Mashable released their latest “Social TV” list for both cable and broadcast programs for the week of 10/24-10/30/2011. Through a partnership with Trendrr, the list presents which shows were most buzzed about online, incorporating statistics from Twitter, Facebook, GetGlue and other social platforms.
We’re in an interesting place in pop culture right now.
Never before has pop culture been more about the NOW.
However, never before have we had the ability to time-shift the way we do now.
While the online conversation is real-time, we can easily postpone watching a show by minutes or even months.
This “mixed media” presents some obvious challenges for all parties involved:
1) While you can avoid “spoilers” for shows that haven’t aired yet, how can you possibly avoid conversations about major TV shows after they have aired?
I vividly remember an episode of the tragically-short series “Sports Night” where sports broadcaster Dan Rydell goes to great lengths to avoid knowing the score of a game he wanted to watch in full after his show. This included rewiring the studio, involving a dozen other people and other shenanigans. Naturally, someone who didn’t know about his avoidance tactics told him the final score immediately following the broadcast.
2) You have to choose: be in the NOW or be free.
If you watch a TV show live, you are doing so with millions of other viewers. You can have live chats with other viewers online and over the phone, which builds amazing communities.
Years ago, my wife and I would call people during the commercial breaks of LOST and create a shared viewing experience.
The trade-off is freedom; freedom to set your own schedule, consume media when you want and skip over commercials. You can’t generally have both.
3) Stories play out so differently.
Gone, for many, are the days of the cliffhanger. There was little more exhilarating than seeing your favorite show end in a mystery or with a shocking development – knowing you had to wait a full week for the next chapter in the story. Anticipation would build over the next seven days, allowing word of mouth marketing to get more and more people interested.
Now, you can live-stream entire series, or DVR and store several episodes, watching a season’s worth of stories play out in a lazy weekend on the couch.
We’ve traded anticipation for instant gratification. Not a bad thing, per se, but still a thing.
4) Who wants to be 2000 and late?
As our news/entertainment/meme cycle continues to accelerate, things happening this morning will be even more obsolete by this afternoon. (Dare I say things will appear and move on faster than a Kim Kardashian marriage?)
And with hundreds of channels and hundreds of social platforms, the churning will lead to burning faster than ever.
We have been presented with some of the greatest technology to control our lives and increase productivity, only to see pop culture move more rapidly in response.
In the social media world, companies can be held accountable for every action at warp speed.
Hours after media content company Netflix announced a few months back that they would be dividing their DVD and online streaming services, they got pummeled online.
Fanning the flame was the fact that they didn’t even control the Twitter account for their proposed new line of DVD videos, Qwikster.
A company’s consumers told them in every way possible – blogs, tweets, Facebook posts and even videos…like this:
Like the man said…the Internet broke up with Netflix. Even if people would pay the additional money, they were mad at how the company made the announcement.
But their reversal was less of an apology and more of an anti-apology.
From their corporate blog announcement, they kind of put the onus of stupidity on their customers, claiming two sites would make it difficult. It wasn’t an all-out, “we’re sorry, we love you.”
No, it was more like, “you can’t handle our awesomeness, so we’ll dumb it down for you.”
In the end, the company fixed the issue that they created, but what did they really accomplish? Customers are ticked off and you basically said it’s their fault. Not good.
In one of the most shocking eliminations in show history, the American Idol viewers voted off stand-out Pia Toscano.
Despite being a favorite of judges Jennifer Lopez, Steven Tyler and Randy Jackson, she garnered the lowest amount of votes. And since the judges already used their one save to keep the talented but odd Casey Abrams, there was nothing they could do.
So, bye bye, Pia.
Sort of.
By making the Top 10, she’s guaranteed a spot in the lucrative annual concert tour. She’ll continue to make business under the American Idol banner and has been the beneficiary of hours of nationwide TV exposure.
Know why I’m so confident her talent can rise above a reality show injustice?
Chris Daughtry.
Perhaps my favorite contestant the show has ever had, he was also cut too early in his season. Should I mention his countless hit records that came after American Idol? He’s become a legitimate rock star and hitmaker, crossing between light rock, hard rock, alternative, pop and country. Versatile, popular, successful.
Pia, use Daughtry as an example.
And if you don’t want to follow the rocker, may I mention Jennifer Hudson? While she only made it to 7th place, she has gone on to become one of reality TV’s true success stories. She’s won an Oscar, a Grammy, a Golden Globe and more. She’s a pop culture touchstone (not quite an icon yet), product endorser and an all-around entertainer.
Being released from Idol isn’t the end…just the beginning.
Bonus – here is Pia’s farewell song, “I’ll Stand By You” by The Pretenders:
“Sports Night” was perhaps my favorite TV show of all time.
It aired in the late 1990s and was about an ESPN-like TV show. It was a time in my life when that was the career path I thought I was headed down. [Turns out, I spent a summer working in sports TV before turning to sports PR, and now social media. Go fig.]
As the series wound towards the end of it’s criminally-short 45-episode run, a mystery man appeared as a company named Quo Vadimus was looking to buy the show’s network.
In a touching scene, the man confesses to Executive Producer, “Dana, I’m what the world considers to be a phenomenally succesful man, and I’ve failed much more than I’ve succeeded. And each time I fail, I get my people together, and I say, “Where are we going?” And it starts to get better.”
That line provides an “ah-ha” moment – in order to succeed, you have to be willing to fail. You see, “quo vadimus” translates to “where are we going?”
In the social media world, the risk of failure is high.
Your brand or company or personal reputation is on the line every time you blog, post, Tweet, share, like, recommend, buzz, or any other social action. Everything you say is inviting feedback from your detractors. Everything you post is open to criticism.
However, the rewards are also high.
Every interaction could create a new customer, or make a fan more loyal. Every update is an opportunity to take your brand to another level.
But in order to try to get the rewards, you have to play the game.
And if you fail, dust yourself off and ask yourself, where are we going? And try again.
hit show from the 1970s.
