Who Knew?

This is the second half of a two-part article. Concerning LOST can be found over at nonTV. It’s a critically acclaimed television show that both encourages and commands an unparalleled level of viewer engagement, with its most devoted fans spending literally hundreds of hours attempting to decode its mysteries. But LOST has failed to convert this engagement into a premium revenue stream: in fact, the ways in which it evokes passion from its fanbase might just be what’s leading it into its decline. Consider: A recent story in Variety points out that 1/3 of its viewers opt to DVR LOST, skipping commercials and making advertisers more cautious of buying time.The show’s been flagging in the ratings, achieving a series low in recent weeks, most likely due to its labyrinthine storyline made even more complicated by the current season. Check out any online poll in the last few months and you’ll find that the majority of people still watching are the most devoted fans, who feel they need to stick with it to the end - newcomers to the show don’t have any such obligation. Obviously, LOST is in no way losing money - it’s still one of the highest-watched programs on network television, scoring big among some key demographics. But what if a show like LOST made its debut on a basic cable network, or didn’t have some of the perks that kept viewers interested from the beginning (like an $11.5 million budget for the pilot)? Basically, what kinds of revenue streams can turn viewer engagement and passion into dollars? Product placement is sort of an overplayed buzzword nowadays, with Ben Silverman (co-chairman of NBC) taking it to an obscene level with shows like American Gladiators, Knight Rider - and Heroes, in which two characters embark on a cross-country quest with a rented Nissan Versa in the first season. Viewers didn’t complain too much because the show was at its creative peak - but in Season 3, an egregious mention of Sprint’s reliable network during a scene set in the Botswana desert drew some complaints. Silverman’s strategy is interesting in that he designs shows tailored to younger demographics who tend to DVR their television, and then just places ads within the actual content. The success of these placements seems to mostly depend on the creative team behind them - for reality programming or cheap remakes like Knight Rider, the in-show ads seemed obnoxious, but for shows like The Office and the beginning of Heroes, the quality of the show went a long way towards making it easier for viewers to not mind the placements. Nevertheless, if you’re not a network’s flagship genre show, it seems like product placement would be the wrong way to go - a brand integration anything less than seamless can do serious damage to how viewers perceive creative integrity and the credibility of the narrative. Interestingly, LOST has had no product placements - at least, not within the show itself. Which brings us to auxiliary transmedia narratives - the backstories and spin-offs told through non-televised media, like alternate reality games (ARGs). Trying to charge for access to this extra content is a bit tricky - if you’re revealing an important part of your show’s mythology through your ARG (as LOST did with The Numbers in “The LOST Experience”) and you make fans pay for the privilege, you’re going to lose trust and loyalty with your fanbase, because they’ll feel cheated that you chose to put behind a paywall the answers that you could have just shown on free TV. LOST chose to subsidize its ARG with sponsors and product placements from blue-chip advertisers, which proved to be intrusive and too obvious, and undermined the creative integrity of the narrative. When an ARG behaves as an auxiliary transmedia narrative to a major creative property, fans of the property get value out of it in two different ways: the extra backstory or narrative content that emerges from the game, and the sheer fun of actually playing the game and uncovering that backstory. What if a fanbase paid a nominal fee, not for the content itself, but in order to actually play the ARG? I mean, fans will pirate the content anyway if you don’t make it freely available, sharing it on fansites and disseminating it across countless message boards. I’m just wondering whether the experience of ARG gameplay alone has enough value to make fans willing to subsidize the experience that you’re providing for them. I’m going to cut this off before it gets even longer, but these are just two ideas for how to monetize a show like this. Regardless of what methods one chooses, anyone who creates immersive entertainment - whether it’s a DIY Internet series or a feature film, complete with a mythology that your audience has no choice but to get hopelessly addicted to - should realize that the nature of their content has some very real added value compared to most other content. It would be a grave business mistake not to try to make some money from that added value, while taking every care to respect the fanbase while doing so.

This is the second half of a two-part article. Concerning LOST can be found over at nonTV.

It’s a critically acclaimed television show that both encourages and commands an unparalleled level of viewer engagement, with its most devoted fans spending literally hundreds of hours attempting to decode its mysteries. But LOST has failed to convert this engagement into a premium revenue stream: in fact, the ways in which it evokes passion from its fanbase might just be what’s leading it into its decline.

Consider:

  • A recent story in Variety points out that 1/3 of its viewers opt to DVR LOST, skipping commercials and making advertisers more cautious of buying time.

  • The show’s been flagging in the ratings, achieving a series low in recent weeks, most likely due to its labyrinthine storyline made even more complicated by the current season. Check out any online poll in the last few months and you’ll find that the majority of people still watching are the most devoted fans, who feel they need to stick with it to the end - newcomers to the show don’t have any such obligation.
Obviously, LOST is in no way losing money - it’s still one of the highest-watched programs on network television, scoring big among some key demographics. But what if a show like LOST made its debut on a basic cable network, or didn’t have some of the perks that kept viewers interested from the beginning (like an $11.5 million budget for the pilot)? Basically, what kinds of revenue streams can turn viewer engagement and passion into dollars?

Product placement is sort of an overplayed buzzword nowadays, with Ben Silverman (co-chairman of NBC) taking it to an obscene level with shows like American Gladiators, Knight Rider - and Heroes, in which two characters embark on a cross-country quest with a rented Nissan Versa in the first season. Viewers didn’t complain too much because the show was at its creative peak - but in Season 3, an egregious mention of Sprint’s reliable network during a scene set in the Botswana desert drew some complaints. Silverman’s strategy is interesting in that he designs shows tailored to younger demographics who tend to DVR their television, and then just places ads within the actual content. The success of these placements seems to mostly depend on the creative team behind them - for reality programming or cheap remakes like Knight Rider, the in-show ads seemed obnoxious, but for shows like The Office and the beginning of Heroes, the quality of the show went a long way towards making it easier for viewers to not mind the placements. Nevertheless, if you’re not a network’s flagship genre show, it seems like product placement would be the wrong way to go - a brand integration anything less than seamless can do serious damage to how viewers perceive creative integrity and the credibility of the narrative.

Interestingly, LOST has had no product placements - at least, not within the show itself. Which brings us to auxiliary transmedia narratives - the backstories and spin-offs told through non-televised media, like alternate reality games (ARGs). Trying to charge for access to this extra content is a bit tricky - if you’re revealing an important part of your show’s mythology through your ARG (as LOST did with The Numbers in “The LOST Experience”) and you make fans pay for the privilege, you’re going to lose trust and loyalty with your fanbase, because they’ll feel cheated that you chose to put behind a paywall the answers that you could have just shown on free TV. LOST chose to subsidize its ARG with sponsors and product placements from blue-chip advertisers, which proved to be intrusive and too obvious, and undermined the creative integrity of the narrative.

When an ARG behaves as an auxiliary transmedia narrative to a major creative property, fans of the property get value out of it in two different ways: the extra backstory or narrative content that emerges from the game, and the sheer fun of actually playing the game and uncovering that backstory. What if a fanbase paid a nominal fee, not for the content itself, but in order to actually play the ARG? I mean, fans will pirate the content anyway if you don’t make it freely available, sharing it on fansites and disseminating it across countless message boards. I’m just wondering whether the experience of ARG gameplay alone has enough value to make fans willing to subsidize the experience that you’re providing for them.

I’m going to cut this off before it gets even longer, but these are just two ideas for how to monetize a show like this. Regardless of what methods one chooses, anyone who creates immersive entertainment - whether it’s a DIY Internet series or a feature film, complete with a mythology that your audience has no choice but to get hopelessly addicted to - should realize that the nature of their content has some very real added value compared to most other content. It would be a grave business mistake not to try to make some money from that added value, while taking every care to respect the fanbase while doing so.
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