MyNetworkTV Re-Negotiating Affiliate Agreements to One-Year Deals; Mondays Confirmed for 'Law & Order: Criminal Intent'
In a startling development, Mediapost.com reports tonight that MyNetworkTV has begun the process of re-negotiating their standard five-year affiliate agreements to one-year renewable deals beginning with the 2009-10 season. The deal gives affiliates 7 minutes of ad time per hour on Mondays-Thursdays, and 5 minutes/hour of ad time on Fridays for 'WWE Smackdown' (programming on Saturday nights will be discontinued this coming fall).
The News Corp group of MNT owned-and-operated (o&o) affiliates have already signed on, as have many of the major affiliate groups. The network does not expect to lose affiliates as a result of the renegotiation.
The network also confimed three nights of their 2009-10 fall schedule:
The syndie deal with NBC Universal gives the local stations half the ad-time while NBCU retains the other half for national sales. If MyNetworkTV opts for similar syndie deals on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, that will leave only two nights of national ad time for MNT to sell (Thursday and Friday nights). Other series rumoured to be under consideration for MyNetworkTV stripping include 'My Name is Earl' and 'Friday Night Lights'.
The article also confirms that MyNetworkTV sold $91.6 million in ad time in 2008.
Originally posted by dumont: MyNetworkTV Re-Negotiating Affiliate Agreements to One-Year Deals; Mondays Confirmed for 'Law & Order: Criminal Intent'
In a startling development, Mediapost.com reports tonight that MyNetworkTV has begun the process of re-negotiating their standard five-year affiliate agreements to one-year renewable deals beginning with the 2009-10 season. The deal gives affiliates 7 minutes of ad time per hour on Mondays-Thursdays, and 5 minutes/hour of ad time on Fridays for 'WWE Smackdown' (programming on Saturday nights will be discontinued this coming fall).
This can't possibly make the affiliates happy. Last year the affiliates were getting 9 minutes of ad time per hour. This year, they lose 2 minutes of that time (and they lose 4 minutes on the only night where people are actually watching the network). Their only gain is that they get Saturday night returned to them for local programming?
quote:
LINK TO -> Mediapost.com: "MyNetworkTV Orchestrates New Affiliate Deals"
Wow...all those extra ratings for this year led to a whopping 5% increase in ad sales? It sure doesn't look like MNTV has benefitted by making Smackdown a 'loss-leader'.
I'm not seeing where any of this is good news, dumont.
Just a few reactions, and I'm glad to see CBS was off for basketball as the friday nite CBS gum certainly has been chewed:
- Do these tourney numbers seem a bit down?
- Somebody raised doubts about FRINGE being renewed. I think FRINGE should be in decent shape at this point.
- LIE TO ME was described as a "strong player." Has it really proven that? It has been in the new period for two weeks, dropped in week 2, and while the show itself appears to have a certain viability, I don't see it as having locked down an audience yet. Whatever the hook is for this show, I don't think it has quite sunk its anchor yet.
**Whoops. I see Marc already noted that the tourney was down a bit from last year.
Posts: 2778 | Location: Western Pennsylvania | Registered: 13 December 2006
Ah, I was thinking Travis would post the finals--missed that.
Even taking into account all the alternative methods of viewing--this was not a show that reached beyond a miniscule minority of TV viewers, here or anywhere else.
I personally thought the finale started out great, and ended up lousy. Which summarizes the show itself perfectly.
