Lessons from the 'quarterlife' bomb

One day in the near tech-o-fied future, when all video is online video and we've got cat5 cables jacked into our nose, we're going to laugh about all this handwringing over what content belongs where. Which'll hurt. Because, like, we have cat5 cables in our nose. But until then, it's our epistemological duty to dissect "quarterlife's" ratings bomb (which I sadly predicted, and show creator Herskovitz acknowledged) and discover some lessons therein. To wit:

The poor ratings on NBC don't mean 'quarterlife' sucks
Like I said in my review, it's a well-done series with good acting and a compelling (if somewhat derivative) storyline. The series garnered a few million viewers online, and was easily the best produced entertainment on the web. Television doesn't have to be the ultimate arbiter of quality. There's an audience out there. But ...

TV viewers were expecting something different
Herskovitz: the experience of watching the show on NBC, with the series' intimate storylines and tight camera angles, convinced him that the series he created (on a non-TV budget, BTW) was more effective with an online audience. "From the first three minutes," he said, "I knew it wasn't right." Of course. Imagine taking ANY Web hit -- like, say, "Prom Queen" -- and porting it to television. Radically different interaction offline (as in, there is none). Now pile on top of that, of the people who watched Tuesday night, they were expecting either a) a traditional storyline and camera work, or b) the same show that they watched online. You'd have been disappointed either way.

The "Hackers" problem: WTF's a webcam, and why do I care?
Ever see the movie "Hackers"? Or any Hollywood movie in which technology played a starring role? Well, they suck. There are plenty of reasons, but the important one here is that it's difficult to create an emotionally compelling narrative when your plot's bogged down in details-laden esoterica. You can get around it by either trying to make the details exciting (oh noes! The lawnmower man's gonna eat me!) or glossing them over. Herskovitz opted for the latter, and it worked online. But it only worked because his Web-savvy audience understood the context. Offline, the story's too specific for a general audience (WTF's a webcam, Beulah?), who don't understand why this camming thing keeps coming up. Why should a real TV audience care about a fictional online audience, especially one they don't really understand? (Come to think of it, that's probably what part of the problem with "Studio 60" was, too. Whole 'nother story.)

The show can be successful online
At it's heart, "quarterlife's" a show about being online. It's made for the Web. Why push it offline out of context. Speaking of ...

A medium isn't just a box
This goes back to point 2, the audience expectation. A medium isn't just the screen you're watching on, or just the couch on which you're grubbing Fritos. Rather, the medium is the aggregate of all your interactions. If you watched "quarterlife," I'm willing to bet you didn't sit there benumbed into an unblinking coma for six minutes. You did other stuff with your attention, like clicked through tabs or checked your email or whatevs. There's so much less you can do with TV. That means you pay closer critical attention to what's on the screen, which in turn affects your analysis of the show.

Let's stop at five. I can think of a few other lessons -- e.g., the show would've done better if NBC promo'd it more; we shouldn't be too quick to judge a series after one showing, etc -- but if you have some ideas, please leave them below.

Comments

[Chizoba Ezeh]

Let me first start by saying, I am a huge fan of Quarterlife, however, I am not surprised by it's broadcast performance due the lack of promotion and the lack of understanding multiplatform storytelling. Regardless of what is said about its television debut, I do believe that Quarterlife is a success and this exercise in cross-platform content sharing has many lessons to ascertain.

In response to your comments regarding lessons learned from the so-called "bomb" of Quarterlife (by broadcast standards) I believe you had hit many of the nails on the head. However, I would like to look deeper into the lack of creating a unique viewer experience via television that compliments the online experience. I completely agree that viewers were expecting something different, in particular those viewers who have been avid followers of the show online, like me. First off, since there wasn't any real promotion of the show to entice new viewers I don't think they had any expectations at all. This show wasn't even on their radar. Quarterlife was not promoted as "must see tv", which is strange coming from the network the coined the phrase.

Going back the point of established viewers who are already aware of Quarterlife, my question is: did NBC believe that Quarterlife's already established online viwership would tune in to watch the show on television? Of course I already know the answer to this question but I'm still trying to figure out why they would believe that? I must admit that I watched (well actually DVR'd and then watched - which goes back to my point above that this was not seen as much see tv) the show in order to see how they were going to re-edit the 8 minute plus episodes into an hour long show and if doing so would give the show a different feel or expand on what I had already watched online. Sadly that did not seem to be the case. There was nothing new. There was nothing that lent this viewing via television to be uniquely engaging or special. It was redundant and old news. The broadcast airing comes way too many online episodes too late. I and many of my peers have already watched at least 30 episodes of the show online, which we can access any time and not wait a week to see what happens next. So without any promotion letting the established viewer know that the broadcast viewing would be something different from the online viewing there isn't any incentive to watch.

Also, yes, Bryant is correct that the feeling of intimacy created by the online experience is lacking in the broadcast experience . . . because, hello - television is a different medium which caters to a different viewer experience. It is this lack in understanding of multiple platforms and their unique relationships to the viewer that in part lead to the "failure" of the show's cross over ability. However, if there were any new viewers who did watch Tuesday’s airing there is the possibility that they will now go to the website or MySpace to watch more episodes and become more immersed in the story and characters. In a way the broadcast viewing takes the role of what traditionally broadband or mobile has done, which has been to be a supplemental marketing tool to get viewers to come the main media source. In this case and for now it seems as though the internet version of Quarterlife is the main media source. If NBC Universal and Herskovitz have any faith and interest in keeping Quarterlife on air they will need to come up with a way to differentiate the show in the television space.

[Steve Barber]

I'm gonna disagree that the average-TV-viewer-doesn't-get-online-culture-techno-factor had much to do with the failure of quarterlife on NBC. There aren't a lot of people left who don't get online media at least at some level.

For a counterexample, there's Nickelodeon's iCarly, a show about a middle-schooler and her buddies who have a weekly web show. The show is huge with tweens, and it doesn't hurt that it stars Miranda Cosgrove, who was already well known to the target audience as the annoying little sister from Drake & Josh, another "Teen Nick" series.

(Just in case you don't have a tween in your life, the traditional '70s-style family sitcom is alive and well and living on Teen Nick and The Disney Channel.)

But that's cable, and it's a different numbers game. Herskovitz's series have always been very good and occasionally breathtaking. But they've always struggled to find large TV audiences, surviving as they did on cult audiences and critical applause. Not sure why NBC didn't notice this.

[Steve Bryant]

Totally agree, Steve, about Herskovitz's propensity to make cult hits. I'm sure certain labor issues forced NBC's hand when they acquired the show.

Re: the tech angle, it's not that audiences don't understand the tech. It's that Herskovitz doesn't do a good job of showing why we should CARE that Bitsie's character is vlogging.

[Johnny Drama Chase]

Let me say this to: Chizoba Ezeh

Lack of promotion?

I was part of the team that did the promotion on this crappy show, and I had to sit and watch the first two episodes (that sucked by the way). I saw them over and over and over on a daily basis and it never grew on me, nor anyone else in our offices. We promoted the crap out of this show. It was the show itself that that did not produce the ratings, not the lack of promotion, we're talking billboards, Myspace adds, paper adds and On air promotion like you will not believe, so unless you know what your talking about, please do not say NBC did not do enough for this show to succeed, because we sure did our best, like with any other show. This show is a copy of "my so called life", who gives a rats ass about people and their same problems, the "hey look at me please, pay more attention to me!!!" writing just like in my so called life, damn if only this show was more original then maybe it would have a standing chance, but guess what? It wasn't.