St. Martin’s harbor, Ile de Re, France
We got back last night from Ile de Re, France (see above).
Coming into Newark after this was traumatic enough, but this morning, when I went to turn on the TV set, all I got was a message on the screen telling me to call Time/Warner Cable.
It’s enough to make me get back on the plane (for obvious reasons).
I called the number and soon enough I was talking to one of the service technicians, who is probably in Phoenix or something like that.
He was kind enough to re-connect my cable service then and there over the phone. (Did you know that they can control your cable box from Phoenix?)
When he had gotten it working again, he asked me if I wanted the DVR service (I don’t) and a whole lot of other features that I have no use for.
I said no about 5 times.
Then he asked me if I watch a lot of TV (is this part of their sales pitch? (ie: “if customer says no 5 times or more, go to page 5 and ask about TV watching habits”)?
I told him I make spend much of my days screening videos and I have no desire to save up someone else’s for my evenings.
He asked me if I was in the TV business, and I said I was. Then he asked me if I had produced any TV shows (which I have done tons of).
He told me he had some ideas for shows he was trying to pitch, but he didn’t know how to go about doing it.
I think there are a lot of people like this around – people with ideas (good, bad, I have no idea, but who am I to judge), who understand that they can now do this, but they just don’t know what to do. So I got into a protracted conversation with him about how to create and pitch TV series (I also got him to sign up for nyvs.com).
I was going to write this morning about the convergence of video and the web and how TV is increasingly irrelevant, but instead I am going to write a bit about this guy in a call center in Phoenix who wants to create content.
There was a very interesting article in The New York Times Sunday book review section by Lev Grossman called “The Mechanical Muse“. (I have been away for 5 weeks and have a lot of NY Times copies to go through). He talked about the technological transition in books from scrolls to codex (printed books) to ebooks, which are just getting started. It’s worth a read.
Talking to the Time/Warner technician made me think of Grossman’s essay.
The basic technology, like scrolls to books, is undergoing a fundamental change, opening the door to whole new ways of thinking.
Why shouldn’t a guy who works in a call center in Phoenix be able to produce a cable series for TV?
He told me he had written up treatments and scripts but had gotten no answer from the major networks (small surprise there) and was afraid of sending it to a production company for fear they would simply steal the idea.
I have no idea how good or bad the idea was or is. And that should not matter. JK Rowling got lots of rejections before she found a publisher.
What matter is ‘how’ to proceed.
He told me it was sports related, so we began to ratlle off all the cable channels that might have an interest. He knew them better than I.
So I told him to focus on the smallest and weakest. They need the content the most and will be the most open.
Then I told him to shoot a demo – 2 minutes – no more, of his idea and start making contacts with the producers at the cable networks he was targeting.
Email them. AÂ lot.
Get to know them.
Google them.
Make a relationship.
Then, show them what you can do.
And don’t limit it to one idea or one video. Make 10.
20.
30.
Like JK, be unrelenting.
And don’t limit it to just cable channels. Look at all the magazines that are starting to move online and onto tablets. They can be a platform for video as well.
The world is changing.
I thought that was pretty good advice.
But he deserved it.
He fixed my cable box.
And from Phoenix.
