I said it when VH-1 did a similar show, and I’ll say it about The CW’s new series, “Online Nation,” as well: with all the great writers in Hollywood who are putting their blood, sweat, and tears into new scripts, why in the hell must we waste time by putting together a half-hour show of what the new viral phenomenon is on the web? That’s why I go on the web; that’s not why I watch TV!
Nonetheless, that’s what “Online Nation” is about – hosted by Stevie Ryan, otherwise known as online sensation Little Loca – and it’s paired with another new series called “CW Now,” which focuses on the hottest new trends around the world and is hosted by Tanika Ray. But it’s what Lisa Gregorisch-Dempsey, who produces the latter show, said in the midst of her various comments about how “CW Now” will have advertisers but won’t have any traditional commercials during its 30-minute run time that made me feel really old.
“We don’t watch black-and-white TV anymore,” she informed the audience. “We don’t watch just scripted programming. Everything has evolved except for the commercials, and the commercials — we all know when they’re coming on because usually we TiVo through them. So we have to be really clever in the way that we do this. But the advertisers don’t have a say in content. I will never compromise the integrity of the content or a good story. It’s going to be very subtle the way we’ll do it. If Pantene, say, is an advertiser, I’m not doing a Pantene commercial in the body of the show. I may do something that flows out of it, like summer hair or holiday hair, which makes sense. When I was in news for so many years, if there was a plane crash, I would make sure I went through the entire show to make sure there was no American Airlines commercial. We have something called ‘the ick factor.’ We make sure that it just doesn’t feel icky. And there will be no overt, flagrant, blatant commercials because I wouldn’t be involved with something like that, and I wouldn’t watch something like that.”
Yeah, I dunno. Me, I don’t know if I’d watch something by someone who said that “we” don’t watch black and white TV anymore. But, then, I’m not actually in the same “we” that she is, so she probably doesn’t care whether I watch or not, anyway.
