SAME product)...and try to wean them off the print version with immediacy. Unfortunately, I'm told even the online version appears days after the print version! Silly, huh?
5. SOD and especially SOW are trying to goose their sales with "news". (This is the term used to refer to story SPOILERS and casting changes). In the modern era, HOW FOOLISH.
Why? Because the moderately literate reader gets all the news WEEKS before the mags from Soap Opera Network, Daytime Confidential, Roger Newcomb, and Canadian TV Guide. The few scoops that remain in the mags (US TV Guide's Michael Logan and SOD/SOW) are INSTANTLY telegraphed on EVERY message board.
News/spoilers is NOT the way to build a magazine nowadays. The news travels faster than print. The only people who will buy your mag for "news" are older people without computers...NOT the desirable demographic for advertisers.
6. What to do? I think there is a multi-part strategy:
a. Shift the news to your online sites. Make it hard to cut-and-paste your news, and surround it with internet advertising. Release the news instantly (I'm really talking about casting and production changes), and soon you will be a destination.
b. Abandon story spoilers. They are killing the industry. The last few viewers don't need to watch, thanks to the mags. So stop "screwing the pooch" by printing spoilers. (Where did I hear that phrase?)
c. Use your legacy content (SOD goes back to the mid 70s) to build a return visitor base. Print subscribers should get exclusive access to your full back library, scanned, online. That builds an "incentive" for subscribership that goes beyond the current print edition.
d. What, then, should go in the mag? DETAILED analysis and interviews (not just with stars). These should be long, multi-page jobs without BREAKING NEWS. Why? Because the message boards will be less inclined to steal and disseminate this lengthier kind of article (how many Vanity Fair articles are being pilfered?). That makes the magazine a place for exclusive content.
e. Broker deals with the major online sites that they can release "exclusive" previews of your articles. That drives an audience to your print product. In return, ask those online sites to censor piracy, so that users are forbidden to share your copywritten material. Soap Opera Network is excellent about doing this (protecting the magazines)...so is Roger Newcomb.
Soon, your magazines become a haven for detailed, analytical, insightful content (and fashion spreads, if you must, though they make me retch). This is stuff you can't get anywhere.
Instead of spoilers, talk to actors and producers about what happened LAST WEEK. Instead of cagey "I can't tell you" responses, now they can freely talk to you about the motivations and intentions of scenes we all watched together last week. For the non-watching viewers, if written right, the "catchup" on recent story will STILL help them keep up with their soaps.
Who the hell am I, asks a "commenter" in one of my Carolyn Hinsey blogs from a few weeks back.
Who indeed? What are my credentials? None. I am, proudly, a nobody.
Let me explain that. There are terrific bloggers out there with bona fide credentials in the soap industry. First and foremost we have Tom Casiello (thank you for the recent shout out...I am humbled) and Sara Bibel. These two have real street cred as people who know the industry, and many of the players still in it. They have taken different post-strike approaches (Tom seems to blog out of sheer sense of community...his voice is so passionate and ardent that sometimes my eyes get teary at his love of the genre...but he is not making any money off it; Sara seems to be transforming into a soap journalist, with a combination of interviews, editorials, and historical insights), but both have become must-read because (at least for me) you feel a little smarter and more insightful after reading their words.
Then we have the once-published journalists (Marlena Delacroix and Lynn Liccardo), who offer the insights of long time fans with historical insight, knowledge of the industry. The gang at Daytime Confidential produces a product that simply trumps every soap publication left for breaking new and outstanding (podcast) interviews. The Canadian TV Guide Online has filled the void left behind after the US TV Guide Online essentially abandoned soaps...with a voice that is best described as "Perez Hilton for Daytime".
Then we have Roger Newcomb, who is pioneering fan-written (radio!) soaps (and whose Manhattanites independent film is eagerly awaited by many of us). Roger's "We Love Soaps" blog initially functioned as a consolidator of headlines. This is amazing. I do not know what kind of RSS feeds Roger has figured out, but literally no soap item (even regarding ex-soap actors) breaks, even in some podunk farm village, without Roger finding it and posting a link to it. Lately, Roger has been bringing more of his own "voice" to his blog, as recent pieces of fan advocacy for ATWT's Nuke or an insightful analysis of the impact of men/older viewers on rating shows.
In the ranks of such luminaries, what am I? Nothing...just a fan for all my days, but with no particular expertise.
Moreover, if you take my show (Y&R), there are 5 million people like me. And more than a few of us have blogs.
Yet, I think, that is where I have something unique to contribute. My voice (and the other 4,999,999 voices) are the outsiders, the consumers. Each of us views the soaps from a unique lens. Mine is as a 40-something guy with a lifelong attachment to soaps, and with some schooling (behavioral science, gerontology, statistics) that gives me a particular take on what is happening to the industry. Someone else--say, a mother of four who works at home--has a different lens (how the show fits into her busy life, why she makes time for it, how it resonates with the reality of her life...or maybe how it represents a 'Take me Away' part of her day).
The blogosphere is very different than old media. Access to "publishing" is no longer limited. The good part is that, in the beautiful anarchy that results, a much broader mix of voices can be heard. I suspect that the soap industry would be wise to sample this more than they apparently do. (Indeed, ATWT's Christopher Goutman has espoused the belief that internet fans are a trivial minority....I suspect he does this at his own risk).
On the other hand, it means that blowhards like me can espouse opinions that have very little backing. They are not "industry-savvy". I may lack experience, history, insight, etc. Yet, because I have carved out a "place" on the internet, some may feel that I am claiming myself to be an "authority" (which I am not).
For me, as a reader, I think the new media is an exciting way to get real time information and analysis that is less filtered, less polished. I think each of us adds interesting perspectives which, taken in their whole, represent a real resource for criticism and opinion. But a fair disclaimer: Opinions are worth what you pay for them.
From the Archive: Claire Labine Interview (2009)
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[image: Claire Labine]
Claire Labine
In November 2009, *We Love Soaps TV* released an in-depth interview Emmy
winning *Ryan's Hope* creator Claire Labin...
Soaps and the Ausiello factor
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I’ve been loving the recent stories I’ve read about journalist Michael
Ausiello and Beverly Hills. Ausiello is well known as an entertainment
writer and ed...
Andrea Lynn Evans, 1957-2023
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What a loss. I just feel like this one warrants a space here. Thanks for
your light, Ms. Evans. It's no secret I was a fan. (And may November 2nd
always be...
CBS Cancels “As the World Turns”
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It’s been a while since I’ve written here, but not much has been going on.
A year after my “return to soap viewing” only one soap, The Young and the
Restle...
Flying Blind
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So this is going to be one of those random entries that jumps around a bit
with no real theme - I've received a few e-mails from people wondering when
(if ...
In my day job, I'm a behavioral scientist and statistician with a particular interest in aging and gerontology. At night, I'm a fervent soap student. That these two threads of my life should come together in daytime soaps, a dying and aging breed with principle appeal to an aging audience, is well...beautifully ironic. Studying the history of soaps also offers a lens into the culture and environments of the 20th century that shaped our older cohorts, and their subsequent generations.
I am a long-time soap fan who started young. Grandma babysat me, and our afternoons were filled with General Hospital and All My Children instead of playgrounds :-). I really found my niche in the late 70s and early 80s with the ABC lineup (AMC through GH). I started with Y&R in 1973, so I'm a lifer, and B&B in 1987, but I often have to hold my nose on that one.
