• by March 25, 2005

LESLIE MOONVES, IN REPLAY MODE -- Leslie Moonves said some really interesting things at the ANA's TV ad forum on Wednesday, but they may not be the ones you think they were. The obligatory sound bites picked up by the trade press included Moonves' "we're open" for upfront business, and that CBS would be seeking significant CPM increases during the upfront. Any surprises there? Not really. Nor was his proclamation that branded entertainment is "growing leaps and bounds" all that newsworthy. What was surprising though, was that CBS, a leader in that field, has yet to work out all the economics of it, and itself is a bit worried about program producers making an end run and striking branded deals with advertisers directly, effectively bypassing the network. "Who gets paid?," Les kvetched.

Another interesting Moonvesism was his allusion that advertisers were negotiating to strike branded entertainment deals for an "entire night," or an "entire series." Why does that seem vaguely reminiscent to us?

Anyway, Moonves did say a lot of other interesting bites, including the notion that CBS is exploring one-minute versions of top prime-time shows like "CSI" to stream to cell phone "viewers."

But the most interesting thing, we thought, was his throwaway line about digital video recorders: "DVR penetration is still relatively minor. It's 6 to 7 percent of the country."

Excuse us? "Relatively minor?" Even if his math is right - and we have to assume it is, because he gets it from none other than CBS research guru Dave Poltrack - we think that 6 percent of 7 percent of the U.S. TV population is fairly significant. To quote another TV research guru, Lifetime Television's Tim Brooks, himself being quoted in the Task Force study released by Nielsen on Wednesday: "A difference of one-tenth of a point in a total day rating over the course of a year is worth approximately $60 million [nationally]. That is, if a 1.0 rating becomes a 1.1, that's $60 million more in revenue. If it becomes a 0.9, that's $60 million less in revenue... so small fluctuations in rating points can mean a lot."

No wonder Les can't figure out who gets paid.

Meanwhile, we have to wonder how big the DVR dilemma really is. According to a report released by Magna Global USA this week, DVRs will be in nearly 12 percent of U.S. homes by the end of the year. That's precisely the point at which Nielsen will begin reporting data for DVR households in its sample. And we can hardly wait to see what those numbers show.

Of course, the Nielsen data will not - at least not initially - show any of the so-called "trick viewing" being done by those DVR households. We won't know if they're fast-forwarding, pausing or even rewinding TV commercials when they play shows back on their DVRs. We'll only be able to guess. But we suspect smart marketers and agencies will begin factoring the percentage of their ad buys that are "watched" during DVR playback.

BUT WAIT, THERE'S HOPE YET, AND IT'S COMING FROM NINE-YEAR-OLD GIRLS - "I liked that commercial." That's a remark you don't hear all that often unless you happen to be standing somewhere on Madison Avenue. Its an even more uncommon remark to hear from a nine-year-old girl, but that's what we heard Zoe say as she was fast-forwarding through a commercial break while watching a recorded episode of "Malcolm In The Middle" on her TiVo. "Malcolm," by the way, should change its name, she said, because they've added a fourth child character to the Fox show and the show's title character is no longer precisely in the middle. But that's another story.

The spot Zoe fixated on also captured our attention, once she pointed it out to us. It was this amazingly cool Honda commercial that was less of a product showcase and more of a piece of moving artwork featuring montages of people and images and terrific ambient music.

"What do you like about it?," we probed.

"I just like it," replied Zoe, as she played it back a third time.

We agreed, and made the following notation in our Riff Fodder Folder: "Great ads are like great art, you know them when you see them - again and again and again."