The Mike Abundo Effect

Kids today are more media-savvy than ever. As such, Sesame Street can afford to make more cultural references than ever. That’s why Sesame Street season 39, the first season to be filmed in HD, will feature more parodies and cameos than Cookie Monster can eat.

Call it a reflection of mashup culture going mainstream. Kids see parodies and cameos all the time on YouTube, so they probably expect Sesame Street to deliver both.

With original online video rising as a viable alternative to TV, the Writers Guild of America strike could finally crack Hollywood’s cycle of senseless greed — and ultimately give us quality shows written from the heart, that we can watch any way we want. That’s why we should support the writers’ strike.

TV’s overall unique audience is down and ratings are down. Many of our clients are looking at the middle of February and knowing they are going to be significantly behind in terms of delivering [ad impressions]. We are looking to make that up in digital. If we can get the impressions on television, we want to stay there, but we are at a point where we are going to have to make some calls, take some dollars back and reallocate them.

That’s ad buyer Andrea Kerr Redniss telling us what she’ll do in the face of falling TV ratings. This is why I really don’t give a shit about the ugly little GMA/ABS ratings kerfuffle. They’re fighting over a shrinking pie, and their petty squabbling is turning off their shrinking audience.