Thursday, January 26, 2006

UPN and WB merge The merger of CBS's (formerly Viacom's) UPN television network with Time-Warner's WB network was announced this week. The two parent companies will each have 50% ownership of the new network, which will be named CW. The idea is to take the most popular programs from each network and combine them, while throwing out less popular ones. The new network will be aimed especially at teens and young adults (WB's specialty) and, to some extent, black audiences (UPN's strong suit). These networks have existed for over a decade, and they have been mired in the #5 and #6 ranks behind ABC, NBC, CBS, and Fox. Unlike their rivals, the two networks never offered a full schedule of programs to their affiliated stations. The new network will drop a number of affiliates in cities where both have a presence now. Our take on this is that it's a big plus for the new CBS corporation, whose programming executives will be running CW while Warner execs have been left in the cold. What's no surprising is that being #5 or #6 is not a very desirable position in an industry, especially as network television has been declining in general, and WB and UPN in particular. The blog Technology Review notes that all television programmers, both networks and cable channels, are fighting an even bigger problem, disruption in the way people consume media: Many of the major cable companies, broadcast networks, and affiliates are looking for ways to reach a television audience that is spending more time with other forms of media. It makes sense, as a broadcast network, to begin to look at ways to reach your audience across multiple formats. CW breaks no new ground, but it does cut out some competition and its will free up resources at both media companies to seek other ways of reaching an audience. Finally, this deal makes two companeis that might be considered media rivals into friendly enemies. Joint ventures like this have to support collaboration and information exchange in other areas, bringing the overall media oligopoly a little mor eintimate with each other.  5:48:25 PM

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