#broadcastwriting

The New York Times has launched a new, Web-only documentary video series that looks at history in the context of the present.

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2418622,00.asp

It's difficult for an up-to-date news outlet like The New York Times to deliver content based on past moments in history. However, the paper might serve fresh audiences with its new online-only documentary series. 

The New York Times proves that timeliness for features isn't as important when on the internet. Physical newspapers and live radio and television newscasts don't often allow for coverage of past events, as news outlets must stay as current as possible to remain financially competitive.

Nearly half of viewers say that social editions of episodes that show tweets on-air added to their enjoyment of the show

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/493345-Study_Bravo_Social_Media_Efforts_Expand_Fan_Engagement.php

The type of social media engagement employed by the Bravo network is something we haven't seen too often. On re-runs of particular programs, tweets of viewers created during the episode's original run are displayed for all viewers of the re-run to see.

I'm guessing the organizers of these "social editions" communicate with the producers of the respective shows. If I were a Bravo producer, I would want to figure out how displaying viewers' tweets would not interfere with the show's presentation value. If displayed at an inappropriate time, a tweet could cause a distraction from the focus of a scene. 

CNN is planning an unscripted series about Chicago that will be executive-produced by Robert Redford.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/05/08/3386925/robert-redford-to-produce-unscripted.html

Broadcast Writing Post 9

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/breaking-bad-boss-writing-series-419092

As a fan of AMC's Breaking Bad, I am always curious as to how far in advance the show's writers know what they're going to write. This interview with the show's creator, Vince Gilligan, gives some insight into how much the writers have things planned versus what has actually been written.

"Today we started shooting our fifth episode out of our final eight," Gilligan said on February 6th. He continued, "The finishing touches are being put on the sixth episode," and further with "the seventh episode is being written as I speak."

As 16 episodes, Breaking Bad's final season is its largest ever. The writers made a tactical decision to have a gap in between the first half of the season and the second half, something that was excruciatingly hard to bear for the show's hardcore fans.

Broadcast Writing Post 7

While our class is on the subject of interviews, I will point out the interviewer Nardwuar. He conducts a lot of interviews with musicians, but his David Cross interview is quite humorous in my opinion.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/18/business/fast-furious-6-focuses-on-its-online-following-for-promotion.html?ref=onlineadvertising&_r=0

The Fast & Furious series isn't the biggest thing to hit the film industry, but online fans on Facebook might fool you into thinking the contrary. Vin Diesel, a lead castmember of the films, has the second largest Facebook fanbase of all actors. And the Fast & Furious fanbase is just as staggering.

The series gained a lot of "likes" after the Superbowl ad for its newest entry. This shows how crossover can occur between different mediums like television and the internet. 

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/61/fiasco