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John, great for you to be on the show. I'm truly honoured Justin, you know, I'm a big fan of Telecast and to be participating in it feels a bit like signing for a football team, you know, you know, your first day to really, you know, I've got hopes and dreams but no, I'm thrilled to be joining you. It's great to have you on. I knew you've been warming up on the bench when Jesse and Chris from Broadcast have already been on the shows.
So you're the third member of the Broadcast editorial team. So it's great for you to join us. And you're going to talk us through some of the big stories of the first day of MIPCOP. I am indeed.
Yeah, Justin. We've conversed by a message. Ordinarily, we'd be probably, you know, meeting up either bumping into each other in the Palais or in the Quaset or in one of the establishments in Cannes to say hi and catch up. But it's been a bit of a weird time, obviously, when we're not there.
And I think that's been slightly reflected in the kind of MIPCOM online plus offering. It's been a new new experience and a bit quieter than usual. But I have had the benefit of, you know, listening into the first keynote that occurred yesterday, which was pretty big one, actually, you know, Ted Sarandos, the co-chief executive of Netflix. And he had some really interesting things to say.
Yeah. Before we go into that, what's been going on to Broadcast recently, John? Well, it's been nonstop. Justin, obviously, are recent rebranded the magazine, the new edition, which I believe Jesse came on to talk about as well in the past, has been kind of getting us all busy.
But last week, I ran a pre-MIP kind of teaser event, a taste-o-event for distribution focus called Showcase Live. It was part of our new content strand distributed showcase, all about the global sales business and the three sessions that we did, well, and burning topics that we think are really important and kind of throwing up a lot of question marks in the industry. And it was really good to do a kind of pre-MIPCOM panel session myself, you know, ourselves at Broadcast and really, really organise our own sets of events and discussions about the global content business. Fantastic preparation, obviously, for MIPCOM online.
So going on to MIPCOM's biggest TED Talk ever, it's co-CEO of Netflix, Ted Sarandos, made a video appearance. Talk us through his session. Ted was, I like what you did there, by the way, the TED Talk, nice one, Justin, it's a very good one. I wish I had that for myself, to be honest.
Throw me off my thought. No, so Ted Sarandos, co-chief executive now of Netflix and also actually content officer at the streaming giant. He was being handed the Variety Vanguard Award, you know, that happens at MIPCOM every year. And quite often, those sessions can be a bit fluffy, you know, I've certainly heard of you in the past.
But he gave quite wide-ranging round of answers, borne out from the questioning by the Littleton, the moderator. And he said some really interesting things. And I think it was indicative of the things he said that, you know, each of the international trades that we all look at and read and are part of covered very different top lines as it were from his speech. From my perspective, I thought the interesting point was that he's been, as well as being candid, I noted he was somewhat combative, robust in his comment about certain things.
And particularly in this case, it was about the cancellation process that both broadcasters and streaming platforms go through when they're cull certain shows and whether to continue extending them. And I think this was born out of some recent, I want to say backlash, but opposition is probably the kindest way to say to the decision to cancel blow the female wrestling drama series that Netflix has, Netflix original series. Yeah. We covered that on the show a couple of weeks ago.
And it was actually, they started production, I believe, on the fourth series. They had, and it was a more than final series, but Netflix canceled that, I think, a week ago, around the first week of October, or as you say, a couple of weeks ago. And it wasn't specifically, his comments weren't specifically addressing that, but he was particularly interesting on the fact that he views the measure of success, which is part of the quote, old media, and those were his words, old media, meaning traditional media, was the measure of the long standing measure of success is longevity of the show. And he was saying that that is what's defined as success, because it then leads to syndication in the US market.
And if you get to the magic 100 episodes, that helps with reruns and your show can live in perpetuity in the media. But in response to opposition to shows being canceled earlier on S-FOD services such as Netflix, he was saying that this measure of success is a little bit antiquated. And unfortunately, under your attention is given to shows that are canceled on S-FOD platforms if they only run for four series. But he was making the point that sometimes, it's quite rare for a show to account for 15 years worth of storylines.
And in actual fact, the content runs out before the number of episodes, the creative content, you know, shows can get a bit tired. And his point was that we shouldn't just be looking at longevity as the measure of success for a show's life cycle. And I think that was indirectly a kind of a rebuttal to the criticism and opposition that Netflix has seen through the cancellation of shows such as Glow and One Day At The Time and Too Go and Bertie. It's an interesting sense of take, isn't it?
Because surely if a series is popular and a series has got a fanbase, it's going to become long running. And it's going to be successful and popular and run for a number of seasons. But maybe the numbers that Netflix, only Netflix has got access to were perhaps tailing off for Glow. So maybe that is the real metric that that decision was made on.
Yeah, well, I mean, in the case of Glow, it's important to point out that the cancellation was described to problems caused by coronavirus. So they took the decision, they must have, you know, I think coronavirus and the pandemic had sold production on it. And therefore, they were, I think, possibly forced to take a decision to go elsewhere, possibly because financial outlay in the time of coronavirus is really tough. And people are experiencing the pinch.
And if you've got a show, like we don't know how much Glow costs, I mean, Netflix is quite proprietary about how much the show costs. You know, if you've got an expensive show and other expensive shows in your pipeline, maybe the easier thing to do is to cancel the show that has come to a conclusion, they would say, conclusion, I'm sure the fans would say that hasn't come to a conclusion and put the money into newer projects. It has to be cabbiatic with those contests. But you're right, I think it is strange because he also made the point that a show shelf life could be three seasons or four seasons or six or eight.
So he was kind of getting up into that. You know, eight seasons is a lot for a show. There are many shows out there that have been going for eight seasons. So I didn't quite understand his point.
Also, as you write it out, something like The Walking Dead, which is going into its 11th series, you know, had its 11th series announced recently, its 10 series was one of its, it was high rated and people were watching. So it is a bit strange that shows are perhaps cancelled sooner rather than later. I mean, I don't know what a perfect shelf life is for a show, but I'm watching 10 series of The Walking Dead and the Board. Yes.
Yes. Well, it's clearly something that will be an ongoing feature really and how long some of these series go on for. And as we don't know what the metrics are for these shows, then I guess if we're really attached to a season or a series, should I say, on Netflix, let's just keep our fingers crossed that everything will get another one. I watch Better Call Saul and I'm just pretty sure that we're going to get to the final season, which has already been an answer.
That's interesting stuff. Now, MIP-Com is a place when we're all together physically, that the rumors circulate often about executive changes, people moving jobs, people being poached and selling a new big row somewhere. But there's nothing rumour about a new promotion of Fremantle. As you say, just as we're always on the lookout for these tidbits and harsh words over a drink in a bar in Cresette about, on the Quasette about who's going where.
As you say, we don't have that opportunity. Fremantle took the opportunity yesterday to announce their new global head of drama, Kristi and Vespa, to replace the former head of global drama, Sarah Dool, who was announced it was going to Red Production Company. That was significant for me in the sense that there weren't many of these announcements floating around. And also because Kristi and had huge shoes to fill in Cetra Dool.
I mean, Fremantle's drama out there over the last few years has been quite impressive if you think of some of the titles that they have had and that Sarah Dool has been a part of the young pope and the new pope and those kind of titles. So his promotion is a significant one. But it makes sense he's been there for four years, I think bringing in someone new to a production entity to oversee Cetra, which is already a really expensive part of the content landscape, and is also probably the most fractious when it comes to the current situation before and ourselves in the coronavirus at Albrecht. You have to really have someone who knows the business, the internal business, really well from the get-go.
So it made perfect sense that he was up and his expertise in international drama in his pre-dissessing roles at Sundance, he helped with Deutsche Lang 83, which is obviously a massive trilogy and quite important drama in the international sphere. So yeah, that's enough for me, Kristian's promotion. Congratulations to him, obviously South Perry of Hands by the looks of it for Fremantle there. This year's MIP, Commonline Plus, has diversity front and center when it comes to his keynotes.
But I see there's also been a big diversity of announcements from a major studio player. Talking through that. Yeah, so this was something that came up this morning. And as you say, Justin, I think diversity is not just part of front and center for MIP, but particularly for MIP, it's part of their change for good campaign to increase the talking points around important areas in the market, such as diversity and sustainability.
And today's announcement was ViacomCBS Networks International, the International Arm. That's quite an awful of ViacomCBS. They were expanding their no diversity, no commissioning policy, which was introduced into their UK broadcast to Channel 5 earlier this year, but extending it to the 180 countries that they operate in. Now that was significant in itself, the fact that they're making this mantra, no diversity, no commission.
It's quite significant part in itself, but they also said in my calling, kind of older story, that they were going to dedicate 30% of its budget to commissioning content related to underrepresented groups and issues. Now that is significant from a couple of points. I mean 30% of the budget is no insignificant total. And that's ViacomCBS Networks International.
So as you think about all the territories they operate, and that's a considerable amount of financial outlay on that kind of content. But also in relation to one of the panels that I did for showcase live last week, which was selling diverse content, one of the points is we want more stories from underrepresented voices, but we also need that dissemination, the sales, the distribution of that content to be widespread as well. And I think by having such a global player as ViacomCBS announcing that these measures, two points to their position entirely in the world, I think that that represents a real step-changing, a further step-changing in the kind of things that the TV industry wants to do around diversity. So it was a really, a really significant point.
And 30% of its budget, I should say, is committed and contaminated underrepresented groups and issues was in applies to their Europe, Middle East, Africa, and Asia and territory. So that's not insignificant if you think about it. And then they also had a 25% target for Latin America. So if you think about that, in terms of an outline, those massive territories, that's significant.
No, absolutely. And we've seen that quite a bit of that, haven't we? And I'm particularly with domestic brokers like the BBC made some big commitments. But it's great, as you say, to see an American international business really putting diversity front and center in terms of their company strategy, as well as just the other commissioning strategy.
So it obviously makes sense from a business perspective for them as well. Absolutely. That's a really significant movement. And of course, as part of the keynote, Sky Boss Jeremy Darrick is also talking sustainability today in terms of the wider diversification of TV, if you like.
And I was discussing with Paul Robinson in our preview show about whether we've reached a pivotal moment in the greening of the TV industry. What's your view on that? And what can we expect from his keynote? Want to get ahead in digital first content?
The drop is the go-to newsletter for industry professionals delivering inside the news, trends and insights straight to your involves. Navigate the fast-changing landscape of digital first production, distribution and monetization. Sign up now for free at dropmedia.co.uk and stay informed with the drop. Yeah, well, as you say, Sky, I think earlier this year, Sky made a big announcement that they've launched a range of initiatives to help deliver quite ambitious target of becoming completely net neutral zero carbon by 2030.
By giving yourself a point in the calendar in the future to become you know, carbon neutral cutting missions. As you set yourself, you know, you've got the goal and you've got to kind of stick by otherwise you leave yourself open for criticism. It's obviously a big part of Sky's mantra, but also Jerry Derek as the CEO. You know, he has really been spearheading and picking up the mantle for this for Sky.
He's been given a newly created award, the Sustainable Development Goals Award for, which he was given for by remade for MICOM. So that's kind of signaling what he will be talking about. That would be a big issue for his keynote, I'm sure, and also putting up the information and all the things that Sky has been doing to get to this point on the road to becoming net neutral by 2030. So I expected largely to be about sustainability and greening the industry.
It will be interesting to hear what he says about that in relation to COVID. I mean, we, you know, I think one of the things that has emerged from conversation over you discussing it just as well on telecast is the cancellation of international conferences, you know, media events such as MICOM and MIC TV and whatever one that's been gone in the past. I mean, canceled that, that is part of the, in a converse way, part of the sustainability drive. You know, we're traveling less around the world to go to these conferences, which is helping our own green efforts ourselves.
We, you know, the TV industry routinely clocks up the MLs, Ted Sarangos, said he misses the global travel that comes with his job. But I was thinking when he said that in his keynote, yes, I was thinking, well, yeah, but you're offsetting your comments. Well, you know, I think that's a useful thing. You should probably get an opportunity to point to that, but he didn't.
It's going to be interesting to see what he says. I mean, I've been given a kind of sneak preview of all these quotes, which are in bar gates. I can't, you know, I can't reveal them sadly, but I think sustainability is going to be key. And I think it will be, you know, someone in general Darris position, the CEO of Sky will be in a good position to give off the right message to the international TV industry that the world needs to do better on sustainability as well.
And hopefully this will be a positive byproduct, if there are any of this current pandemic, that we're all going to take a little bit more care and a little bit more thought about our actions and the implications of, as you say, not being at a mittcom, that's 30,000 flights, say, as opposed in one go. And although we want to be there and we wish we were there, then maybe it's looking at all of those other events around the calendar and I know we've discussed it before on the show, but maybe there's some that maybe we might consider doing those virtually. Now, we're in the habit of spending up a lot of our time on Zoom and everything else. But interesting stuff.
And let's hope it is that real turning point, because I think we all know that we need to do something. So hopefully it's a no-dish and a positive outcome from this awful pandemic. We've had many discussions about programming that costs a lot from a green perspective. We've talked about how much extra costs COVID is putting on productions, which is really important.
And, you know, with the bottom line always high up in people's minds, you know, when they're putting together TV, which is an expensive business, it's important to be able to think about ways to, you know, drive down costs, but also help the environment. I think that's one thing that, you know, maybe come out of the, as you say, a positive byproduct, whatever that is from COVID is perhaps people will think twice about how to put together one of those really expensive productions that involves a lot of international travel and multiple voices and kind of introduce ways of getting around that, be it through collaborating with people on the ground in the territory that you want to go to. So therefore, you don't need to take a load of production equipment and team with you to a location. And I think that will set up some really important conversations from the production site, not just moving around to go to international events.
And finally, looking at NICOM online plus, it's been said by many people that it's a distributors market this year, more than anything else. Have you seen any interesting announcements about shows that are traveling well? Yeah, I have, and it's not, I wouldn't say it's the super glamorous, big international dramas that we often are showcased at NICOM and stuff like that. We often read stories about people launching their huge international dramas with the biggest amount of talent that, you know, refers to the world and are being snapped up by the Netflixes and the Amazon Primes for global rights and have big, big budgets attached to them.
It was something that I noticed yesterday, a very domestic drama, an English drama, a drama I think, so that will point to your own heart from, you know, setting the Yorkshire Dales just in, playground entertainment or creatures great and small reboot, which was, yeah, channel five recently, and it smashed channel five drama records when it first came on. It's gone around the world, you know, it's a drama about a young country vet in the Yorkshire Dales in the 1930s, doesn't necessarily scream international smash hit, but, you know, it's been picked up by Acorn, the AMC network's streamer for South and Central America, I imagine, you know, I saw about the Yorkshire Dales being broadcast in South and Central America, I don't think we could. That's right, it's my backyard. Exactly, exactly, and also Acorn have picked that up for the UK Iron and the Malta, so it's a very English, very domestic drama that has gone around the world and it's obviously also been picked up in places as far from as New Zealand and Australia and Asia, so I just thought that was a really interesting, you know, a positive TV story because we've been told recently that, you know, buyers and commissioners are looking for feel good, escapist content, and this apparently, absolutely, I haven't seen it yet, to my background, absolutely pretends to that.
It is a very feel good, symbolic, domestic drama that has been picked up by international broadcasters and platforms, because that is what the content people want, they want good, feel good, escapist content. You walk your content. You walk your content, that's exactly what you're doing. Excellent, very good.
Well, no, like you, I haven't seen All Creatures Great and Small yet, so obviously, I grew up with the original, you know, Giving Away My Age there. No, it's a fantastic series, I'm sure, certainly the books are fantastic in the original series too, so congratulations to everybody involved in that show, great to see some international success. So, well, John, we've come to the end of our MIPCOM roundup for today. Thank you so much for taking the time out and what's an extremely busy time to speak to me, and I hope you're going to come back on the show at some point very soon.
I would love to. If I haven't completely burnt my bridge by appearing on this, on this for the first time, I would be delighted to come back in the future, Justin. Fantastic. Well, good luck for the rest of MIPCOM Online Plus.
We'll see you soon. Take care. Well, that's it for our second MIPCOM special show. Tomorrow, I'll be joined by Dead Eyes International editor, Jay Cantor, as we cover off the key talking points of day three of MIPCOM Online Plus.
Until then, stay safe.