Upfronts 2011 – Video Trailers

I usually try to put up trailers for the season’s new shows every year so that you can see what’s going to be on next season. I was unsure about doing one of these this year after what happened last time, when none of the American networks was willing to make their clips available outside of the United States. When I did find a non-American source for the clips they were shut down within a few days. It wasn’t worth the hassle. If the situation didn’t change this year, well I wasn’t going to push the issue.

This year three networks took the trouble to make their clips available internationally. One of them was NBC. That network has, in the past couple of years, made a real effort to reach out to me and to other Bloggers. They have dedicated a lot to new media strategies and it shows. Both FOX and The CW also have clips on YouTube that are available to international viewers. The latter is particularly interesting since The CW is at least partially owned by CBS which is the network which I, as a Canadian blogging about TV, have had the most trouble with.

Naturally this brings me to a Rant. Neither ABC nor CBS have made their show trailers available to people outside of the United States. In the case of ABC, it is possible to see clips from their new shows if you go onto the new show webpage on their site. The clips are presented in a very small window on the page but you can expand them to full screen. In no way shape or form is this as convenient as having the clips available freely on YouTube or some other video site, if for no other reason than you cant embed these clips. Oh, they have the clips on YouTube, but as a Canadian I can’t see them and that makes them useless to me.

As for CBS, they give me nothing that I can use, either to present to my readers or to just watch and develop my own views on the shows. It’s totally useless, and it bothers me because I really can’t understand the reasoning behind this. It’s not as if, as Leo Laporte would put it, I am about to download all these clips and peddle them to the public from a  blanket on my lawn. There’s not enough material from the shows in question to make this worthwhile. I suppose there’s a question about international licensing and copyright but again, the clips are so small that I don’t see them being that much of a threat to the broadcaster’s position. I think in fact that the benefits of having them available internationally probably outweigh not having them available. One of the big things about “New Media” and “Social Media” is that it is without borders. If the Analytics for this Blog are correct, most of the visits to this blog come not from Canada but from the United States by a ratio of about five to one. More visits to this Blog come from California and New York combined than come from all of Canada. That strikes me as a promotional opportunity that is being missed because of fear of, well I’m not exactly sure what.

Anyway, here are he clips that I have from the networks. As much as possible I have tried to organize the clips by day, followed shows that will be debuting at mid-season

NBC

FOX

The CW

CBS

To see trailers from CBS, please click here.

ABC

To see trailers from ABC, please click here. I you are from outside the United States you can see trailers from the new series at the ABC website (I hope).

In addition you can search for the individual CBS and ABC show names on YouTube and (at least for now) be able to find copies of the trailers that have been posted by third parties without regional restrictions. How long this will last is anyone’s guess but from experience it likely won’t be long.