Two bits of news caught my eye this week. One was the depth of Martin Sorrell’s bath and the other was the forward order book for Pace Microelectronics. You might think these have nothing much in common, but bear with me.

Lets start with Mr. Sorrell’s bath. He’s well known for his ability to judge the market and has just revised his forecast for 2009. Rather than predicting a flat year Mr. Sorrell thinks his revenues will actually fall before they pick up in 2010.

And what about Pace Microelectronics. Well apparently they are seeing quite a demand for the new breed of broadband set top boxes. It would seem convergence is finally with us but perhaps not in the way that many predicted.

Both of these events are significant. But taken together I think they tell us a lot about the future for broadcasting in this country. To start with the loss of advertising puts a big hole in the business plan of most television channels – be they on-line or not. There simply isn’t enough advertising to go round and the idea that literally thousands of channels will be funded in this way is absurd.

And what about Pace? Well that’s interesting too. Because in my mind it finally signifies true convergence. As speeds increase more and more television will be delivered via broadband. That much we knew. But I don’t think the final destination will be a computer screen. It’s ironic really because the main beneficiary of the new technology will be the humble television set.

Which makes it all the more fascinating for folks like us. We have unlimited opportunities and can now bring a tremendous array of great content right to the viewers living room. But apart from the good old license fee the truth of the matter is we have no real idea of how to pay for it!

So the G20 summit is finally over. The Heads of State have come and gone. The protestors have had their say and another country has been entirely won over by Mr and Mrs Obama.

And the headlines have been pretty complimentary. Over a trillion dollars has been pledged and wise heads are saying that this marks the turning point for the global economy.

But look a little deeper. I’m not arguing here about the figures. I don’t know if these are old pledges or new. I don’t know if the regulation is tight enough and I don’t know if even a trillion dollars will re-vitalise world trade. But I doubt anyone else does either.

No, I think we need to look at the human cost of this recession. The thousands of firms going out of business and the millions of  people losing their jobs and in many cases their homes as well. And mainly, though not entirely, because of greed and arrogance. And it goes beyond the unemployment figures themselves. In America for example millions of people are on the breadline though they remain in part-time employment – too proud to accept State aid.

So when will we start to see an end to this recession if not following the efforts of the G20? That bit is simple. When we see real values return to corporations – both financial and otherwise – and when success is measured in real profits rather than financial engineering. And when our best and brightest recognise the value of earning an honest living.

Well it sure has been an interesting couple of days.

Camp one was flooded and all the competitors had to be evacuated to hotels. However, 4 people to a 2 man room assured that we all felt like we were in camp.

In fact our British spirit really showed through yesterday when about 20 of us broke camp (the hotel) and went for a run in the rain, much to the amusement of the other nationalities.

The first stage of the race has had to be scrapped as the tents and equipment could not rescued in time for today’s scheduled start.

But fear not, the race may be 1 day shorter, but the organisers have thrown in 10 miles of the biggest dunes around into a revised day one to keep Marathon des Sables on target as the toughest footrace on earth.

Matt Mahoney

Through knowledge comes hope
Running Marathon des Sables 2009 for Yorkshire Cancer Research

Links:

Sponsor me: www.justgiving.com/mattmds
Web: www.mahoney.co.uk/mds.php
Charity Site: www.yorkshirecancerresearch.org.uk
Official Race Site: www.darbaroud.com/index_uk.php

27th March
Day: T minus 2 – Into the desert
Excitement Level: Damp

So you thought the Sahara was hot and dry. Well Today that couldn’t be further from the truth. The entire country seems to be flooded and half the competiors can’t even get to the first camp.

What is notoriously the toughest foot race on earth is fast looking like turning into the toughest swim.

At this very moment in time we are sat 12kms away from camp and unable to get there because it’s too dangerous for the military transport.

This might be a very long damp night.

26th March
Day: T minus 3 – Fly to Ouarzazate (Morocco)
Excitement Level: Medium rare

“Training to run 100 miles is like training to get hit by a truck”
Luis Escobar

Right now I am pondering the collective noun for the throng of Marathon des Sables competitors that congregated at Gatwick this morning; an asylum, a band of mad men or maybe a hobble (probably more appropriate for the inbound journey)?

So this is it, we have all arrived on the worst self catering beach holiday on earth. Nonetheless, spirits are high and 800 MdS bores have finally released their family and friends from months of obsessive gibbering about freeze dried food, pack weight, their latest injury and the pros and con of long v short parachute silk gaiters … guilty as charged I’m afraid.

Spirits were high as dinner chat turned to pack weight and calories.
So many different tactics, the proof, no doubt, will be in the running.

So we all headed to bed early to pack and repack. 1 day to go!

Day: T minus 7 days
Status: Philosophical
Excitement Level: about 5 on the Richter scale

“You’ve got an abnormality in your heart”, said my doctor, “but it’s quite normal for an athlete”. Phew! Medical passed. Never has so much teetered on the latter part of a sentence.

So cleared as being fit as a fiddle, a bizarre expression if ever there was, the race is on!

Eighteen months of preparation including 216,000 situps, 21,000 pushups, 4,200 miles run in training and completing, amongst others, 101 miles in 24hrs, has finally culminated in one week to go.

Someone recently asked me whether I was ready. I answered, with bravado of course, “I was born ready”. But the truth be known the MdS has an awful reputation for culling even seasoned ultra athletes. Sure the 24hr marathon is mentally harder, and perhaps physically, but you’re not carrying 12kgs and running for 7 day in 50c+ heat with the much fabled problem of trashed feet.

Everyone has their Everest, and at the moment the Marathon des Sables is mine. I often say to people I train that the thinking is always worse than the doing, but when you’re there, seven days from the start line of the toughest footrace on earth, it is very hard to listen to your own advice.

There remain a few bits of kit to scrabble together over the next few day, oh and the all important crew hair cut (luscious locks are not the order of the day in the desert), but otherwise everything is pretty much ready to go.

“What are you running?” I hear you cry.
The Marathon Des Sables is a gruelling 7 day, 150 mile foot race through some of the world’s most barren desert terrain in temperatures exceeding 40 degrees centigrade.

Competitors carry all their own rations, water, cooking and sleeping equipment and are to all intents and purposes entirely self sufficient…. and certifiable.

“Why?” - For Yorkshire Cancer Research (YCR) of course.
YCR is a wonderful charity that has become the most successful regional medical research charity in the UK. They fund internationally recognised research into the cause and cure of cancer at universities and their associated teaching hospitals throughout Yorkshire.

Links:

Sponsor me: www.justgiving.com/mattmds
Web: www.mahoney.co.uk/mds.php
Charity Site: www.yorkshirecancerresearch.org.uk
Official Race Site: www.darbaroud.com/index_uk.php

There’s no doubt these are tough times for the media industry. Advertising revenue for both newspapers and television companies is substantially down with forecasts of a 20% reduction in one year is common.

In truth it is hard for these companies to survive and we’re witnessing both a haemorrhaging of jobs and significant closures of titles. And bizarrely we’re all able to watch this play out on the new media that was in line to save these venerable organisations. Employees can be seen blogging and twittering away on their last days at work.

And the cause of all this isn’t difficult to see. Despite the cuts the cost bases of these traditional media houses are too high. On-line advertising just hasn’t filled the gap caused by the decline in revenues and people simply don’t want to pay for news – be it on or off-line. And despite what the clever people tell you a ‘free’ economic model is never going to pay the bills.

But there’s an underlying issue here that goes far beyond this recession. And if we’re going to be honest with ourselves it needs to be addressed if we’re going to come out of it. Is the industry we work for meeting the needs of the audiences it serves?

The danger here is that our major media outlets are driven more by their cost models than the needs of their constituents. We’re too keen to distribute what we want to produce rather than what people will pay to receive.

And there lies the rub. Interestingly all our research shows that people – both personally and professionally – have a much greater need to communicate than they did before. And if we actually listen hard and work to meet that need then the economic model will follow.

Examples aren’t hard to find from iTunes through to journal subscriptions people will pay for what matters to them. So lets put our efforts into making sure that the ‘new’ media economy that comes out of this recession is fit for purpose and not just a re-hash of 19^th century ideals.

When the average American watches the evening news there is precious little international coverage. And you can bet that what there is pays scant regard to the millions of lives affected each year in the world’s poorest countries by disease and malnutrition.

And it’s the same when it comes to newspapers. Throughout the United States thousands of editorial jobs have been lost, budgets cut and revenue restricted which has led to a narrowing of coverage. And this means less room for stories about the world’s poor who after all don’t vote and don’t buy advertising.

And here lies the paradox. Because the United States is also responsible for spending hundreds of millions of dollars on fighting these killer diseases in the developing world. The Government through its various aid projects and wealthy private sector organizations such as the Gates Foundation.

So how do we square this circle? There is clearly both the interest and the money to fight disease but no place for coverage in traditional media. Part of the answer here lies in new technology. Take Global Health TV as an example. The channel tackles many of the issues talked about here and is funded via several initiatives. But even so being a web based channel it suffers from the normal competition driving traffic to its site.

So enter the EdgePlayer. Global Health TV has transformed its reach by putting video players on high profile sites whilst retaining control of the content played on them. Take a look at thelancet.com and globalhealthcouncil.org as examples. And the result is over 100, 000 people each month tuning into coverage on global health. And given the problems we have to deal with that coverage is invaluable.

I think one of the key words for 2009 is momentum. And it applies to everything doesn’t it. Barack Obama’s election win is a good example but it applies right across the board. In fact two English Premiership football managers lost their jobs yesterday because their sides lack momentum. Big or small, if you haven’t got it you’re in trouble.

And television has it in droves right now. I was looking at an incredible set of figures that just seem to break record after record. It appears that this year’s Super Bowl had 100 million viewers making it the most watched sporting event in US TV history. And the figures for on-line video are even more staggering. By my calculation there have been some 500 million requests to view from the websites of British broadcasters over the last year or so. With the BBC’s iPlayer alone accounting for some 300 million of those.

So it seems that we’re watching more television than ever across an almost bewildering array of formats. Our own work with the EdgePlayer, which allows companies and other organisations to host video on their sites without any of the traditional technical issues has thrown up some interesting results with literally hundreds of thousands of people watching content in this way.

So the revolution is well and truly with us across all platforms. But if the revolution is with us we still haven’t figured out how to pay for it. The same terrestrial broadcasters with record numbers of viewers are making cuts in programme budgets and even the greatest on-line video phenomena of them all – YouTube – is a long way off covering its costs, let alone making money.

So where’s this all going to end? I’m afraid we’ve already started to see broadcasting casualties in this recession and we will see many more. Because we live in the real world and revolutions in the 21st century have to be backed by a good business plan.

January can be a tough month can’t it? At the best of times temperatures fall, work mounts up, and those credit card bills come tumbling in.

But as we all know these aren’t the best of times are they? We’re now officially in recession and some forecasters think it could be the worst since the Second World War. And with our biggest banks reduced to penny shares these are economic times like no others.

And it’s hard to see a way out. Nobody knows how long or deep this recession is going to be. And one of the biggest casualties in times like these is confidence. And without momentum everything seems harder.

But there is a ray of hope and a lead from New President Barack Obama. A realisation of what needs to be done and the scale of the problem we face but also an unshakeable belief in our ability to get the job done.

And it’s the same for us here at WebsEdge. We started the year off in style in New York producing Historians TV, another great brand to add to our roster. And however tough 2009 and 2010 become we’re going to carry on producing great TV for our vertical audiences. I hope the President is proud of us!