PBS Goes to Facebook Before TV

Here's another social media first in 2010: A 102-minute documentary from PBS will be broadcast on Facebook before it does on, well, PBS. The "American Experience" documentary about the history of the U.S. environmental movement, titled "Earth Days," will be presented on Facebook on April 11, according to the New York Times, eight days before its TV broadcast on April 19 -- marking the first time a full-length documentary has appeared on the site before TV (the documentary has been touring 40 U.S. cities over the last year).

The Facebook showing is meant to be a community event, with real-time interaction between viewers and the filmmakers, enabled by a "social screening application" from Brand Networks, with underwriting from PBS. Brand Networks created a customized video player combined with online polling and the Facebook comment box.

In addition to just being nifty, the decision to generate buzz with a Facebook debut ahead of broadcast TV is obviously a strategic move targeting a younger audience which is interested in environmental issues, but might not be big TV-watchers. The "American Experience" executive producer, Mark Samels, explained to the NYT: "It's an opportunity, we think, to engage with a new audience, an audience that we may not be bringing to PBS Monday nights at 9 o'clock."

This message reminds me of similar sentiments expressed by people inside and outside broadcast TV, derogating the broadcast medium's ability to reach young viewers, who are supposedly all wrapped up in social networking. In the lead-up to the Super Bowl, for example, Pepsi execs explained the company's decision to eschew TV ads during the televised sports blowout in favor of an online charitable initiative with a social network component, telling USA Today, "the ad buy no longer makes sense for them when their target consumers are hanging out in digital space."

This is obviously a favorite new talking point -- some might say conceit -- in social media and marketing: if you want the young 'uns, this is where to find them. There is a growing body of evidence supporting this belief: in the second quarter of 2009, Nielsen found 18-24-year-olds watched almost as much video online as they did time-shifted content via DVR (5 hours, 11 minutes per month versus 5 hours, 33 minutes).

On the other hand, there's no denying young adults still watch a whole lot of TV, tempering the claims of social media and online generally as the go-to places for younger audiences. In the second quarter of 2009 Nielsen found 18-24-year-olds spent an average 108 hours, 49 minutes per month watching traditional TV. True, that's significantly less than the average 131 hours, 11 minutes per month spent by 25-34-year-olds, and the 136 hours, 38 minutes among 35-44-year-olds, but it's still a good amount of TV -- dwarfing the 5 hours, 11 minutes for online video.