Emmys: Triumph (?) of the blogosphere?

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.

SoapOperaNetwrk@MarkHsoap If the show can pull in more than 2 million viewers at best, there is some hope. If not, it's done on broadcast.6:12 PM Aug 29th from web in reply to MarkHsoap

(As I type this, Errol tweets:

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?)

2. Several online sites provided real-time live-blogging and live twittering, including DaytimeConfidential, Soap Opera Network, Soap Opera Source, and Daytime Royalty.

3. The pre-show has been well supplemented by CBS pre-show interviews that are more detailed and more informative.

4. NaVell Lee, Roger Newcomb, Damon Jacobs and Jamey Giddens all converged as a visible force at the awards. They are providing/will provide more of a real-time report; by the time SOD/SOW get the news out, it will be "old"

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!

The soap magazines hung on better than the soaps!

Today, I was fiddling around with my usual ratings charts. What started it was the claim by Brenda Dickson (to TVGuide.ca's Nelson Branco) that when she came and left to Y&R, that coincided with Y&R hitting and leaving #1 status. That seems palpably false, since she last left Y&R in 1987 and Y&R didn't hit #1 (where it has stayed) till the 1998-1999 season. This figure illustrates the point.



You can't help but look at those lines after 1990, though, and just click your tongue at the unrelenting bleeding.

So then I got to wondering, "how badly did this all this soap decline hurt the magazines"? The figures and tables below provide some data about this, and they are somewhat surprising. During the 2000s, the magazines have pretty much "held on". Indeed, Soaps in Depth emerged in this decade, and quickly overtook Soap Opera Digest (both the ABC and CBS versions separately overtook SOD in newsstand sales). Some caveats:

A. Data come from the Audit Bureau of Circulations, and only are available free/to the public from 1998 forward (with 1997 data embedded)
B. Public data are limited to the top 100. Soap magazines dropped out of the top 100 in total circulation after 2002, and only Soap Opera Digest appeared in the top 100. So, I don't know about later data.
C. Looking at "single copy sales" (newsstand), the story is less bleak--it actually seems to show relative stability. 3-4 soap magazines appear in the top 100 in every year from 1997-present. Soap Opera Weekly dropped out of the top 100 in 2008 though, so I estimated its average newsstand circulation (at 100,000) for 2008. That may be an over-estimate. (The bleeding circulation for SOW may explain some of the Carolyn Hinsey sacking? Even though it was probably not her fault).

The figures are actually encouraging to me, because it suggests a kind of levelling off of circulation (relative to the shows themselves). From 1997-2000, the single-copy sales include Soap Opera Digest, Soap Opera Weekly, and Soap Opera Update. (In 1997-98, Soap Opera Magazine is also included). After 2000, Soap Opera Update disappears, but is replaced by Soaps in Depth (CBS and ABC) in the newsstand top-100. Interestingly, from 2005 on, Soaps in Depth (both versions) actually EXCEED Soap Opera Digest in newsstand sales.

Since the soap magazines held on better than the soaps themselves, it does make one wonder if viewers who "lapsed" in watching the shows continued to "keep up" by reading the magazines. And if this is the case, is this a good thing or a bad thing? Does the availability of spoilers, recaps and pictures actually hurt the original product?

If anyone is interested, I have the magazine-specific data, and can share it at a later date.

Total circulation of Soap Opera Digest during the years in which it appeared in the Audit Bureau Top 100 Total Circulation



Newsstand circulation of Soap Opera Digest from 1997-2008



Total newsstand circulation of all soap magazines listed in the Audit Bureau top-100, 1997-2008.
(Note, 2008 figure for Soap Opera Weekly is an estimate)

Is Roger Newcomb right? Are there too many Victor covers at SOD?

Roger Newcomb has been, appropriately, beating the drum about too many Victor covers at SOD.

His latest post on this is here, and says in part:

I hate to beat a dead horse with this, but with daytime ratings in the toilet and subscriptions down, seeing Digest on the newsstand might be the only thing that piques a lapsed fan's interested. And so those people are left with the impression that the only things happening on the soaps these days are the same things that have been going on for decades. How about trying to reel in some new fans or win some old fans back?

And in case someone at Digest hasn't noticed, no soap has lost more viewers than Y&R in the past year (nearly 800,000 viewers since last based based on the Nielsen Ratings for the week ending November 7). Despite the improvement in quality, the ratings are sinking fast so all this promotion isn't helping. Yet THE YOUNG AND THE RESTLESS has been the main cover or partial cover of Digest in 14 of the past 19 issues (that's 74%). And Eric Braeden has been on the cover seven times (with Victor menioned on an eighth). Digest, it's time to turn your attention to the rest of the soap world for a while.

I posted a comment there that said the following:

I'm with you...as a Y&R fan...except for that little bit of sophistry. "Y&R has lost the most viewers....promote other shows" (I paraphrase).

From the premise that there is Victor overkill (I agree...but it MUST be boosting sales, no?)

- Y&R remains that strongest show by most measures, so boosting it COULD serve to boost the industry "flagship". For example, on weeks where Y&R is down, B&B/ATWT/GL are often down too. So, saving Y&R might save the whole CBS lineup

- proportionally, all of CBS is in jeopardy, but Y&R is NOT the "biggest loser" when it comes to percentage loss. These numbers are taken from Toups' ratings archive at Soapoperanetwork:

SHOW, 11/03/08 rating, change since 11/07, 11/07 rating, % change since 07

Y&R, 4674000, -797000, 5471000, -15%
B&B, 3379000, -489000, 3868000, -13
GH, 2895000, -248000, 3143000, -8%
OLTL, 2693000, 34000, 2659000, +1%
DAYS, 2686000, 143000, 2543000, +6%
AMC, 2664000, 184000, 2480000, +7%
ATWT, 2551000, -419000, 2970000, -14%
GL, 2065000, -505000, 2570000, -20%

- From these numbers, GL is in "death trajectory", and GH is not statistically different from Y&R.

- If we're going to make these judgments based on numbers, we probably have to look at "volatility". Y&R is also more VOLATILE than the other shows, showing more week-to-week variation. So, not all weeks look this bad :-).

None of this takes away from your point! I agree that Y&R is getting too much cover time, and that SOD is failing to represent the genre as a whole!

But the argument for SOD to do differently should be conceptual...not on the basis of numbers. Y&R is the strongest show creatively, budgetarily, and in absolute numbers.

My guess is that SourceInterlink would reply that "these covers ARE based on numbers...what sells".

If that is true, how do we deal with it? Just like Soapnet can't afford to show soaps because the financials don't support it...apparently SOD has revealed that the financials now require Victor covers. If that is true...if they don't sell as many issues when other soaps are on the cover, what can we do about that??

Many fans are complaining about the bizarre developments at our soap venues:

- Soapnet is moving away from soaps

- SOD is moving to a Y&R-only format :)

I think we have to remember what is really happening here. The financials are driving these decisions. This isn't about "editor preference" or "bad editorial judgement" or whatever. I'll bet SOD doesn't even get to choose this: I'll bet SourceInterlink is mandating this.

The REAL lesson here is that we are going to have to let go of Soapnet and SOD. They're almost done.

Soaps are moving to the online world...one that is more democratic and less commercial. Roger Newcomb himself is a perfect example: His soap AND his blogsite are terrific...and they are totally internet! That is the future. That is how we get around Madison Avenue.

When Soapnet goes, online broadcasts of surviving soaps will be the new "re-purposing". I expect we'll lose at least a soap a year, maybe more, for the next few years. When SOD goes, Roger and the many wonderful online sites will fill the void...in a far more democratic way. This is simply emblematic of the larger future of broadcast, cable and print.

The plan to save soap print media

Excuse the provocative title.

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.

Struggling with the meaning of the Hinsey affair

I am struggling so much with the meaning of this whole Hinsey affair.

When I look at those 1800+ posts, it feels like an initial group of angry people (perhaps appropriately) began bashing her. But, if you analogize it to something in real life, initially a few people began beating on (retaliating on) the bully. Soon, though, a circle of onlookers formed, and then they started getting their kicks in too. And soon, you have mass attack that may very well have ruined Hinsey's career.

Mass attack. Don't call me melodramatic when I say that phrases like "wilding", "gang rape" and "group think" come to mind.

I AM NOT DEFENDING HINSEY for her alleged crimes. I am also not saying there was not truth in that thread. Even Marlena Delacroix, in her blog today, clearly states she was harmed by Hinsey...or at least (more on this later) by the corporation for which she worked.

Let me also say I know NOTHING about any facts here. I am not an insider...just a viewer...so I am not disputing facts.

I simply believe that there has been a "piling on", in which I was complicit by visiting and revisiting (and revisiting) that Jossip thread. The gleeful Schadenfreude. I feel vaguely (maybe I am melodramatic) like Dachau neighbor in Nazi Germany. By merely countenancing it, I was a part of something wrong.

So, let me list a couple of the fleeting streams of consciousness that are troubling me.

1. There are stories that Carolyn battled publicists and rival publications for exclusive access and scoops. Does this make her unusual or different? I somehow STRONGLY believe that this level of journalistic bullying for exclusivity is part of the game...whether it be Dianne Sawyer battling Katie Couric for the latest "get", or People outbidding The Star for pictures of Brangelina's baby. This is what our media is.

So, when publicists and writers from other shows and even people from the shows now profess disdain for her aggressive tactics, is this unusual? Is she the only player of that game?

2. There are stories about payola. I cannot comment on these, or how she linked Blondie's to coverage promises. I guess this is an area where I wish there could be TRUE investigative journalism.

3. There are stories about abuse of employees. Now, here, again, I view this as allegation until there is evidence. I'm SURE it was true. Totally. But as we all know, things get mixed up.

- She is a brassy New Yorker. The stereotype of such a person is "loud", "in your face", etc. We love brassy New Yorkers in many contexts. How much of her 'abusive' nature was really attributable to this?
- She is alleged to be a heavy drinker. If this is true, how much of her behavior was due to an untreated disease? What allowances, if any, should we make for this? Did her behavior get worse as her disease progressed?
- She is alleged to have been abusive to employees, asing "peons" to do things below their station. Now, I have been a peon...and I have had people who report to me. And you know what...at some level we ALL hate our boss. No matter how much we love our boss...when it comes to performance evaluations or following instructions...all of us at some time have some flash of resentment at a boss. So, how much is the outrage at Hinsey usual and normal. Bonnie Fuller keeps getting mentioned. But even a less extreme editor...would they evoke these kinds of feelings?

4. There is Snark's important statement that she was a hypocrite. To wit, she complained that Soapnet was promoting non-soaps and dropping classic soaps...all the while her magazines were doing the same. Good point. I see several possibilities:

- She shows an appalling lack of self-awareness, and so the alleged mistreatment of employees (basically, failing to consider their humanity) may reflect that same lack of awareness as her contradictory messages in column-vs-cover/content
- She was sending a message about how she REALLY feels. Maybe what she wrote in her column was her true feeling, and the non-soap cover/content were concessions to bosses (Primedia or Source Interlink) or real market factors that she would ignore at her peril. Let's be clear...even now, SOD runs different covers for subscribers versus newstand, because covers determine sales. As much as we had those sensationalistic covers, they wouldn't be there if they didn't sell magazines.

We might wish it to be different, but I don't think we want these magazines to run at a loss.

Years ago, when Ms. Magazine was losing its identity due to advertisers, they decided to go into a completely self-supporting model (no ads). I haven't followed the fortunes of that publication, but I imagine it is as hard a go for Ms. as it is for PBS. Still, people WILL support Ms./PBS/NPR. But will they freely pay $10/issue for SOW/SOD to avoid advertiser-dictated content? I think not...

5. There really IS a category of leader like this...horrid to work for...inspires great things. Leona Helmsley, Donald Trump. I'll bet their employees hated/hate them just as much. But I worry that sometimes extreme greatness sometimes coexists with extreme horridness. Do we want to forego greatness because it comes with a lot of sh*t?

I don't know....I AM AWARE that there is a different path. You don't have to be Bobby Knight. You CAN be Billy Donovan. The truth, however, is that there are a lot of Bobbys out there.

6. I wish I had my last copy of "It's Only My Opinion" here. I read it and re-read it this week. It's really quite good. She writes with a distinctive loud voice...that in your face thing...but it is SO refreshing in a soap press THAT STILL HASN'T TOLD US ABOUT THE RISE AND FALL OF LYNN LATHAM WITH HONESTY (as one example). To hear a voice decrying GH's violence or the backburnering of veterans or the over-use of newbies or... is REFRESHING. If she DID cut exclusive deals with shows and had favorites...I still maintain she was also the most consistently critical (with love) voice.

I cannot excuse her telling the soap writers not to strike. I cannot excuse her for saying Jax was not raped on GH. But just because she wrote awful, wrong things....must we negate that she was ALSO sometimes a force for good?

Why is it so impossible for many of us to believe that the two could co-exist?

7. The deeper recipient of my disdain is, and will be, SOD/SOW and their corporate owner. I believe it is THEIR malfeasance that lost us Mimi Torchin and Marlena Delacroix. I believe it is THEIR market research that got us American Idol on the SOW cover. I believe it is THEIR pandering to the lowest common denominator that explains why we have virtually no SERIOUS or DEEP interviews with writers/producers/directors. I believe that the culture of "publicity agreements" between shows and magazines has led to neutered, pandering content...rather than critical analysis.

Let's put this another way, and then I'll stop my rant. If this implosion happened at the New York Times, NYT would (sooner or later) run a self-reflective accounting of what happened, and an analysis of it. Our respect for NYT would grow because of the transparency.

I HAVE NO CONFIDENCE that SOD/SOW will _ever_ address this change. We are not supposed to notice. In so doing...SOD/SOW underestimates its audience...underestimates that Carolyn had fans and detractors ALL OF WHOM want to hear the story.

In truth, the ultimate casualty of this whole affair for me has been the fragile respect I still had for these magazines. I no longer trust that they will ever tell me the REAL truth about something unless advertisers and/or the shows want me to know that. With that...I think I'm done.

I think I have to cancel my subscriptions (with sadness, because as goofy as it sounds, SOD was a lifeline for me--first to my grandmother, and then to my 'home' when I lived overseas--for almost 30 years). Unless there is stem-to-stern change in management and editorial policies, nothing will have been gained.

We're left with the 1800+ spectacle of a woman -- bully or not, nasty or not, evil or not -- having been beaten to a pulp by a thronging mass of group think, out for virtual blood...delighting in taking down the mighty. I'm so proud of myself for having participated in that.

A late weigh-in on Hinsey-gate

By now, the whole free world seems to have visited Jossip and read the tale of the alleged firing of Carolyn Hinsey and the alleged reaction of her purportedly much-maligned staff. I was initially addicted to that thread until it became an ugly mess of forgers.

For me, five or six days after the initial release of the item, these are the four lessons I have learned.

First, there is enormous anger at the "managed" soap press. The remaining die hard viewers want more than advertising-tied fashion and beauty articles, spoilers packaged as "news", and not-very-probing Q&As (although I prefer the Q&As to the turgid profiles we used to get--still get in SOD. I think the "outings" in the Jossip thread are really much more reflective of a desire for honestly and candor. Sexuality is the most OBVIOUS way to expose the dishonesty of the soap press (and the most prurient), but it wouldn't happen if readers felt the soap press were being "straight" (forgive the pun) with them.

Second, there is still a ton of fan passion for the soaps. The unprecedented size of the Jossip thread (albeit, now, mostly due to multiple posts from a small group) and the widespread interest in the thread (on all blogs and soap sites) reveals that there IS a market out there.

Third, the truth is never in a single thing, but in the gestalt of things. As much as we are to believe "The Devil Wears Lane Bryant", the truth is that Hinsey was a passionate advocate for soaps, and did a great deal to promote them. That this ended up being bound up in some potentially unhealthy attachments to "pets", or to a payola scheme for her bar is unfortunate. What really comes across here, however, is that this was a dramatic, flamboyant, aggressive woman...and what better kind of advocate of soaps can there be? This does not excuse what she apparently did to both undermine her rivals and create a culture of fear at her magazine. Great personalities, however, usually inspire these kinds of extreme love-hate sentiments, rather than more moderate feelings.

Fourth, the Jossip thread has devolved into nonsense, as an erstwhile soap reporter publicly works out his issues with SOD/SOW (for the record, I always really enjoyed Alan Carter, and I also religiously followed his soapstarworld.com), and a phalanx of forgers ruins the thread with misinformation. Which goes to prove: We STILL need a legitimate soap press--one that verifies information--because the modern blog/message board cannot provide that. The democracy of the internet is always one heartbeat away from chaos...as Jossip now demonstrates. Where the soap press can still earn its money (and cannot be replaced) is by doing quality control on information. If only the soap press could figure out a way to join the modern world with more timely information, we'd have it made!