Varietys Cynthia Littleton, Anne Sweeney of Disney, Matthew Blank of Showtime and Joshua Sapan of AMC Networks
The first day at this years Cable Show held two panel discussions: one titled Innovation in broadband, and another focused on the creation of content from the perspective of channels.Innovation in broadband was moderated by CNNs Jake Tapper, with panelists Jim Bankoff of Vox Media, Hosain Rahman of Jawbone, Ali Rowghani of Twitter, Inc., Tom Rutledge of Charter Communications and Steve Shannon of Roku. One of the takeaways of this panel was that social networks such as Twitter complement the TV experience, rather than cannibalize it. Rokus Steve Shannon indicated that 70% of its customers are cable subscribers. TV everywhere is a great opportunity, he added.The other panel was moderated by Varietys Cynthia Littleton, and included Matthew Blank of Showtime Networks, Joshua Sapan of AMC Networks Inc. and Anne Sweeney of The Walt Disney Company. The panel pointed out they consider all platforms to create content beyond the TV screen. Joshua Sapan said this is the case of AMC Networks: between show seasons the company creates original content for the new seasons or do catch-up TV.Showtimes Blank said that 80% of its subscribers watch the seasons first episode On Demand a day after the premiere. On Demand has been incredible for premium services, he added. Disneys said that VOD is better.
