This week, Fox Mobile announced the promotion of Mitch Feinman to senior vice president, under Fox Mobile president Lucy Hood. In his new role, Feinman will take on the challenge of identifying and creating new distribution channels for Fox Mobile Entertainment.
Previously, Feinman was vice president of digital content at Fox Mobile, where he oversaw the creation of the popular mobisodes (a term he is credited with coining). Under his watch, mobile phone users got to watch 24: Conspiracy and Prison Break: Proof of Innocence, among others.
TV.com News spoke with Feinman to get the 411 on the future this burgeoning entertainment arena holds.
TV.com: What has been the initial consumer reaction to your initial suite of mobile products?
Mitch Feinman: While it is still early days in this business, we have been pleased with excitement and the interest from consumers. Though the percentage of mobile video users is still low (the majority of phones are not video-enabled), there has been more than 1.5 million downloads of our Mobisodes™ series. 24: Conspiracy is now in 25 countries and six languages. We're optimistic about this format, but these are early days so right now it's a bit of a testing phase.
TV.com: Do you view mobile as a new cool novelty, or a whole new avenue of entertainment?
MF: We believe there is a big future for mobile entertainment--with more than 2 billion mobile phones in the market today. Forming a separate business unit (Fox Mobile Entertainment) shows our commitment to growing this category and providing the best mobile entertainment experience for today's and tomorrow's mobile user. This is why our offering is quite diverse, from grafix, screen savers, and realtones to mobile channels and video.
Whether we're creating new Mobisodes series or developing new content or content formats for mobile, we are thinking of this as a new distribution channel. People are consuming mobile entertainment in a very different way than they do other forms. Right now we find most people enjoy media on their mobile phones during downtime. For example, they are at a doctor's office and want to play a quick game of 24, or they are delayed at the airport and want to watch the "snack"-sized Prison Break: Proof of Innocence Mobisodes series.
We're very excited to watch how this industry evolves.
TV.com: What are the challenges of tailoring narratives to the medium?
MF: Telling stories through mobile is very different than other existing mediums. We have to tell the story in a different way--visually and through sound and written word. Below are a few specific considerations in producing for the mobile platform:
Visually
-Close-ups are key to draw the eye in and convey important messages through video. For example, there is a scene in Prison Break: Proof of Innocence where drugs are being passed around in the prison cell. This is an important part of the scene. We needed to focus in on the bag being passed so [that] it was obviously cocaine.
-On a related note, mobile phone screens are darker than their larger counterparts. The scenes need to be shot brighter so that they are more easily viewed.
Audio
-Rule about sound: Less is better. Don't want to crowd the soundtrack-–it would cause too much confusion.
-In a movie theater, you are likely listening to 5.1 surround sound. With the mobile phone, you might be listening on an ear bud. In producing Mobisodes, we use aural information that helps with the story but suits the format. For example, in Prison Break: Proof of Innocence there is a scene with a woman that is locked in a room. The door knob starts to jiggle. The sound effects have to help focus the listener/viewer in to that occurrence for them to feel the suspense of that moment.
Script
--Structure of writing is very different, too.
--Each Mobisode has a dramatic arc in a very short time frame.
TV.com: Identifying and creating new distribution channels sounds suspiciously like extending reach by increasing the number of carriers and markets that carry and have access to Fox products. Is that how you measure success at the end of the day?
MF: We measure success in a number of ways, reaching the most potential consumers (through carrier relationships and market expansion) certainly being one factor. Once we reach these consumers, though, we need to make sure we are providing them the most rewarding and relevant entertainment experiences. Continued technologic and product creativity and innovation are essential to keeping our consumers interested, engaged, and coming back--it also sets us apart from the competition. Of course, we also look to our sales and usage as one metric to gauge consumer interest.
TV.com: To what extent do you solicit or factor carrier feedback into your business strategy?
MF: We have a carrier-friendly business--both with our direct-to-consumer unit, Mobizzo, and with our direct sales to carriers. Fox Mobile Entertainment partners with carriers to distribute quality News Corp brands and products like Fox News, Fox Sports, and clips and trailers. In part, Mobizzo is the result of carrier requests to us to create a place for great and easily accessible content backed by marketing muscle to support this emerging entertainment category.
In these cases, the carriers have the direct subscriber relationships, so we are keen to get the carrier insights in learning how to improve upon the consumer experience.
TV.com: What's the level of support advertisers have shown toward your mobile offerings? Can you reveal dollars and cents? How much revenue is the mobile division is generating from marketers/advertisers?
MF: We do not break out our numbers in this way, but I can tell you the advertisers are very interested in how they can leverage the mobile platform to extend their reach and brands. The upfronts are still going on, but there has been great enthusiasm by the advertising community in factoring mobile into their advertising mix.
TV.com: Today's news touts Toyota as a mobisode sponsor. What sold Toyota on the opportunity? What do the ad units look like on the mobile front, and what level of granularity can you provide Toyota in terms of reach and number of viewers?
MF: Toyota's sponsorship of the Prison Break: Proof of Innocence Mobisode series was part of a broader deal crossing several of the company's entertainment divisions, including Fox Broadcasting (FOX), Fox Mobile Entertainment (FME), Fox Interactive Media (FIM), and the FX cable channel.
In a press release, Toyota recently made the following statement about this sponsorship: "We're utilizing this emerging entertainment medium as a way to provide fans of Prison Break with details about the show courtesy of Yaris," said Jim Farley, Vice President of Marketing for Toyota. "Our partnership with Fox provides an exclusive portal to showcase Yaris to consumers in a fun way where they can discover more about the car on their own time."
Advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi LA produced unique 10-second marketing messages for Toyota that will aired at the beginning of each Mobisode. Toyota vehicles, including the all-new Yaris Liftback and Sedan, were prominently featured in the 26 Mobisodes.
TV.com: What are other Fox franchises that may make the leap to mobile? Will we see American Idol, House, Bones Mobisodes?
MF: Fox Mobile Entertainment has successfully leveraged dozens of popular News Corp/Fox brands for the mobile realm. We are very fortunate to have such terrific brands with which to work. In many ways, these brands set us apart from our competitors.
In fact, among our first mobile programs was with American Idol. The text voting certainly is the most visible. This year, there were nearly 65 million text messages throughout the fifth season of American Idol, breaking last year's record of 41.5 million text messages. This year we introduced American Idol Realtones, live contestant performances made available as ringtones to Cingular customers in less than 24 hours after they were performed live on TV. Typically, traditional recorded music requires months to go from recording to distribution.
Below are just a few other examples:
-In addition to the 24 Mobisodes series, 24: Conspiracy and 24: Mobisodes, we also licensed 24 to I-Play, which created the 24 mobile game, one of the most successful mobile games of 2006.
-Family Guy has been hugely popular on the mobile platform. Since its launch in February 2005, there have been nearly 3 million downloads of Family Guy mobile content--ringers, games, wallpaper, and ringtones.
-Mobizzo, Fox Mobile Entertainment's comprehensive online destination for mobile content, sells a slew of News Corp and Fox-branded content, including Family Guy, Napoleon Dynamite, American Dad, 24, and Ice Age.
In terms of future Mobisodes or mobile video leveraging these properties, it is certainly possible and we are actively considering and doing more around properties with existing Mobisodes series. It is early...so we will continue experimenting on what works for consumer. Our goal is to offer our consumers rich and rewarding experiences on their mobile phones.
TV.com: Will we see more mobile episodes starring actual show casts?
MF: Again, it is early days for this industry and we'll continue to experiment with formats and content that gives our consumers the best entertainment experiences. Our Mobisodes series have utilized diverse types of content--from completely original series for mobile to our complimentary episodes, like Prison Break: Proof of Innocence, and compiling clips from actual shows like we did with Simple Life using outtakes, and 24: Mobisodes, which summarizes the first four seasons of 24 in an engaging way. So we are continuing to explore with new formats and content for mobile and in terms of Mobisodes, we would not overlook original video programming that uses the cast or other elements of shows.
TV.com: Do you envision more original mobile programming in addition to spin-offs?
MF: As above, we will continue to experiment to find the right ingredients to make compelling entertainment experiences for our consumers. In addition to looking at the possibility of original programming as an option, we will be looking at other forms of original content, whether it's user-generated content or what we are already doing at Mobizzo's Fox Mobile Studios, which was created to conceive, develop, and produce original content made exclusively for mobile.
TV.com: Thanks for taking the time to answer our questions!
So there you have it, mobile phone-using TV lovers. The future is looking bright, even if your mobile screens aren't (yet)!
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