TV Kids September 2023

FAST Channel Trends / Cartoon Forum Preview

Evan Shapiro / High School Musical: The Musical: The Series’ Tim Federle

Mansha Daswani

Editor-in-Chief

Anna Carugati

Editor-at-Large

Kristin Brzoznowski

Executive Editor

Jamie Stalcup

Alexa Alfano

Associate Editors

David Diehl

Production & Design Director

Simon Weaver Online Director

Dana Mattison Sales & Marketing Director

Genovick Acevedo

Sales & Marketing Manager

Daphne Menard Bookkeeper

Screen Stress

The well-known brands in the kids’ linear space have historically been very good at easing parents’ concerns. Real people do actual vetting, with education specialists on hand to provide guidance on embedding nutrition into kids’ entertainment.

Dedicated blocks on broadcasters to match children’s day patterns were handy, too, for limiting how much time they spent in front of a screen.

KIDS GO FAST

Leading distributors and channel operators offer perspectives on the nascent yet rapidly developing FAST ecosystem for kids.

Ricardo Seguin Guise President

Anna Carugati Executive VP

Mansha Daswani

Associate Publisher & VP of Strategic Development

TV Kids ©2023 WSN INC.

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Today, screen time is constant. Whether a phone, a tablet, a gaming console or a smart TV, kids are always connected, and parents are worried. BBC Children’s and Education surveyed U.K. parents recently and found that 67 percent are concerned about what their child is watching. And you can understand why. YouTube is the primary destination for kids today. While that platform has both human and mechanical systems for keeping inappropriate content off the site, the digital content ecosystem still has a bit of a Wild West feel when it comes to what young ones are accessing. Safety concerns have hampered the FAST channel ecosystem for kids, according to Common Sense Networks’ Eric Berger, so those angling for a piece of that growing pie are emphasizing human curation and vetting to boost engagement on these new services. We do a deep dive into the FAST business for kids in this edition of TV Kids . Mansha Daswani

TOON INTO TOULOUSE

Cartoon Forum is returning to Toulouse for its 34th edition from September 18 to 21.

EVAN SHAPIRO

Hear insights on Generation Alpha from the respected producer, thought leader and media cartographer.

TIM FEDERLE

Watch a video interview with the creator of Disney+’s High School Musical: The Musical: The Series

Superights

Tara Duncan / Sullivan Sails / Clay Time

Superights has on offer Tara Duncan, a fantasy series based on the French books. It follows a strong heroine learning to control her new powers. For ages 3 to 5, Sullivan Sails centers on a young hero who aspires to become a cartographer and “teaches children important knowledge about our natural world” while encouraging adventure, exploration and tolerance, says Nathalie Pinguet, deputy managing director of sales and acquisitions. Also aimed at kids 3 to 5, Clay Time’s third season presents 30 original characters and 30 new DIY tutorials.

ZDF Studios

Theodosia / #LikeMe / Slava the Dog

ZDF Studios’ kids’ catalog features a second season of Theodosia , taking place in 1905 and following the daughter of Egyptologists. “Full of fun, thrills and heart, Theo’s adventures will see her making new friends and discovering new powers,” says Peter Lang, VP Junior. The slate also includes a fourth season of the musical series #LikeMe. Slava the Dog centers on a Ukrainian family who flee to Hamburg when their home is destroyed. In the chaos of Central Station, they lose their dog, but the whole city joins the search for her.

“Sullivan Sails encourages a love of adventure, exploration and imagination.”

—Nathalie Pinguet

“We invest in captivating stories with international appeal.”

—Peter Lang

K ids Go

pocket.watch’s Ryan’s Mystery Playdate.

Kids may be early adopters for virtually every new viewing trend, but by all accounts, they have been relatively underserved in the FAST space—until now. If this year is a watershed for FAST in general, with the volume of channels booming across the U.S., Europe and Latin America, it is also marking a bit of a turning point for the children’s media sector, with a slew of IP owners and platforms eyeing FAST services as a critical way to boost engagement, enhance L&M sales and even drive traffic to SVOD options.

Take, for example, pocket.watch, a company that emerged for and from the on-demand era, building a thriving business on curating a slate of content from the creator economy— namely YouTube—amplifying it across platforms and building those made-for-the-web shows into 360-degree brands.

“When I started the company, if you said, ‘Hey, you’re going to have two linear channels,’ I would have said, ‘You’re crazy,’ ” quips Chris M. Williams, founder and CEO of pocket.watch. “VOD was taking over at that point. It took me by surprise how quickly these

FAST

Leading distributors and channel operators offer perspectives on the nascent yet rapidly developing FAST ecosystem for kids.

new FAST services came on. When we started seeing services like Sam sung TV Plus and Pluto TV growing, we said, we should be there. We also like that these are walled gardens. When extending popular creators’ IP into other areas, we don’t focus on the open platforms like Face book or Snapchat. We focus on walled gardens because we know there will be limited options, and you want to be curated into those services. FAST was providing a new way of doing that.”

The company’s early entry has paid off, with its two services, pocket.watch and Ryan and Friends, now among the FAST ecosystem’s most distributed kids’ channels.

“FAST is increasing tremendously, but the kids’ sector is lagging in terms of monetization,” observes Eric Berger, co-founder and CEO of Common Sense Networks. “Brands are concerned about trust, privacy issues and a lack of standards. We believe that we offer solutions that work not only for kids and families but also for brands and platforms.”

Common Sense Networks began its journey to cater to kids and families with Sensical, an AVOD service built around the values of Common Sense Media. “As we partner with platforms like TikTok and YouTube to help them elevate the quality of children’s digital

media, we see a way to bring world-class content vetting and curation to the FAST space.”

The team at Common Sense Networks has spent the last few years identifying “well-produced, safe, digital-first content that’s widely appealing to kids and families” to curate three thematic channels: Sensical Jr., Sensical Gaming and Sensical Makers.

“The FAST sector is narrow when it comes to the kids’ space,” Berger explains. “It’s missing the bridge age—kids 6 to tween. Most of the content that you’ll see in the kids’ space is focused on preschool animation. We’re missing out on a lot of the content that the young kids love—shows from digital-first creators that focus on a wide range of topics of interest. It’s difficult to find digital-first content that is appropriate, and it takes a lot of trial and error.”

Common Sense Networks and pocket.watch are both using FAST channels as part of their holistic efforts to reach kids everywhere they are, a move that is being deployed by a range of streaming and linear channel operators.

Future Today brought a FAST experience into its HappyKids AVOD app. “The channels we’re launching are around specific brands,” says David Di Lorenzo, senior VP of kids and family.

“FAST is increasing tremendously, but the kids’ sector is lagging in terms of monetization.”

—Eric Berger

“Our audience is gravitating toward that viewing experience.”

AVOD platform

Kidoo dle.TV has also expanded into FAST. “We’re looking back at traditional models of television programming,” says Brenda Bisner, chief content officer. “How can we update it? We’re looking at dayparting. What can we bring to an audience in the morning, afternoon, evening and then on the weekend to make it special? We’re exploring how we can show up in a way that is more eventized and leads to some social cross-promotion.”

In the U.K., Narrative Entertainment, which operates the successful portfolio of POP-branded linear channels, has also entered into FAST, rolling out POP and Tiny Pop on several platforms.

That linear broadcasters are now seeking additional FAST channel rights is a new complication for IP owners figuring out the best way to approach this segment. Some have launched their own FAST channels, including I.M.P.S. with a service for The Smurfs and Guru Studio with one for True and the Rainbow Kingdom. WildBrain, with its extensive library, has a curated offer of some 60 FAST channels across the U.S. and Europe, focusing on single IP brands while also distributing its shows to linear and streaming platforms across the globe. “We have a healthy dynamic with our

distribution arm,” says Lara Ilie, VP of revenue share and transactional. “You’ll have a hard time finding a traditional broadcaster willing to buy 365 episodes of Teletubbies and air all those episodes. That left us with a lot of our beloved franchises that have found a new home in the FAST world.”

For distributors like WildBrain, various business models exist to tap into across inventory share, revenue share and license fees. “We also have our own ad-sales team that has been focused on selling our YouTube content and now are looking into selling CTV ads from our FAST channels,” Ilie explains.

Inventory share is the preferred route for pocket.watch, Williams says. “There are typically two ways you engage with a FAST platform. One is that you take half the ad inventory and monetize that yourself through direct sales and programming any ad waterfalls associated with that inventory. Or you do some sort of rev-share where the platform sells the ads and then shares the revenue with you. We’re one of only a handful of companies that Google has granted ad-sales rights to for selling YouTube Kids’ ad inventory. We can package that along with our FAST channel, AVOD apps, gaming downloads and custom content from the biggest kids creators in the world.”

“A lot of our beloved franchises have found a new home in the FAST world.” —Lara Ilie

For multi-genre services, which form a large part of the kids’ FAST sector, success with viewers and advertisers comes down to curation, with safety being a key consideration.

“On the source side, it’s really about understanding the audience deeply,” says Berger at Common Sense Networks. “We look at thousands of series and find content that is ‘good TV’ for FAST. There’s a lot of content that works well on-demand. The secret sauce is the vetting side. We’re the only ones with child development experts watching every video frame. Vigilance is our filter, and consistency is our goal. We create an inordinate amount of metadata that helps us with the programming, content classification and advertising.”

Williams at pocket.watch also stresses the importance of curation and safety: “We are curating, enriching and packaging content to be distributed more broadly onto premium platforms. We give a lot of confidence to business partners like FAST platforms and to parents that this is now a safe environment to give kids what they crave. We take that YouTube content and package it as 22-minute episodes. We’re doing best-ofs. We’re doing promotional episodes for new series. We’re doing event-driven stunts, not unlike what traditional TV has always done. Data informs what’s working and gives us roadmaps to curate and program our channels.”

Berger adds: “TV networks spend a lot of time on dayparts. We’re focusing on day patterns. We need to figure out how these kids of different ages watch FAST. We then refine the programming across each half-hour to improve the engagement and the flow from one show to the next, decreasing channel changing.”

While startup costs are not what they are for a cable channel, navigating the FAST ecosystem is not easy, especially given the lack of standard metrics and varying needs in terms of deliverables at the platforms. Growth projections, however, are rosy.

“It will fundamentally replace traditional free TV and be an important piece of a cross-platform flywheel for content owners and brands,” Berger predicts.

There are lots of reasons to feel optimistic for the future of FAST, Ilie adds. “In the U.S. alone, there are still a lot of people who are not aware that the option exists to begin with. There are still smart TVs to be sold. The quality of the shows being made available on FAST will improve, so people will spend more time watching on FAST. That will come hand-inhand with the monetization.”

“Data informs what’s working and gives us roadmaps to curate and program our channels.”

—Chris M. Williams

Toon into Toulouse

Cartoon Forum is returning to Toulouse for its 34th edition from September 18 to 21.

Jamie Stalcup

The return of Cartoon Forum gives producers the opportunity to pitch their animation projects to broadcasters, investors and other potential partners from around the world looking for European coproduction opportunities.

“European animation is a wide patchwork with a great variety of patterns, textures and colors, making a wonderful canvas with its contrasts, harmonies and dissonances,” says Annick Maes, general director of Cartoon. “It’s with great joy that we offer a frame for that magnificent canvas.”

This year, 77 projects representing 16 countries are included in the lineup, encompassing 479 hours of content. The selected projects have a total budget of €398 million ($426.2 million), with an average cost per project of €5.1 million ($5.5 million), an

increase from last year’s average of €4.5 million ($4.8 million). The average cost per minute of animation production reached €13,848 ($14,829) , up from last year’s €12,815 ($13,723).

In addition to the official program of pitching sessions, a special initiative titled “Animated UK Meets Europe” will encourage coproductions between European territories and the U.K. A total of five new projects will be pitched in partnership with U.K. broadcast partners BBC, Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery and Sky.

“Our mission is, more than ever, to gather in order to go forward,” Maes says. “The most difficult challenges to come— preserving our natural habitat, living respectfully with all human beings—won’t be solved without everyone involved. Cartoon Forum is a place that we wish to be representative of this involvement and shared responsibility. That’s why we have started the process to obtain a sustainability certification. We want Cartoon Forum to have an impact in a better and more responsible industry.”

“ European animation is a wide patchwork with a great variety of patterns, textures and colors .”

—Annick Maes

Evan Shapiro

Thought leader and media cartographer Evan Shapiro has unique perspectives on cutting through a crowd ed children’s media landscape. In terms of what’s popular now, Shapiro points to the crucial role of gaming and social video in kids’ media diets.

“The thing that catches my curiosity on a regular basis is the evolution of our media ecosystem in all four sectors: video, audio, social and gaming,” Shapiro said. Those sectors are converging “into what I consider a personal bundle that most consumers manage on their own, in their pocket, on their phones or on their screens via their remote controls. Watching control move even further into the hands of the consumers is really what I track on a daily basis.”

Discussing Generation Alpha, Shapiro cited a “downturn in media consumption” over the last several years as

kids, with pent-up demand post-Covid, look to spend more time doing things outside and with friends. “But apart from that, the one thing that Generation Alpha says that they do every day is game. Seventy percent of kids between the ages of 8 and 15 say they game every single day. It’s not just gameplay.

A tremendous amount of the time is social. There is a metaverse that’s taking place on Roblox, Minecraft, Fortnite and PUBG. That is part gameplay, but a good deal of this is a new version of social media. If you want to see where Web 2.5 is taking shape, it’s in these fully functional, always-on platforms— with their own economies—that we call games but are much more than that.”

He continued: “When you look at where they spend their video time, increasingly there’s this ‘yes/and’ point of view among all consumers, but especially among those under the age of 20. YouTube is one of the first places that they’ll go for video content. Netflix is the second place. Twitch is a place where they spend a tremendous amount of time, but then also Disney+. There’s this real acceptance of the idea that I’m going to jump from free media on social video to premium video on a subscription platform and back and forth.”

“The one thing that Generation Alpha says that they do every day is game. ”

Tim Federle High School Musical: The Musical: The Series

The fourth and final season of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series bowed on Disney+ in August, with eight episodes that feature the series’ main cast and some familiar faces from the original film franchise. It follows as the high schoolers prepare a stage adaptation of High School Musical 3: Senior Year and participate in the fictionalized film High School Musical 4: The Reunion .

Tim Federle, creator, showrunner and executive producer of the series, says the last season serves as “our tribute to the fans for sticking with us for four amazing seasons. Longtime viewers get some answers on big emotional things.”