The coverage of the earthquake in Haiti has been the primary piece of news coming from the networks & cable outlets for the past eight days. Rightly so, as this is a human tragedy almost beyond comprehension. But even this life changing event hasn’t been able to drown out the interest in what have come to be known as the Late Night Wars, or, more appropriately, the Late Night Wars II. As a broadcast television professional in the business for 20 years, I find the whole thing endlessly fascinating.
I won’t go into the details of the first round of wars some eighteen years ago. That has been written about ad nauseum and covered to death. I will say if you’d like to read the best account of the Late Night Wars I, pick up a copy of “The Late Shift” by Bill Carter. The latest round of battles surrounding ”The Tonight Show” on NBC involve low ratings for Tonight Show host Conan O’Brian, and the dismal failure of The Jay Leno Show to capture an audience at 10:00 pm. The abject failure of Leno at 10:00 prompted NBC to move Leno back to 11:30 and bump “The Tonight 
Show” to 12:05, where it technically becomes the tomorrow show. Conan O’Brian had an issue with this move, and said he would leave the network. Over at CBS, David Letterman, who has never been quiet about how he feels he got screwed by NBC after Late Night War I, has been sticking it to NBC, and Leno, in a gleefully vicious way in his nightly monologues.
Yeah, I’ve picked a side. For the sake of clarity, I’m a Letterman man, always have been. I’ve been a fan of Dave’s from the beginning of “Late Night” and always liked his irreverent, offbeat style. Jay Leno’s a funny guy, and has the occasional good joke. However, I’ve never thought his middle-of-the-road style of humor was that good and I always thought he was appealing to the lowest common denominator. Not to take away from his success, the man has found his niche, and exploited it for many years. He’s good at what he does, no denying it, it just never suited me personally. When NBC sent Letterman to CBS after denying him ”The Tonight Show”, I went with him and never looked back. Watching NBC flounder in its mistakes of late night programming has been a bit fun. Karma’s a bitch, ain’t it boys?
There is one scenario being batted around that has Conan O’ Brian taking his show to Fox and possibly being shown on its cable outlet, FX. This could be the most likely scenario and not for the reasons most of you are thinking. Yes, Fox has a broadcast network with a nationwide affiliate outlet, just like the ”Big Three” of CBS, NBC, and ABC, but putting Conan on the broadcast network at 11:00 or 11:30, plays havoc with the local stations who mostly have profitable syndicated programming in those time slots and wouldn’t want to give them up. This is where Conan could have an edge. By going to Fox, airing on FX until an affiliate agreement is lined up puts O’Brian in the perfect position to take advantage of the future of broadcasting…which is the networks ceasing “free” over the air broadcasting and becoming full-blown cable outlets.
Let’s face it, free TV is going the way of the dodo. The model the networks run on is simple. Free television for the masses, subsidised by advertising dollars. For 60 years, that model has worked just fine. We are now in an age, however, where advertising simply isn’t enough. The advent of cable, and “niche” broadcasting has splintered the audience, and simple fee based advertising isn’t going to get the job done on a large-scale anymore. The failing economy forced the networks hands even farther. Drops in ad revenues, particularly from the auto industry, has hit the networks where they live. In response, quality programming and programming development takes a hit. When “Survivor” made a big ratings splash in 2000, all the networks took notice. “Reality” programming is cheap to produce, easy to sell ad time on, and apparently draws in viewers. You saw a massive propagation of the format, which is still evident today. Meanwhile, take a look at the quality of programming for drama that began popping up on the cable-only outlets around the same time. The trend was kicked off by HBO’s “The Sopranos”, which started getting serious attention after it was repeatedly nominated and sometimes won in many Emmy award categories, including best drama. Other cable programmers took note. Over the last ten years, shows like “Six Feet Under”, ”Dexter”, “Mad Men”, “Rescue Me”, “Burn Notice”, ”Monk”, just to name a few, have sprung on the cable landscape and have been critical and commercial successes. Why? Well, for one, the money to produce and develop them has been there due to a steady, uninterrupted, stream of capital…cable subscription fees. Add in advertising fees and the cable outlets have it over the networks in spades.
Will this change happen overnight? No, and until a couple of months ago, I wasn’t sure it would happen at all. Then a funny thing happened, Comcast bought NBC. This, my friends, is an omen, and if you don’t see the writing on the wall, you’re not looking hard enough. one of the largest cable companies in the world, will have a majority stake 
in NBC/Universal and all of its properties. That includes the main network itself, cable outlets MSNBC & CNBC, and the USA network, Universal Studios Theme parks, etc. I firmly believe Comcast eventually plans to turn NBC into a cable only, subscriber based network. Once this happens, watch for ABC, CBS, & Fox, to follow suit, if not do it first
On the plus side, the network news divisions wouldn’t be so hamstrung financially by the failures of the entertainment divisions to make money. This might free up the news purse strings a bit and we could see better coverage in more places and not maps, telephone calls, and shaky-ass cell phone video passing for real coverage. On the downside, free, over the air television would become a thing of the past. But let’s be honest, has your life been that enriched by “Dancing with the Stars” or ”American Idol”? Jay & Conan can fight it out all they want, in the end, the one that pays, will be you.
