For NBC, mobile TV isn't must-see TV

NBC made me laugh this week, and it wasn't a sitcom pratfall or late-night talk show quip that did it. Nope, it was funnyman Jeff Zucker--better known as the CEO of NBC Universal--who spouted off on the state of the mobile content industry during an appearance at the recent World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Speaking alongside notables including Sony CEO Howard Stringer, FCC chairman Kevin Martin and Google CEO Eric Schmidt, Zucker railed against the strong-arm tactics of wireless operators, complaining that they award just "10 percent of the economics to the content companies," thereby creating little incentive for NBC Universal to devote its attention to the mobile platform. "[Mobile's] actually not that important," Zucker sniffed. "We're obviously playing in this world, but playing in a small way." Here's the punchline: Zucker followed his remarks with the announcement NBC will broadcast some 2,200 hours of live mobile coverage of the upcoming Summer Olympics. ("That's pretty amazing from a company that doesn't consider wireless very important in the near term," cracked Fortune magazine senior editor David Kirkpatrick, who moderated the panel.)

But wait, it gets better. In the wake of Zucker's comments, NBC announced it will launch WAP sites for the majority of series on the network's schedule, boosting its overall mobile multimedia presence to nearly 40 WAP sites and three mobile video channels in all. (In a press release, NBC proudly trumpets that's "more than any other broadcast network.") In February NBC will debut 10 new mobile sites spotlighting series including Saturday Night Live, Last Call with Carson Daly, Lipstick Jungle and American Gladiators alongside existing sites for non-scripted programs like Deal or No Deal and The Biggest Loser. NBC also notes its mobile games for the hit action series Heroes--one a trivia title, the other a "Create Your Own Hero" platform--have proven extremely popular with viewers, and in all, the network racked up more than 1.6 million WAP page views during the fourth quarter of 2007 alone.

Zucker's inane comments notwithstanding, NBC is clearly betting big on mobile, but at least for now, that investment does not include original scripted content. As the Writers Guild of America strike enters its fourth month, with no real end in sight, Hollywood scribes are still battling producers over their share of income derived from webisodes, mobisodes and other scripted new-media formats--more and more, however, the question is whether viewers even care about original digital content in the first place. According to a survey released this week by media communications research firm Carat, 72 percent of respondents report that they are watching the same amount of primetime TV than before the strike began in November, while 25 percent are watching less and 3 percent are watching more. But only 16 percent of viewers said they would continue watching reruns of their favorite series for the next three to six months--among respondents who said they would not (24 percent) or may not (60 percent) continue to watch their favorites in repeats, 54 percent said they would go online instead. Among that 54 percent, only 6 percent said they would go to the networks' websites to watch shows or parts of TV shows (i.e., webisodes) they would or would not normally watch.

The Carat study does not explicitly address the WGA strike's impact on consumers' mobile media behaviors, but viewers' overall shoulder-shrug response to the absence of new scripted series, combined with the relative success of NBC's mobile web efforts as well as the seemingly minimal interest in webisodes and related digital content, does not bode well for mobile TV's future. If the current economics of mobile don't favor content providers, and if NBC feels that WAP sites and trivia games create a sufficiently compelling consumer experience, then there seems little reason for broadcast networks to invest heavily in mobisodes or related mobile production initiatives when a majority of viewers seem content to tune in to reruns, reality shows and sports anyway. From a wireless perspective, it's almost immaterial which side wins the writers strike: If networks don't care to invest in unique mobile programming--and if consumers don't care, period--then mobile TV is the clear loser, regardless of the outcome. - Jason