• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, June 6, 2005

ESPN may want to give viewers a chance to own a little piece of its network - by buying an ESPN-branded television set.

Of course with a 500-channel universe, this seems somewhat crazy. What if the other 499 networks did the same thing? You'd certainly have some shelf space considerations.

A good video joke would have the first customer angrily punching his remote with frustration because he can only get ESPN channels on his set.

We don't know how an ESPN-branded TV would operate. Perhaps ESPN's TV would morph all TV content into sports. Watch Brian Williams read the news wearing a hockey helmet. See "Desperate Housewives" making both football passes and passes at men.

A network-branded TV could be nothing more than turning on your set and initially getting only ESPN channels -- kind of like how hotel TVs are always first tuned to the hotel promo channel. (Don't PC and Mac makers have specific setting so users go first to their Web sites for news, search engines, or support?)

Just like with any PC, you'll be able to change any initial setting on your branded TV set. But if you are a big viewer of ESPN - and you are already buying this specific TV - why would you want to?

Smart thinking ESPN executives will use this market justification when and if they ultimately go ahead with a deal.

In the wake of consumers' increased fickleness about the entertainment they consume, we get the corporate logic here. There's licensing money to be made.

Walt Disney chairman Robert Iger said in a New York Times story that brand value will be more important -- but not more important than the real reason viewers turn on their TV sets in the first place.

He said what many media executives have said for some time -- "Content is king."

If that's the case, then branding must be content's queen.