RE: U.S. TV Shows Losing Potency Around World

From: Vincent Campbell (VCampbell@dmu.ac.uk)
Date: Mon 20 Jan 2003 - 14:11:12 GMT

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    Hi,

    Just to add a little to Alan's comments.

    A key problem in Latin American television as far as global exports go is the relatively unaffluent domestic audience, which enables rich countries with affluent TV audiences (like the US and the UK) to sell programmes much more cheaply having already covered their costs through domestic broadcasts. The UK benefits still from the Commonwealth legacy of many former colonies structuring their broadcasting systems, and broadcasting ethos, on British broadcasting, as well as the legacy of the english language having been transported around the world, particularly into Asia (so India has been a major maket, for example). Another key advantage the UK has is that it dominates sales of programmes to the US.

    For a book, not absolutely up to date but still pretty good, about these kind of issues relating to TV, video, and film, see Albert Moran's 'Film Policy' (1996, Routledge). It's got some good stuff about the French nearly bringing GATT down over film quotas.

    A colleague of mine has been doing some research on the British industry's attempts to get into the US market more fully, and has published work in the past on international broadcasting policies (her name is Jeanette Steemers).

    The next big competitive arena is China, rapidly waking up to TV and potentially an absolutely gigantic audience (I think it's at least around 300 million at the moment, based on a comment during an english football match the other day, in which a Chinese player was playing, for Everton I think).

    The struggle for hearts and minds is being waged on many fronts- Disneyland Hong Kong is being built as I type, for example, so this kind of cultural competition is going to hot up.

    Actually, I think I recall reading in the paper the other day that the BBC has done a deal with Al-Jazeera for regional news footage concerning the Middle-East. Aren't the US networks still not showing any Al-Jazeera footage for fear of hidden messages to terrorists?

    Vincent

    > ----------
    > From: derek gatherer
    > Reply To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    > Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 4:09 PM
    > To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
    > Subject: RE: U.S. TV Shows Losing Potency Around World
    >
    > > What makes this significant is that Britain,
    > > although some way behind the
    > > US, is the second largest net exporter of TV
    > > programmes globally,
    >
    > Hi Vincent
    >
    > I'm way off my subject here (and of course right on
    > your territory), but can the above really be true? I
    > thought that Mexican and Brazilian soaps and variety
    > shows like Don Francisco's "Sabado Gigante" (which
    > inspired Ted Rogers' "1-2-3" in the UK) were the
    > world's biggest TV product. If I'm wrong, I'd be
    > curious to know what the stats are. I seem to
    > remember reading somewhere a few years ago that
    > Veronica Castro had 'officially' become the world's
    > biggest star as her back catalog of soaps was being
    > shown in the majority of the world's countries, a
    > market penetration unequalled by any Anglophone
    > luvvie. Also I read (again that great journal
    > 'somewhere') that Lucia Mendez can be seen at any time
    > on TV in virtually every country, with the exceptions
    > of UK, northern Europe, Australia and Canada. 'Amor
    > de nadie' (1991) reruns took the former Soviet Union
    > by storm in the mid-late-90s and other oeuvres are
    > regularly trotted out to fill afternoon slots all over
    > the world from Indonesia to Univision in the USA.
    >
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