GNTV. A few clarifications

There has been a great deal said about GNTV in the past couple of weeks, some of it painful and most of it helpful in one way or another. My special thanks to Tyme White for a thoughtful and perceptive post that has generated, the last time I checked, over 135 comments.

I cannot address every comment, but there are several areas where I think I can add to this conversation by clearing up a few assumptions and misstatements:

• GNTV is not a new concept. I have been working on the idea since last summer. The idea came to me as an outgrowth to the SAP Global Survey on Social Media, Business & Culture. I wanted to use video to get people to talk about ideas and practices that will help professionals use social media in their organizations. I believe that this is a small audience today that will grow quickly and soon. In my mind, it is very much like Naked Conversations was when we published in January 2006, trying to show the potential for corporate blogging. There were very few corporate bloggers then, but the number has grown quite quickly. I am as convinced in the rightness of this thinking now as I was back then, perhaps more so. I am as determined today to make this show a success as I was back then.

• I often suck at first. I almost got sacked 3 times as a cub reporter. Three years later I was the Assistant night editor. I got sacked from my 1st two PR clients, then went on to start and operate a successful boutique PR agency for 17 years. Robert & I had 6 months to write Naked Conversations. In our 1st month of posting material we got shouted down on everything we posted. In the end, we delivered a book that many people think breaks ground. Scoble & I 1st spoke at Les Blogs 2, where we did so poorly I posted and apology blog. Six months later, we were being mobbed by admirers as we stepped off the dais.

I have learned by doing a lot in life but this time it has very clearly backfired. Someone wrote me that it's like I was ready for a script reading in a summer stock barn, but found myself alone on an opening night stage on Broadway without so much as a sound and lighting crew. That being said, I will get better.

• The sponsorship thing. I first approached a sponsor last September. He said yes in December, before I had serious discussions with Scoble and long before FastCompany was involved. I pitched Robert to start a video production team with me, funded by the two sponsorship deals we had landed. Robert is not really a startups kind of guy and approached FastCompany, who hired Robert to build a video network. Fast Company brought me in, I assume, on the basis of Robert's very strong endorsement of me and on the fact that it appeared I had a sponsorship in my pocket. They cut a deal at that time which I could only describe as generous. On Feb. 27, three days before sponsorship funds were to come in and while I was in Detroit, prepping for my interviews with Lutz & other executives at GM & Ford, my sponsor called to tell me the bad news. The funding cut was for reasons that had nothing to do with my program. It also had nothing to do with the recession as Robert misstated in comments. After getting the call, I immediately contacted FC, expecting to be cut right there. But instead, FC offered to procure sponsorship through their sales department. That effort actually began about four weeks ago and there are several possible sponsors. It is moving slowly, because that's how large companies move on new projects. While I cannot possibly know for sure, the feedback I'm getting is that none of them has been discouraged by the clips they have seen or the blogosphere conversation.
• I ain't quitting. Absolutely nothing that has occurred to date has made me doubt the potential for GNTV. While a great deal of online video is designed to be entertaining, GNTV is intended to be useful to a global business audience. We will never try to be American Idol or even some deviation of the Muppets. The show is essentially an interview show. Meet the Press was never among the most popular shows on television. Visually it is quite tedious. But it turns out there is a pretty constant audience for intelligent discussion of politics and current events. The show is now in its 62nd year. Oh yeah, one other relevant factoid. It had no sponsor for its first two years on television.

         

Comments

[Dan Schawbel]

Shel, this is very well written. It is a token of your authenticity and transparency online and I think a lot of people can learn a lot from it. We all make mistakes, but only a portion of us admits them in public.

Looking forward to your next show.

[anon]

Interview driven video can actually be very compelling. It's not so much that we want American Idol, it's moreso that we want Charlie Rose.

[Pat Kershaw]

Don't worry about the mob.
Read the headlines any day lately, and "most" are from people like me with no track record, except to belittle and denigrate.
That IS the weakness of blogging and the reason traditional media, and business, still don't take it seriously.
Its prime attraction, and a key advantage, having no barriers to entry, makes it, as Robert often says, an echo chamber, fueled with inexperienced and unqualified shills and whingers.

Prove them all wrong.

[Hjörtur Smárason]

That's the spirit Shel. It's inspiring to read this post and I have no doubts that with your attitude, you will succeed. And Loren has only sped up the process by bringing focus to your work.

People are too afraid of mistakes. If you don't want to fall of your bike, you'll never learn to ride it.

[/pd]

never give in - never give up !!

The show must go on :)-

We wll always be here for you shel, thats what people do for nice guys" !!

[pat phelan]

Someone asked me today why their blog was failing and not getting hits
"Tell the human side of the story first" that's what you told me and that's what I told them.
Never give up, never give up, never give up buddy

[Tyme White]

Thank you Shel for the kind words and clarifying those points. I wish you much success with your show. :)

[francine hardaway]

You go, buddy. I suck too, and not just at first. I just have a thicker skin. Sucking is part of life, and you learn from it. You and I were sucking before these people were born:-) Hmmm...maybe I shouldn't go there.

[shel israel]

Actually Francine, you and I have lived long enough to know that getting older sucks. Others just make fun of it, but it is so very preferable to other options.

[Heather Dulin]

As a fairly experienced marketing/ communications professional who is new to social media, I am learning and discovering more every day.

I find your willingness to put yourself out there and to consistently improve your work inspirational. Thanks!

[john cass]

Shel, I really enjoyed reading about your baby steps in social media, journalism, book writing, and stuff. Very inspiring. The moral, if first you don't succeed, try, try again.