Monday, August 13, 2007

Viewer-Centric CBS?


"Viewers will know score with CBS alert"
Hollywood Reporter

"CBS announced what it called a new "viewer-centric" marketing initiative to keep audiences informed if their favorite television show is delayed because of sports or news broadcasts that run over. CBS Eye-lert, which launches in the fall, will enable viewers to be notified via e-mail and text message if the start time of a program is delayed."

Hey CBS how does this help all the people whose show is pre-empted? Let me think of an example.... I've got it. How about viewers of Jericho? If you pre-empt Jericho on a Friday night will you then send out an alert to let us know we missed it? Is this another way of saying "pre-empted" yet using the word "delayed"?

Thanks but no thanks.

Speaking of "viewer-centric", is that what CBS has been lately as it involves Jericho?
I think not.


"Web turns TV ratings around"
Australian but interesting.

For more on communication issues between CBS and Jericho fans go here.



6 comments:

kestral said...

Not interested in Eye-lert at all! What I would be interested in is a network that works hard to fufill it's promises and make sure it's shows are aired when they are supposed to be!

Sweet Tea said...

Thanks for commenting. I agree with you. No eye-lert interests me. Just air Jericho like you should.

Skeeterbit said...

How do I say this without sounding like I'm siding with CBS??

I've spent the last 14 years in the Administrative office of an industry that runs 24-7. Whenever we did something, we had to turn ourselves inside out to try and make EVERYONE happy ALL the time. It's pretty near impossible.

Pre-empting ticks off fans of the show (with or without warning) and not pre-empting ticks off the fans of the sporting events.

Feel free to wish you could shove my virtual rose-colored glasses up my virtual rose-colored rearend, but I feel for all parties involved and wish I had a solution to suggest.

As much as I love JERICHO and absolutely hate to see it pre-empted, for myself and all my new recruits, it's times like these for which they created this saying:
"You can make some of the people happy some of the time, but you can't make all of the people happy all of the time."

Sling poo - but sling it gently! I bruise easily. :)

Sweet Tea said...

Skeeterbit,
You're right- there are two sides. No, not everybody can be happy.
What I object to most is that CBS led us to believe certain things like they would promote and we would get new viewers. I don't even mind the pre-emption but I do mind that new viewers are totally lost when CBS makes no announcement.
My suggestion would be that CBS have a liason who would connect with Jericho fans at times like these and make announcements. I feel Jericho is a special situation after going through the Nuts campaign. CBS should also go the extra mile to make sure new viewers are informed the week before a pre-emption airs.
No poo to throw. It might blow back on me.

Skeeterbit said...

A liaison is an excellent idea, but it reminds me of a saying my Daddy always uses, "Knowing his/her/their butt from a hole in the ground." To put it a little more professionally, this would require CBS to have their finger on the pulse of the situation - if they did in the first place, they would have been more aware of JERICHO's online, TiVo, iTune, etc., popularity, and it most probably wouldn't have been cancelled.

Since the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing, while the left hand is scratching someone's rear-end, I think we will always face these disappointments. We are probably getting the same thing from other networks; we just aren't as aware because we aren't fighting as hard for their shows.

Now, I shall shut up, because it's starting to sound like I'm taking up for CBS and I really don't mean to.

PlatPat said...

Skeeterbit, I saw from your interview that you said you worked in the hospital or medical field.

I, too, used to work in a major metropolitan hospital. I was in the Executive Office. Wanna talk about trying to keep everyone happy? Let's see, besides the patients, there were the visitors, relatives, the doctors, the nurses, lab, engineering, maintenance, food service -- I could go on, but let me just say there were 50 departments and I won't mention the Med School and residents or the System's Regional Office, the Corporate Office and the Supreme Head Honcho's office!!

It can't be done. You just do the best you can.

Now whether CBS is doing the best they can? Who knows. I just think the reruns are not that important to them.

What burns me up is that I keep telling my friends who are new to the show that the best thing is you can watch on line so you don't have to worry about missing anything, but when they tried to watch this weekend, the feed was messed up and out of sync, etc. I watched and had no problem! Of course, the newbies had the problems! That's just life, I guess. But I am happy to report that we did not lose any fans.