Banff, Alta.: The bbc, spiritual mum of Western public broadcasting, launched Banff TV Fest 2000 with a pitch for a fundamental rethink of pubcasting that fits on the digital dial.

Mark Thompson, newly installed bbc director of television, set the tone for the fest by comparing the prospects of pub-tv programmers with protagonists from the movie Gladiators. ‘It all looks strangely familiar,’ said Thompson in a dynamic keynote, saying public service programmers sometimes feel like millennium cult members with the mantra, ‘We’re all going to die.’

He maintains there’s nothing wrong with pubcasters ‘protecting serious’ television as is done on the bbc’s two main channels – particularly in elite arts coverage – but adds public broadcasters have to fight for digi-space. In the bbc’s current review of its tv networks, he says, ‘The object is to create a suite of channels which live up to the ideals which the bbc was created to promote, but which also make sense in modern digital homes…there can be no sacred cows.’

The broadcaster’s research, conducted in the weeks before Banff, looked at the epg, or onscreen electronic program guide, and found ‘viewers either like it or love it. They feel it puts them – not the broadcaster – in control. And although many families still turn to the terrestrial channels for blockbuster programs…we came across quite a few households who are excluding terrestrial tv altogether.’

Thompson says this research does not change his view that pubcasters like the bbc should still offer broad ranges of programming. ‘The question is whether, in the world of the epg and [hard-disk storage systems such as] TiVO, it will still make sense to place them all on a single channel.’

Following Thompson’s speech, emcee Laurier LaPierre said Canadians would watch to see whether cbc president Robert Rabinovitch follows Thompson’s advice.

Banff fest, self-niche-ing

The btvf itself has become a ‘suite of channels’ – simultaneously serving its core audiences of broadcasters and producers with master classes, seminars, and market simulations, while also catering to new groups such as Web content creators and distributors.

One hot Net-focused event was the Cyber Lunch,featuring Snap Media exec vp Roma Khanna. She left no doubt producers and broadcasters who want young viewers have to build on the Internet. She says there are currently 44 million ‘telewebbers,’ people who surf the Net and watch tv at the same time, in the u.s., a figure expected to rise to 52 million by next year. She also says ad trackers expect $32 billion will be spent on Internet tv ads by 2006.

The Vikings are coming

Content creators such as Snap can help producers or broadcasters build a presence online, or create their own Net series. Khanna says Snap has just licensed The Pillage People, a 13-webisode series, to Mondo Media for two plays per ep. Snap gets a licence fee up-front and a percentage of syndication sales. With advertising already built into the episodes, Mondo can sell content and ads prepackaged. If Pillage becomes a big hit – with its wacky stories of Vikings roaming the globe, wreaking havoc – Khanna says ‘it can be pushed out to tv, and t-shirts and other opportunities.’

As for online revenue, Khanna says most obvious is banner ads, although ‘the idea of advertising is getting less and less strong.’ Websites can sell sponsorships, so Pillage People could be brought to you by, say, a travel agency for a month. Then you have licensing or syndication for webisodes, along with e-commerce rev-hits. Finally, you can charge subscription fees, she says, ‘if you have a real [established] brand people want. For instance, if you’re the Wall Street Journal, you can charge a subscription fee even though the New York Times and Globe and Mail are online and more [with searchable archives], because you’re the Wall Street Journal.’

Story first, money later

Khanna acknowledges that, ‘for producers, [identifying] the revenue is hard.’ But it must be done because ‘your audience is going to demand it of you. You have to answer that demand because if you don’t it will weaken your brand against your competitor’s brand.’

But she emphasizes you can’t try just to make money, at the expense of story. As an example, Khanna pointed at producer Linda Schuyler in the audience, recalled the strong brand developed by the Degrassi Street series and said Schuyler’s next project, Degrassi, the Next Generation, will allow kids to drive the development of that brand.

‘Don’t ask the broadcaster what the interactive component of your show should be – they want to take those rights, they don’t want to pay for those rights.’

And, finally, as the lunch ended, Khanna’s apropos challenge: ‘Cannibalism is good. If you’re worried about cannibalizing your own audience by going online, then do it. Because if you’re not doing it, someone else is. It’s not multimedia, new media, old media. It’s just media.’