Skip to main content

American TV Series, Not Movies, in Demand

Variety reports that American TV series, not feature films, are the hottest commodity in the international market today. The creme de la creme -- hour dramas like "CSI: Miami," "Desperate Housewives" and "Invasion" -- are reckoned to be pulling in upwards of $1 million an episode from foreign deals.

A just-released study from Paris-based research firm Eurodata argues series are the most-watched fiction genre in most countries around the world. "Among the different fiction genres, note the sharp rise of series, to the expense of all the other genres, to 64 percent of the top fiction audiences in 2005, compared with 50 percent in 2004," the study's authors pointed out. Among the reasons: The study suggests "creative scripts and cliffhanging endings."

The seven major Hollywood congloms belonging to the Motion Picture Association of America rake in upwards of $6 billion a year from their free and pay TV deals outside the U.S. With new-media platforms -- digital terrestrial, broadband, video-on-demand -- set to take off abroad, that figure is bound to climb.

Popular posts from this blog

Why 2025 Will Redefine Mobile Connectivity

As international travel rebounds to pre-pandemic levels in 2025, the mobile communication roaming market is at an inflection point. Emerging technologies and changing customer preferences are challenging traditional wholesale roaming agreements between mobile network operators (MNOs). The global wholesale roaming market is projected to more than double, from $9 billion in 2024 to $20 billion by 2028. This surge will be fueled by the expanding deployment of 5G Standalone (SA) technology, which enables real-time roaming connections and activity monitoring. But beneath this headline figure lies a complex landscape of regional variations and technological mobile service disruptions. Global Mobile Roaming Market Development Western Europe dominates inbound roaming connections, largely thanks to its Roam Like at Home (RLAH) initiative, which eliminates roaming charges among member countries.  Meanwhile, the Indian Subcontinent is emerging as a growth hotspot. Between 2024 and 2029, inbou...