1w ago

While Trump celebrates the demise of Stephen Colbert's show, the economics of late-night TV are crumbling

CBS says its decision to end Stephen Colbert’s late-night comedy show is financial, not political. Yet even with the ample skepticism about that explanation, there’s no denying the economics were not working in Colbert’s favor.
Trump, who has called in the past for CBS to terminate Colbert’s contract, celebrated the show’s upcoming demise. “I absolutely love that Colbert got fired,” the president wrote on Truth Social. “His talent was even less than his ratings".
As recently as 2018, broadcast networks took in an estimated $439 million in advertising revenue for its late-night programs, according to the advertising firm Guidelines. Last year, that number dwindled to $220 million.
Late-night TV was a particular draw for young men, considered the hardest-to-get and most valuable demographic for advertisers. Increasingly, these viewers are turning to streaming services, either to watch something else entirely or catch highlights of the late-night shows, which are more difficult for the networks to monetize.

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The economics of over-the-air TV are crumbling, more likely.
Local stations have been dying for two decades, and without local affiliates... what are you even offering to most people that's valuable?
We joke about how few people actually have cable and how its pointless that FOX News is the most watched cable network because all the people who watch it are octogenarians who will surely die soon and take their subscriptions with them... Yet we don't seem to realize even fewer people care to fuck with an antennae, or if they have cable, are even bothering to watch NBC, CBS, or ABC.
Traditional TV is dying and has been for two solid decades. Ever since Anne Sweeney, President of Disney-ABC Television told her daughter that “You’re going to have a television if I have to nail it to your wall ... You have to have one." in 2009. She said this at a Reuters event, promoting this as though she was tough and knew how to fight the upcoming streaming behemoth. The people running this dead fucking industry have been completely out to lunch for two decades as the internet has been eating their lunch.
Web-TV Divide Is Back in Focus With NBC Sale NYT, Dec 3, 2009
“Mom, you don’t understand. I don’t need it,” her 19-year-old responded, saying she could watch whatever she wanted on her computer, at no charge.
That flustered Ms. Sweeney, who happens to be the president of the Disney-ABC Television Group.
“You’re going to have a television if I have to nail it to your wall,” she told her daughter, according to comments she made at a Reuters event this week. “You have to have one.”
- I have a television. A nice 65" OLED. I use to watch Netflix and YouTube. I don't even have broadcast TV any more.
  
  Same TV here (LG C3) and I use it to watch Plex, but i also bought an HD Homerun (network TV tuner) and an antenna just to have some local channels available and to catch the occasional Price is Right episode.
  I watched a lot of late night growing up (mostly Conan) but haven't watched it since around the time the whole Conan/Leno fiasco happened at NBC. It doesn't really serve much purpose these days other than advertisements for movies and TV shows.
- streaming behemoth
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The economics of late night TV are terrible because they rely on advertisement and the inability to avoid it back when TV was live and streaming hadn't yet robbed the hateful advertisers' ability to force their shit on those who wanted to watch something.
If someone wants to host Colbert's show and charge me to watch it - without advertisement naturally - I'd pay. Change business model and I guarantee you if the content is good, there's money to be made without bringing in the fucking advertisement industry.
- There’s also a cultural shift. Many of us abhor the interviews. Why do they exist? I don’t want to hear some celebrity’s opinion about anything or how they underpaid a ghost writer to make them look literate.
  
  Some of the interviews are really good. They're not all celebrities. Colbert often interviews politicians, journalists, authors, etc.
  
  Celebrity interviews are the backbone of the format though. The show borrows their name to get people to watch, which makes advertisers happy. Celebrities get a platform and audience to promote their work. Win-win. Same goes for magazines. Everything else is to entertain, but is really secondary to the first part.
- If someone wants to host Colbert's show and charge me to watch it - without advertisement naturally - I'd pay.
  Good news: you can already do that.
I work at a large car company that utilizes ad placements. CBS is asking too much $$$ for their placements. We ended up going with Fallon, which was 1/2 price for around the same impressions.
Most of these shows are crappy rehashed internet humor from a few weeks back.
- Most of them are about whatever happened the day before.

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