AMC and OLTL Will Move Online!

[JackPeyton]

Yup.

and a reality show on bravo could easily mean hosting a reality comp show like top chef, work of art, etc... likely a makeup or hair one.

That said, BravoMaxiene seems... iffy. Andy Cohen would break this news. But according to her profile shes a bravo mole? eh.

[Chris B]

They're having trouble aquiring all the money needed for this venture. http://allthingsd.com/20111103/can-one-life-to-live-get-new-life-on-the-web-heres-the-pitch/?reflink=ATD_yahoo_ticker&mid=51

[marceline]

Hard data. That's nice to have.

[Max]

Chris, thanks for linking to an article from an objective news organization. Sorry, but I will have to take any news from the soap press with a grain of salt, given their obvious fianancial interest in the success of this venture.

According to this objective article, there's now a possiblity that PP won't even have both soaps ready to air as soon as OLTL leaves ABC.

[dragonflies]

I think the We Love Soaps stuff is the same as the above: http://www.welovesoaps.net/2011/11/prospect-park-wall-street-journal_03.html

[JaneAusten]

I think trying to raise funding in Hollywood was a mistake. Money is very tight and has been for the last couple of years with the recession but Hollywood is very conservative and old school in many ways. All you need to do is read about how many including the networks view the internet as just another media channel, not as an the main platform for their creations. Thats why that netflix show with Kevin Spacey is such an important endeavor.

Silicon Valley is a better avenue for funding.

I really don't understand why they don't consider a fee. I tend to think the people who watch online would be willing to pay something. They could have it free for 30 days and have a payment option kick in after the fact to get people hooked too.

[LeClerc]

I don't understand why they won't reconsider the five days a week thing. Even their own power point presentation (which is actually quite interesting) states that only 14% of their respondents said they watch soaps five times a week. (It does also state that 44% of ABC soap viewers reported watching their soaps five days a week, but even that is still less than half).

[marceline]

I agree. I don't see why they are so married to copying the current model. I'm still in favor of the telenovela model but...whatever.

[SFK]

Exactly LeClerc, I think producing 5 a week is too ambitious and costly at this point, and unnecessarily so. You could survey how many viewers would sit and watch two hours worth of soap on their computers 5 days a week and all of the fans thirsty for their shows to live will say yes, but I don't think that's reality. I think less is definitely more here. And perhaps you're like me and you get really frustrated when you try to "fast forward" with your online viewing and are hindered by annoying ads and information overload and frozen screens and you're just like, "[!@#$%^&*] it!" I think it's much easier to get "butts in computer seats" when there's less of a commitment, and I'm not suddenly marathoning 9 episodes one Sunday afternoon. Just one viewer's opinion.

[marceline]

Out of curiosity are you referring to ABC or CBS? Both players are glitchy but ABC's web player is IMO far worse. I hope that PP puts a lot of time and effort into making sure their web player is seamless or it won't matter what the content is.

[SFK]

I was actually thinking more Hulu, A&E, Crackle... I've only watched CBS online two or three times when an actor friend had a guest spot. FOX I've watched for Hell's Kitchen, and NBC for Celebrity Apprentice, and they were pretty easy going though I am hopeless at getting the little time tab thingy to land just where I want it when I need to rewind.

[John]

My Thoughts On PP/AMC/OLTL

http://filmguy76.blogspot.com/2011/11/prospect-park-follow-me-here.html

[JaneAusten]

I think they are married to the current model because its the easiest and quickest way to get these shows up and running. Creatively you dont have to retool anything. While I think the principles are visionaries when it comes to techology and the idea of producing creative content for the internet, when it comes to specific content like soaps and how to develop and produce them, I dont think they have that, which is why you are seeing the same people getting hired who run and write these shows now.

The thing is there are telenovellas which are hugely successful, you have primetime soaps that are successful, you have reality shows that are soap like that are successful, lots of places you can pull talent from but its obvious the stumbling blocks are purely financial and have nothing to do with any creative component of this venture because they have no apparent interest in altering that. They could goto 3 days a week less episodes. That means you dont need as many actors or writers then right?

[SFK]

Absolutely, and eschew pesky age old soap quibbles like "boring episodes where nothing happened". I think the novella format is more exciting and I honestly believe that a lot of TV fans out there like "seasons", they like to be able to wrap their brains around beginnings, middles, and ends, and they feel a sense of accomplishment when they work their way through their favorite shows. I really think the open-ended approach of a soap is losing its appeal for the minds of today. Of course we still know it's a soap and it'll continue until, well, it's cancelled, but if we can look at it as a series of benchmarks, it's a little less overwhelming than say logging onto P&G Classics and realizing you have 137 episodes of Another World to work trough before they get taken down. A hungry viewer is a happy viewer.

[SFK]

My brain keeps going back to Degrassi's novella format which I didn't watch but read was successful. This is the audience of the future, the folks who are most likely to watch a series online, and they committed to a well-produced four episodes a week for seven weeks format. On cable, of course. AMC and OLTL could do two or three a week for several more weeks.