• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, March 2, 2007

Some traditional and new digital networks want to be out front, in front -- but not necessarily upfront.

In a recent invite, Turner Entertainment Networks, in preparation for the upcoming TV advertising buying season, eschewed the word "upfront." Instead, the company's event on March 13 was called a "Brand and Programming Summit."

The word "upfront" may now begin its dirty legacy, taking up from the always grubby word "commodity" as it pertains to the TV advertising business.

Similarly, Yahoo recently concluded its "infront" presentation for advertising in New York, Los Angeles, and elsewhere, as an attempt to rebrand the upfront advertising market for the digital age.

Critics of the Yahoo event say there was little to talk about -- other than to explain exactly the assets that Yahoo already has -- such as search, email, community, entertainment, user-generated and other places for advertisers to become involved in.

We expect certain fringe benefits from upfront events, and here there was no new Patrick-Dempsey-starring TV show, no new quirky TV legal show from David E. Kelly, no aspirational reality program featuring back-biting young models -- no typical upfront-like star power to wow the attention of advertisers.

In the interest of full disclosure, MediaPost Communications has been also riffing on the theme, offering "Outfront" -- its one-day conference focusing on the key traditional and nontraditional issues for the upcoming TV advertising selling season.

The rebranding of the advertising market moniker is an attempt to steer business towards new digital areas; that would seemingly reveal the roots of another tough and weak traditional TV advertising market upon us.

Putting aside issues of minute-by-minute ratings, DVRs-added viewer ratings, engagement, and that darn eBay media auction system, media sellers' main business seems to be how to call the marketplace something other than what it has been called for about three decades.

Let's just be upfront about this: No one wants to return to the heyday of quick moving upfront markets, where in three wild days and nights TV's prime-time market would see $8 billion change hands -- all with the smell of cold pizza on media executives' breath.

That would be just down-back.