The New Reality
Jeff Gaspin's job: figure out how to make online entertainment pay
By BROOKS BARNESMay 15, 2006; Page R3
When people ask Jeff Gaspin to describe how important new media has become to the old-line television networks, he brings up an embarrassing story.
While conducting meetings a few years ago at the Bravo cable channel, Mr. Gaspin, now president of cable entertainment and digital content at NBC Universal Television Group, says he could never remember the name of the executive who oversaw the online unit. "For an entire year, I just couldn't remember it," he says. "I was truly embarrassed, but it just didn't seem important enough that I remember his name."
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The 46-year-old Mr. Gaspin believes that these days he isn't likely to suffer the same fate. "Now, the online guy is the most important guy in the room," he says.
The New Frontier
As the television networks race to figure out their strategies for delivering shows to viewers in new ways, Mr. Gaspin is the person NBC Universal has charged with coming up with programming that runs on the Web, cellphones and on other digital platforms that haven't yet been invented. He has to figure out what kind of content will work in this new realm, how to generate revenue and prod Hollywood writers, producers and agents for ideas. It's a totally new job in an industry that, when it comes to programming, hasn't changed much in the past few decades.
In many ways, General Electric Co.'s NBC Universal is staking its future on Mr. Gaspin's job. The network, which is trying to pull itself out of the prime-time ratings hole it fell into with the departure of the hit sitcom "Friends" two years ago, has been particularly aggressive when it comes to developing unique TV content for the Web. This summer, for instance, the network will run 10 mini-episodes of the popular sitcom "The Office" exclusively on the Web -- the first of the Big Four networks to attempt such a project.
So far, NBC and others aren't generating much revenue from their online projects, especially compared with the money they make through television advertising. But everyone is trying to devise a formula.
"We are going to figure out a way to make it pay," says Jeff Zucker, chief executive of NBC Universal. "The only way to do that is to bring something new to the party. It's about having the content."
JEFF GASPIN NBC's digital guru
Mr. Zucker has dubbed his initiative to deliver new content in new ways "TV 360." And he says he asked Mr. Gaspin to oversee the effort in part because of his track record in the reality-TV genre. "Jeff is great at taking an emerging business and figuring out how to make it a mainstream one that makes a lot of money," Mr. Zucker says.
Mr. Gaspin is regarded as one of the founding fathers of reality TV, the genre that exploded in the late 1990s and gushes profits for networks because of the low production costs. Among other projects, he created the juggernaut series "Behind the Music" for Viacom Inc.'s VH1 music cable channel and developed Bravo's hit makeover show "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy."
Mr. Gaspin's journey into the digital realm started in a routine strategy meeting held last summer in New York with GE Chief Executive Jeffrey Immelt. At the time, Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc. were getting lots of attention for their stock prices, and Mr. Gaspin says that Mr. Immelt wanted to know what NBC's broad strategy was for the Internet and mobile devices. Mr. Gaspin says he was given eight weeks to put together an extensive presentation.
A Huge Shift
Mr. Gaspin, who is based at NBC's studio in Burbank, Calif., says he set up meetings with everyone from Google to his own online people. "It was a 180-degree shift," he says. "We went from not paying enough attention to this being our complete focus."
Among his first projects: A reality show called "StarTomorrow," which NBC will launch on the Web in July. The "American Idol"-style show, produced with Tommy Mottola, the former chief executive of Sony Music Entertainment, represents the first time a major broadcast network has developed a series exclusively for the Internet.
MEET THE NEW BOSS Scenes from an online episode of "The Office"
But Mr. Gaspin's big test will come this fall, when NBC will start running its first full batch of shows that have offshoot components for the Web, cellphones or Apple Computer Co.'s iTunes online music and video service. Viewers will be able to go to NBC.com and watch such programs, known as Webisodes, free of charge. Programming for mobile phones, called mobisodes, will be available free to people who have a video-ready cellphone and subscribe to a video package from their wireless carrier. All of the content will likely feature a combination of banner ads and video ads, although NBC says it hasn't decided yet how they will be incorporated.
One extensive project involves "The Black Donnellys," a new drama series about four brothers involved in organized crime, which will debut in September on NBC. The show also will feature exclusive content for both the Web and mobile phones. There will be Webisodes with the show's narrator divulging the history of the Donnelly family. There's also a blog from the executive producers focused on putting the show together.
Today, NBC is scheduled to unveil its fall lineup to advertisers in a major presentation at New York's Radio City Music Hall.
In on the Action
NBC isn't alone in its quest to serve up programming everywhere and in every way. Virtually all broadcast and cable networks are frantically building out a digital division.
News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox studio is developing TV content for the company's various Web sites and other platforms, and the company just created a unit called Fox Interactive Media to coordinate the effort. Already, Fox is a leader in developing original content for video-ready cellphones. It recently announced a spinoff of its "Prison Break" series to be viewed exclusively on cellphones. And original mobisodes of Fox's hit counterterrorism series "24" ran on cellphones late last year.
NBC and the other networks also face competition from Internet companies themselves. Yahoo is working on creating its own content, including reality shows to be distributed on the Web. But the online company also is partnering with television networks to stream content.
For instance, Yahoo will be streaming episodes of CBS's news program "60 Minutes" starting in September. Immediately after the broadcast, one segment will be posted on Yahoo with expanded footage and interviews, along with a totally new segment based on the week's news.
Meantime, upstarts like New York-based Rocketboom LLC are getting in on the action with their own original programming. Rocketboom runs a popular video blog where a few friends post a daily satirical news report with Internet-related content.
Greater Workload
Within NBC itself, the network faces the tough task of wringing more content out of existing employees. Like other networks, NBC isn't yet keen to spend much money on digital initiatives.
So, for instance, "The Office" Webisodes for this summer were written by some of the writers of the original series -- for no extra money. NBC and other networks have relied on corporate muscle to demand such extras.
An NBC spokesman says: "We don't separate out compensation for these services; it falls under overall compensation."
This is a festering problem for Hollywood's writers and other unions, which are starting to talk of a strike -- and one that Mr. Gaspin will be called on to help resolve.
"We need more resources if we're going to go full bore with this," says Ben Silverman, executive producer of "The Office" and several reality shows for NBC and other networks. "The good news is that I think the networks realize this."
Writers are used to developing half-hour or hour-long shows -- not Web clips and mobisodes. And they are used to big payoffs if networks buy a project. "The big turn-off at times is when people realize that there's not the upfront revenue they would like there to be," says Bob Levinson, head of world-wide television for Los Angeles-based talent agency International Creative Management.
When it comes to creating digital tentacles for their shows, Mr. Gaspin says some producers have the attitude of, "I don't need it, I don't want it, leave me alone."
So how does he handle those situations? Mr. Gaspin says he talks about the attention such efforts can bring to a show, and tries to give a tutorial on the digital universe without tripping over any egos. "Very few shows are so well run that the producers have extra time to do anything," Mr. Gaspin says. "We understand there are constraints. But the world has changed."
If nothing else, producers are starting to realize the promotional power of the Web. NBC credits its decision to make episodes of "The Office" available on iTunes with helping the show notch a sharp ratings increase. And creating online dieting clubs around the reality show "The Biggest Loser" -- where people compete to lose the most weight and win $250,000 -- helped the series blossom into a modest hit last fall. The clubs, which charge members $20 a month, offer message boards and diet and exercise tips from the cast members of the series itself. The six-month-old venture has 40,000 members to date, according to Mr. Gaspin.
"When you have little successes like that," he says, "it helps take the barriers down."
Online Incubation
In scouting for potential projects, Mr. Gaspin has started relying on a handful of talent agents, including Mr. Levinson.
At a recent pitch meeting, Mr. Levinson tried selling Mr. Gaspin on an animated project set in the future. The project would start as a Web series and then, if successful, be spun into a video game and then a TV series or even a film. By starting on the Web, the project could be incubated without incurring high costs, says Mr. Levinson. "With luck, a hit on the Web would then move elsewhere."
It's Mr. Gaspin's job to figure out what pitches are worth taking a chance on, and he says it was immediately clear that Mr. Levinson's project was worth a serious look.
"It worked out exactly as we were hoping," Mr. Levinson says. "Instead of us having to go to various divisions and sell something over and over to people who may or may not be talking to each other, we were able to go to one person. By the end of the day, Jeff had talked to all of those people for us."