English Entertainment
AXN bets big on 2015; launches new shows
MUMBAI: Come April and English entertainment channel AXN from the Multi Screen Media (MSM) stable is all set to redefine itself. The channel will be extending its content offering and has lined up a slew of new shows for this year. Moreover, April will also see the launch of the channel’s high definition offering – AXN HD.
Speaking on the launch of the HD channel, Sony Pix and AXN EVP and business head Saurabh Yagnik says, “Due to digitisation, issues relating to distribution and availability have been addressed. The category has now become more amenable to appointment based viewing and audiences are seeking two kinds of shows – iconic and fresh shows from the US.”
As part of its revised strategy, the channel will do away with telecasting movies.
Brand New FPC
Keeping consumer insights in mind, the channel has increased its programming line up. For instance, the weekday programming slot from Monday to Thursday has been re-jigged to Monday to Friday. The 8 pm slot will have signature shows like Guiness, Ripley’s, American Ninja Warrior and Wipeout.
This will be followed by reality shows at 9 pm like Fear Factor, So You Think You Can Dance, Top Chef, Survivor and The Amazing Race.
The 10 pm slot will have famous crime shows like 24, Elementary, NCIS and CSI amongst others.
Finally, the 11 pm slot will have edgier content with shows like Sex and the City, Dexter, Ray Donovan and Californification.
Weekend Slot Strengthened
In August 2014, AXN introduced a new weekend slot, ‘Not So Ordinary Weekend,’ which aired on Friday and Saturday. Since the weekday slot will now be extended from Monday to Friday, the ‘Not So Ordinary Weekend’ slot has been moved to Saturday and Sunday. During this slot, the channel will air fresh content airing closer to US dates. Shows that air in this slot are: Sherlock (season four), Supernatural (season eleven), Orphan Black (season three), Hannibal (season three), Elementary (season four), Voice (season nine and 10), Madam Secretary (season two), Extant (season two), and Scorpion (season three).
New Shows:
Beginning 6 April, fresh seasons of shows like 24 and Dexter will be telecast at 10 pm and 11 pm respectively on weekdays. Top Chef Masters season five will begin from 9 April at 8 pm during the weekdays. Another long running reality show Survivor is back in its season 27 from 21 April from Monday to Friday at 9 pm.
The channel has partnerships with 20 global studios like CBS, Sony Pictures, BBC, WB, MGM, NBC Universal, Buena Vista International, Fremantle Media, Endemol, and FOX for content deals. The channel also has 2000 plus hours of content supply every year.
AXN HD Launch
On 6 May, 2014 MSM received two licences from the Information and Broadcasting Ministry (I&B). The aim was to increase its high definition (HD) offering to its viewers. The licences obtained were for AXN HD and SET HD. The network today announced that AXN HD will be launched on 6 April, 2015. It will have 1080i HD picture clarity and 5.1 sharp surround sound. The network is currently in talks with various platforms for its distribution. It is currently priced at Rs 30.
“While the shows will be same on the two channels, we will be tweaking some of the content for the HD feed. We could also have certain exclusive content for the HD feed in the future,” informs Yagnick.
Social Engagement
Providing some inputs from digital agency Social Bakers for the period December 2014 to February 2015, the channel claims to have an engagement rate on social media of 5.80 per cent versus its closest rival Zee cafe at 2.90 per cent. For the same period, FX, Comedy Central and Star World had an engagement rate of 1.70 per cent, 1.36 per cent and 0.76 per cent respectively. A third of the channel’s marketing budget is dedicated for digital activations that are handled both by AXN and digital agency Tonic Media. Through this, AXN targets to reach an additional five million fans on social media.
The target audience for the channels is the 15-34 age group.
Marketing
AXN has also put in place an aggressive TV plan where promotions will run across the MSM network channels. A print plan targeted in four cities on 6 April is on the anvil besides robust social media promotions. However, radio and OOH will not feature for the promotions.
Sharing an insight about the genre’s growth, Yagnick says that the average weekly viewing (time spent) of 10 minutes on the genre has increased by approximately 50 per cent. While the metros have been performing well for the channel, the U.P. market has grown substantially as distribution has helped increase availability.
Pix and AXN vice president and head programming and acquisitions Amogh Dusad informs that drama is the biggest performing genre on the channel. “Comedy is well being explored and reality shows too have performed well for the channel,” Dusad adds.
With a robust line up and a focus ahead on retaining its leadership position, AXN is aiming at making it big this year.
UK: The aerial is losing its grip. As broadband becomes the default way Britons watch television, the UK is edging towards a decisive, and divisive, question: should Freeview be switched off by 2034? The issue, highlighted in reporting by The Guardian, has exposed deep fault lines over access, affordability and the future of public service broadcasting.
For nearly 25 years, Freeview has delivered free-to-air television from the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5 to almost every corner of the country. Even now, it remains the UK’s largest TV platform, used in more than 16m homes and on around 10m main household sets. Yet the same broadcasters that built it are now pressing for its closure within eight years.
Their case rests on a structural shift in viewing. Smart TVs, superfast broadband and the Netflix-led streaming boom have pulled audiences online. Advertising economics have followed. By 2034, the number of homes using Freeview as their main TV set is forecast to fall from a peak of almost 12m in 2012 to fewer than 2m, making digital terrestrial television, or DTT, increasingly costly to sustain.
But critics say the rush to switch off risks abandoning those least able, or least willing, to move online.
“I don’t want to be choosing apps and making new accounts,” says Lynette, 80, from Kent. “It is time-consuming and irritating trying to work out where I want to be, to remember the sequence of clicks, with hieroglyphics instead of words. If I make a mistake I have to start again.”
Lynette is among nearly 100,000 people who have signed a “save Freeview” petition launched by campaign group Silver Voices. She fears the government is about to “take [Freeview] away from me and others who either don’t like, can’t afford, or can’t use online versions”.
Official figures underline the fault lines. A report commissioned by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport estimates that by 2035, 1.8m homes will still depend on Freeview. Ofcom’s analysis shows those households are more likely to be disabled, older, living alone, female, and based in the north of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Freeview is owned by the public service broadcasters through Everyone TV, which also operates Freesat and the newer streaming platform Freely. After two years of review, DCMS is expected to set out its position soon, drawing on three options proposed by Ofcom: a costly upgrade of Freeview’s ageing technology; maintaining a bare-bones service with only core PSB channels; or a full switch-off during the 2030s.
The broadcasters have rallied behind the third option. They argue that 2034 is the logical cut-off, when transmission contracts with network operator Arqiva expire. By then, they say, the cost of broadcasting to a dwindling audience will far outweigh the returns from TV advertising.
Ofcom agrees a crunch point is approaching. In July, the regulator warned of a “tipping point” within the next few years, after which it will no longer be commercially viable for broadcasters to carry the costs of DTT.
Others see risks beyond economics. Questions remain over whether internet TV can reliably deliver emergency broadcasts, such as the daily Covid updates, in the way that universally available DTT can. The UK radio industry has also warned that an internet-only future for TV could push up distribution costs and force some radio stations off air if PSBs no longer share Arqiva’s mast network.
“It is a political hot potato,” says Dennis Reed, founder of Silver Voices, who says he has “dissociated” his organisation from the government’s stakeholder forum, which he believes is “heavily biased” towards streaming.
The Future TV Taskforce, representing the PSBs, counters that moving online could “close the digital divide once and for all”. “We want to be able to plan to ensure that no one is left behind,” a spokesperson says, adding that rising DTT costs could otherwise mean cuts to programme budgets.
The numbers show the scale of the challenge. Of the 1.8m Freeview-dependent homes projected for 2035, around 1.1m are expected to have broadband but not use it for TV. The remaining 700,000 are forecast to lack a broadband connection altogether.
Veterans of the analogue switch-off, completed in 2012 after 76 years, recall similar fears of “TV blackout chaos”. Around 6 per cent of households were labelled “digital refuseniks”, yet a targeted help scheme and a national campaign, fronted by a robot called Digit Al voiced by Matt Lucas, delivered a largely smooth transition.
This time, the BBC is less keen to foot the bill. Tim Davie, the outgoing director general, has said the corporation should not fund a comparable support programme for a Freeview switch-off.
Research for Sky by Oliver & Ohlbaum suggests that with early awareness campaigns and digital inclusion measures, only about 330,000 households would ultimately need hands-on help ahead of a 2034 shutdown.
Meanwhile, viewing habits continue to fragment. Audience body Barb says 7 per cent of UK households no longer own a TV set, choosing to watch on other devices. In December, YouTube overtook the BBC’s combined channels in total UK viewing across TVs, smartphones and tablets, albeit measured at a minimum of three minutes.
That shift may accelerate. YouTube has recently blocked Barb and its partner Kantar from accessing viewing session data, limiting transparency just as online platforms consolidate power.
“When the government chose British Satellite Broadcasting as the ‘winner’ in satellite TV it was Rupert Murdoch’s Sky instead that came out on top,” says a senior TV executive quoted by The Guardian. “There already is such an outsider ready to be the winner in the transition to internet TV; it is YouTube.”
Freeview’s future now hangs on a familiar British dilemma: modernise fast and risk exclusion, or protect universality and pay the price. Either way, the aerial’s days as king of the living room look numbered.
