26 January 2011

Germany

Manager Magazin portraitsAnke Schäferkordt

Germany

Sarah Connor staysa coach on X Factor

Netherlands

Boer zoekt vrouw fascinates Dutch viewers

France

Destination RTL on water shortage in Cyprus

26 January 2011

week 04

Passion for programmingGerhard Zeiler receives Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award

the RTL Group intranetweek 04

26 January 2011

Germany

Manager Magazin portraitsAnke Schäferkordt

Germany

Sarah Connor staysa coach on X Factor

Netherlands

Boer zoekt vrouw fascinates Dutch viewers

France

Destination RTL on water shortage in Cyprus

26 January 2011

week 04

Passion for programmingGerhard Zeiler receives Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award

Cover: The 2011 winners of the Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award: Dick Ebersol, Chairman, NBC Sports; Regis Philbin, Co-host, Live! With Regis and Kelly; Mary Hart, Host, Entertainment Tonight andGerhard Zeiler, Chief Executive Officer, RTL Group (from left to right) with Lilly Tartikoff Karatz (centre)

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The prestigious award was presented to Gerhard Zeiler by the global, non-profit programming association Natpe on 25 January in Miami. In his introductory remarks during the awards event, Mark Kaner, President of News Corp’s Twentieth Century Fox Television Distribution, said: “I’ve never met anybody who loves programming more than he does and that shows in everything he does. He knows the difference between taking his work seriously and himself seriously. The first is essential, the second is a disaster. He’s been a great friend for a long time.”

In a video tribute, media entrepreneur Haim Saban said: “There is only one Mister TV Europe, and that’s Gerhard Zeiler.” Jeffrey Schlesinger, President of Warner Bros. International Television, said: “He’s easy to talk to, he says what he means. When you shake his hand you know you can take it to the bank.”

Zeiler said that this award was never even in his dreams. “When I started in the 80s, we always looked at America and there was one man who stood out – Brandon Tartikoff, and it was his programming that we bought and wanted to emulate.”

On 24 January, Broadcasting & Cable ran a portrait of Gerhard Zeiler, quoting Gary Marenzi, copresident of worldwide television at MGM:

“A lot of people have fallen on the sword of synergy. Gerhard has avoided that by keeping a firm hand on the overall group [while giving] the local units the authority to respond quickly to local market conditions.” The article describes his programming passion as an entire hallmark of his career: “Early on, his enthusiasm for the kind of popular TV programming that the new commercial broadcasters were bringing to Europe was already evident.” And as

Gerhard Zeiler

Mark Kaner introduced Gerhard Zeiler at the event

“Mister TV Europe” As the first Non-American TV executive, RTL Group CEO Gerhard Zeiler has been honoured with the 8th annual Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award. Luxembourg / United States - 26 January 2011

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Zeiler believed in the power of the emerging commercial channels, he believes in the power of television in the digital age: “The philosophy almost seems a natural outgrowth of the man at the top, who remains a true believer in the power of the medium. ‘The future of TV,’ Zeiler quips, ‘is TV.’”

The Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award is named in honour of Brandon Tartikoff, a former Programme Executive at the US network NBC, who was responsible for famous shows such as The Cosby Show, Cheers, Seinfeld, Alf, Knight Rider, The A-Team, Miami Vice all of which became hit formats around the world.

The award was created in 2004 to recognise innovative leaders and artistic visionaries in television who have shaped the business and inspired their colleagues. Previous recipients include creators and producers such as Anthony E. Zuiker (CSI franchise), Marc Cherry (Desperate Housewives), Dick Wolf (Law & Order), David E. Kelley (Ally McBeal), as well as TV executives such as Peter Roth, President of Warner Bros. Television, and Anne Sweeney, President of Disney ABC Television Group.

Alongside Gerhard Zeiler, the 2011 Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award honoured Dick Ebersol, currently the Chairman of NBC Universal Sports & Olympics; Mary Hart, host of Entertainment Tonight; and broadcasting industry icon Regis Philbin, widely known for hosting the US version of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? on ABC from 1999 to 2002. Philbin has performed in 16,000 hours of TV – a Guiness World Record – while Dick Ebersol was in charge of the ten most-watched TV prgrammes in the US ever.

“We believe that Dick, Mary, Regis and Gerhard have remarkably shaped the global television industry on both business and pop cultural levels, and truly embody the spirit of the Brandon Tartikoff Legacy Award,” said Natpe President & CEO Rick Feldman. “Both Natpe and Lilly Tartikoff Karatz are delighted to honour the recipients’ storied careers through this special celebration.”

Meliassa Grego, Editor of Broadcasting & Cable (left), interviewing Gerhard Zeiler

Gerhard Zeiler being interviewed at the Natpe conference

Brandon Tartikoff is regarded as one of the medium’s greatest programmers who left an indelible imprint on the television industry. During his ten years as NBC’s chief programming executive (1980 to 1990), he was credited with turning around the network’s prime time ratings. His standout competitive achievement was called “the streak” – 68 straight wins in the weekly ratings race, from June 1988 to October 1989. On 27 August 1997, the man “who transformed TV in the 80’s” (New York Times) died, at 48, after a long battle with Hodgkin’s disease.

Tartikoff was known not only as a professional whiz, but also as someone who brought a sense of humor and respect for the creative process to all that he did.

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“The stiltedness of a Business School Amazon is completely alien to her, her gaze is sharp and clear with something very candid in it, something you don’t get to see all that often in this industry,” writes Manager Magazin about Schäferkordt. In the portrait, Germany’s leading business magazine praises the CEO of Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland as fresh and straightforward, easy-going and friendly, but also determined: “When she ties a knot, it stays tied.”

Not only does the portrait bear the headline “Queen of Ratings,” Manager Magazin goes as far as to draw on the world of comic superheroes for comparison, and refers to Schäferkordt as ‘Wonder Woman’ nearly throughout. “She is one of a handful of women in the global economy who head a billion-dollar company,” it writes, but as she herself says, she is “completely and utterly bored” with “woman questions.”

Gerhard Zeiler, CEO of RTL Group, gets “downright solemn”, writes the magazine, when he notes that “Anke Schäferkordt is the kind of godsend that is very rare in the European TV landscape: she combines an extremely good understanding of programming with excellent leadership qualities, and her business results are simply outstanding.” Schäferkordt emphasises that her predecessor at the top of the German family of channels gave her the necessary freedom. “That’s how the relationship of trust could grow,” says Schäferkordt.

The magazine repeatedly emphasises the business and programme successes of Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland and tells of how Schäferkordt began restructuring the group three years before the crisis hit. She is praised for her candidness and perspicacity, her constancy and her instincts for programming. RTL Television dominates the German TV market, writes Manager Magazin, causing competitors’ market shares to “dissolve like fizzy tablets.“

‘The Queen of Ratings’Manager Magazin has published an extensive portrait paying tribute toAnke Schäferkordt’s achievements at the helm of Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland.Germany - 21 January 2011

Anke Schäferkordt read the full-length

portrait in the press

review section of

Backstage

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Sarah Connor (30) comments on her engagement as an X Factor judge and mentor: “I really enjoyed the first season and I look forward to new talents and new challenges.” As in the first season, Connor will not only appraise the individual candidates on the panel of judges but will also coach them and get them in shape for the big stage. The mentorship will be even more intensive during Season Two of X Factor: “I’m excited to see what category I will be assigned this time. Then I’ll take a good luck at my candidates’ potential and work with them on their development accordingly.”

But first Germany’s best candidates need to be found, in three categories: ‘Solo vocalists aged 16 to 24’, ‘Solo vocalists 25 and over’ and ‘Vocal duos or groups’. Information on applying is posted on Vox.de, the deadline for applications is Monday, 28 February 2011.

Edita Abdieski, meanwhile, has already made it: after winning the first season of X Factor on 9 November 2010, Edita is the promising new talent on the German music horizon. Right after the big finale her winning I’ve Come to Life stormed the I-Tunes and Amazon download charts, going straight to number one. Edita’s second single The Key and her long-awaited first album One, including a duet with global star Ricky Martin, are due out in March. “The music is very danceable, just what I wanted,” says Edita. “It’s very important to me that the songs correspond to my ideas, and that took time.”

Edita Abdieski was voted Germany’s first X Fac-tor winner on 9 November 2010, scoring 74.1 per cent of the viewers’ telephone votes. “The Voice” prevailed over 19,000 other contestants. The first season gave Vox an audience share of 15.4 per cent among 14- to 49-year-olds and the season’s peak viewership of 2.91 million viewers aged 3 and older.

Sarah Connor staysAs X Factor enters its second round on Vox, Sarah Connor will again join the search for remarkable vocal talents with that certain extra ingredient needed for stardom. Germany - 21 January 2011

Edita Abdieski won Germany’s X Factor in 2010

Sarah Connor

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The Dutch version of Farmer Wants A Wife has turned into something of a cult show in the Netherlands with more and more viewers tuning in week after week. The fifth season of the romance reality series produced by Blue Circle, the Dutch division of FremantleMedia, is broadcast on Nederland 1 and presented by Yvon Jaspers.

The first episode was broadcast on 5 September 2010 with very good ratings already, but the last two episodes on 16 January and 23 January 2011 vastly surpassed the previous records. On 16 January, 4.9 million viewers tuned in to see the various participant’s quest for love, for a total audience share of 58.4 per cent. A week later, on the 23 January 2011, the show passed the historic mark of five million viewers, with 5,105,000 people watching Boer zoekt vrouw on Sunday evening, for a total audience share of 58.3 per cent. The episode ended with a thrilling cliffhanger – so Blue Circle expects even more viewers for the next episode to be aired on 30 January.

Jacco Keyzer, Editor in Chief of the reality-show, believes that season five has succeeded in appealing to more young viewers which are very active on social networks such as Twitter or Facebook, which is a large contributor to the show’s “cult” status.

Another record was broken during this fifth season, namely the amount of letters received from viewers. In total, the production company received 2,354 letters after the season premiere, with 1,029 letters alone addressed to the 26-year-old farmer Frank.

The Dutch love romance…Boer zoekt vrouw, a Blue Circle production, attracted more than five million viewers – its best ratings ever, making it the most watched programme on Sunday evening.Netherlands - 26 January 2011

Yvon Jaspers (centre) with the farmers who were presented to viewers in September 2010

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In the social-awareness programme Destination RTL, each month a journalist from France’s leading radio station travels to a place where part of the planet’s environmental future is at stake.

In January, reporter Etienne Baudu travelled with technician Philippe Maillet to Cyprus, where he discovered the island’s semiarid climate and thus its blatant lack of freshwater. In fact, the island is symptomatic of the drinking water shortage which is plaguing many parts of the world. Solutions are studied, tested and work, as Etienne Baudu reported, throughout the day.

Faced with major problems of drought, Cyprus has been compelled to make management of water resources a priority by installing desalinisation plants, building dams and wastewater treatment plants and raising the population’s awareness. It has to be said that the situation had become worrying, with international experts fearing that Cyprus is bordering on the shortage threshold.

In fact, in summer 2008, after several years of drought, the island’s authorities were forced to import drinking water from Greece. Andreas, an inhabitant of Nicosia spoke to RTL Radio: “It’s true that in 2008 we saw ships carrying millions of litres of drinking water which were then distributed around the island by tankers.” The inhabitants are used to being careful with how they use water, but sometimes the supply is cut off. In the North, in the Turkish part of the island, the shortage can also be felt.

By clearly and concisely explaining all the measures taken by the Cypriot authorities, and by speaking to inhabitants and experts on the air, RTL Radio informs listeners in France of current environmental challenges, giving them an opportunity to form their own opinion.

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How’s the planet doing? For the third Destination RTL of the season, aired at the beginning of the week, Etienne Baudu took the listeners to Cyprus, a Mediterranean island where water supply is a major problem.France - 21 January 2011

Water tanks on the rooftops of buildings, here in Nicosia, the island’s capital

Kouris dam, the island’s largest. Cyprus is the country with the most numerous reservoirs per capita in the world

Cyprus is home to some real treasures like the magnificent beaches of Petra tou Romiou, where Aphrodite is said to have

walked, according to Greek mythology

And the voice of Holland is... Ben Saunders

Leading the public’s votes throughout the final

on the evening of 21 January, Ben Saunders

beat competition with 59 per cent of the votes

to become the first winner of ‘The Voice of

Holland’. An average of 2.7 million people

watched the show every Friday

since it launched in summer 2010.

The final attracted 3.74 million viewers –

the highest figure ever for a

Dutch talent show.

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Dirty tricks and snide remarksTV viewers can’t get enough: Scènes de ménages is M6’s trump card on the 20:00 time-slot, attracting more and more viewers.France - 24 January 2011

The French are fond of M6 on mobile devicesThe M6 app was downloaded 1 million times within three months.France - 24 January 2011

Children need skills to deal with advertisingMedia Smart’s redesigned website for parents and teachers now offers even more background information on advertising. Germany - 25 January 2011

Germany’s most popular news app N-TV’s free I-Phone app is the most popular news app in Germany and one of the country’s Top 10 free I-Phone apps. The app has been downloaded 800,000 times to date, and 65,000 times in December alone.Germany - 25 January 2011

Helping as well as informingRTL Radio in France posted 13,500 job offers on its site through its latest Journée RTL Emploi solidarity initiative. Bel RTL will host SOS Emploi once again on 1 February.France / Belgium - 25 January 2011

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People

Simon MurphyUnited Kingdom - 21 January 2011

Simon Murphy becomes Head of Gambling Division, a division newly integrated in to FremantleMedia Enterprises.

The gambling division was initially launched in 2008 as an internal start up, part of FremantleMedia Ventures, and quickly gained traction over the years. This success has encouraged FremantleMedia to scale its investment in the gambling sector.

Simon Murphy, who was appointed head of the division, will be responsible for the company’s online, land-based and mobile gambling initiatives. With over eight years gambling experience holding key roles with IGT WagerWorks and Million 2-1, a mobile gaming specialist acquired by IGT, he will be tasked with building FME’s brand presence and distribution of multi-channel gambling related content.

Mel Alcock, CEO EMEA, FremantleMedia Enterprises, said, “Now that the business is of sufficient scale, we believe it is ready to be integrated within FremantleMedia Enterprises which is the main commercial brand extension arm of FremantleMedia. We look forward to combining Simon’s experience and our expertise in extending major brands into cross-platform entertainment.”

Paul Kanareck, Head of FremantleMedia Ventures, said, “FremantleMedia has managed to build significant share in this exciting market in a very short period of time. Simon’s appointment signals our ambition to grow this business even further and become the leading supplier of branded content to premium operators across multiple channels.”

Simon Murphy

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