The New York Times featured two articles this past Sunday, both concerning the harsh realities of television programming today. As the writers’ strike well-established their plight for equal reimbursement in the age of digital, they’ve finally shouted what television execs have long-since whispered: the internet is to television as the telephone is to the telegraph. And while the networks are tousling with ventures into the world wide web, they’ve tried to keep one ace up their sleeve: franchising.
Networks have always garnered more attention and income for popular shows by turning them into franchises – the Happy-Meals, toys, t-shirts and cartoons have keeping a lot of them in the black. Well, except for NBC’s popular, yet fledgling dramatic series about a high-school football team, Friday Night Lights, so explains writer Virginia Heffernan:
The fault of “Friday Night Lights” is extrinsic: the program has steadfastly refused to become a franchise. It is not and will never be “Heroes,” “Project Runway,” “The Hills” or Harry Potter…
This may sound like a blessing, but in a digital age a show cannot succeed without franchising. An author’s work can no longer exist in a vacuum, independent of hardy online extensions; indeed, a vascular system that pervades the Internet. Artists must now embrace the cultural theorists’ beloved model of the rhizome and think of their work as a horizontal stem for numberless roots and shoots — as many entry and exit points as fans can devise.
On the flipside, Nickelodeon’s wildly popular show with both children and their parents alike, Yo Gabba Gabba, followed the lucrative franchise path to fortune. NYTimes’ Rob Walker writes that even though the program originally aired in August, Yo Gabba Gabba had merchandise in stores by December. And not just any schwag-shop, but Kidrobot and Barneys New York.
Charles Rivkin, the president and chief executive of Wildbrain, which produces the show, says, “I challenge you to find another preschool show that four months after going on the air is actually selling adult apparel at Barneys.”
Once again, American television networks have proved that while creative, thought-provoking and entertaining shows exist, they don’t mean much more to them than the amount of branded collateral that can be sold. (We miss you, Arrested Development!)
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