• by John Gaffney , May 28, 2003

Cable's Time: I was talking with someone last week who opined that the key to whether or not the cable networks could grab their due upfront money this year would depend on their ability to show that their audience was still growing. Well, two things have happened. The first is that cable companies showed their audience is not only growing but that they were more involved in the programming than networks and syndicators. The other thing that happened this year is that audience strength has been largely rendered irrelevant. I don't think any major media buyer in New York over the past two weeks was compelled to spend millions on a growing or involved network audience. They went because the mass market is with the networks. They went and spent out of the fear that they just might miss something for their clients. The upfront process has taken the concept of limited inventory aimed at a mass audience and presented it to a hypervigilent business. The result is a buying frenzy. Cable will benefit from it as well. And the cable networks, with more focus on marketing resources and an involved audience, deserve it.

And The Rest? I don't believe other media will suffer from the bolt of money being thrown at TV. The issues that magazines, radio, outdoor and the Internet face now are the same ones they have faced for years. These media will continue to find novel ways to research effectiveness and consumer perceptions, and they too will benefit from a richer media climate this year. Business is tough outside of TV. But I don't think it's any tougher than it was last year.

At The Buzzer: I'm done with Jayson Blair. But I can't help but be appalled at the whipping the Times is taking from other media. If I'm a planner or buyer, this has caused me to look at the credibility of newspapers based on an isolated incident. It should have been nothing more than that, but it has become a credibility plague on this business.