Karate Kid a pris de l'âge : voici Cobra Kaï, 34 ans plus tard, rajeuni

Cobra Kaï est la poursuite d'un ancien film (Karate Kid, 1984). Elle a d'abord été lancée par YouTube Red, devenu depuis YouTube Premium, avant d'être rachetée par Netflix qui produira la troisième saison en 2021. Notons que Amazon, AMC, Hulu et Netflix étaient déjà preneurs de la série que YouTube a emportée. Les deux premiers ensembles de 10 épisodes sont désormais, après YouTube, proposés aux abonnés de Netflix. 

34 ans plus tard, Cobra KaÏ prend la suite de Karate Kid. Sur YouTube, la série a connu un très raisonnable succès avec plus de 90 millions de spectateurs chaque année pour sa première diffusion ; sur Netflix, le succès semble prometteur également. Mais attendons la troisième saison de cette "action comedy-drama".

Pour l'instant, voici donc les deux anciens finalistes du film, William Zabka (Johnny Lawrence) et Ralph Machio (Daniel LaRusso) qui se retrouvent face à face ; ils sont maintenant patrons de dojo's et ils sont dans le rôle qu'ils occupaient dans le film, ils ont vieilli, bien sûr, et ils ont dû reprendre l'entrainement qu'ils avaient plus ou moins abandonné après Karaté Kid. Ils font revivre leur concurrence dans une atmosphère un peu ancienne et classique, quelque peu nostalgique et fière (on dirait "corny", en anglais). L'un est plutôt pauvre, parfois alcoolique, seul, sans épouse, tandis que l'autre a réussi  brillamment dans la vente d'automobiles ; il a une femme et deux enfants, dont une fille qui pratique excellemment le karaté. Le premier est hargneux, le second est calme. Et l'on retrouve aussi dans la série, entre autres, des oppositions courantes de la culture des teen-agers américains.

L'ensemble constitue une incontestable réussite pour Netflix, l'audience regroupant sans doute des anciens fans de Karaté Kid - ils ont 34 ans de plus - et des nouveaux, plus jeunes (teen-agers), qui se reconnaissent plus ou moins dans les gestes et les paroles des héros de Cobra Kaï. Conflits de générations, de cultures surtout : la plupart des Américains peuvent se retrouver dans l'un ou l'autre des héros de la série.

Quant à la série, elle même, son histoire se complexifie : des films, on passe beaucoup plus tard à une série de deux saisons (20 épisodes) sur YouTube qui, ensuite, sont reprises sur Netflix, qui lui-même produira les saison suivantes. C'est ainsi toute l'économie de la télévision qui peut se trouver bouleversée.

En octobre 2020, Netflix a lancé la production de Cobra Kaï pour une quatrième saison par Sony Television.

Connected TV is the thing this year!

A long time ago, in 1952, Dina Washington was singing 'TV is the thing this year...". Connected TV (CTV) now seems to be the thing this year. American TV is going digital. Linear was great, but now it's out of date... There are many names for connected or advanced TV: CTV, OTT, IPTV. You name it! It is, simply said, television programming delivered via over-the-top devices, via streaming.
Here are the main trends we can observe. Because this is not a disruption but rather a progressive adaptation.

1. Despite what has been said, Americans are not cord-cutters; on the contrary, they are willing to subscribe and pay for TV. They just do not want to subscribe anymore to traditional TV. More and more of them cut the cord which used to attach them to the TV set. Some of them, from a younger generation, do not even bother to start a subscription: cord-nevers! They go directly to Netflix, which is but another cord! They often do not even own a TV set. On one hand, Americans unsubscribe from cable and satellite TV, on the other, they subscribe massively to Netflix and, to a lesser extent, to Amazon Prime Video or Hulu. For Netflix, they pay 10 US dollars/month (which is, by the way, what Europeans already pay as a TV tax). Netflix is proof, on a very large scale, that people are ready to pay for TV, but they do not want commercial interruptions. They want to choose their own schedule: primetime is whenever they want it to be and they often binge watch. Connected TV is on-demand. Before Netflix there was no alternative to commercial TV (besides PBS), now there are many, and behaviors are changing.
2. TV is less and less a household device; it is becoming something personal, available on many devices. 
3. When households subscribe to traditional TV, instead of huge packages, they prefer skinny bundles. "Cord shavers"! Skinny bundles are less expensive and better suited to their taste, especially if they do not want to pay for expensive sports programs (major sports events are for free on the local stations that carry networks). Of course, "cord shavers" may well soon become "cord cutters"...
4. Finally, to survive in what is becoming a Netflix world, traditional TV groups develop their own over- the-top programming (OTT), standalone streaming service. Instead of selling their programs to Netflix, as they first did, they sell directly to consumers (DTC): streaming, this is the new Disney strategy. New networks are launched (cf. chart below) and many are in the works. The consumer can choose to receive advertising or not: with advertising, it is less expensive (CBS All Access: $10 without commercial, 6 $ with). Advertisers will follow viewers on commercial OTT platforms. The new OTT supply expands the TV market. Low churn, high engagement... For some TV companies, like CBS, OTT is becoming a key driver.
5. TV Everywhere: cable or satellite subscribers can access the programs they subscribe to anywhere, on any digital device (smartphone, computer, tablet). They can go from one device to another, they just need to identify themselves with their personal code (single sign-on). See also Movies Anywhere by Disney.
6. In addition to the traditional MVPDs, one notices the development of virtual MVPDs (cf. Hulu, a new business model for MVPDs). It seems that in some cases (DirecTV for instance) what virtual MVPD subscribers gain offsets the loss of traditional subscribers. Globally, MVPD basic video subscriptions decline while their broadband subscriptions increase. Statu quo ante bellum!

But there's more! ATSC 3.0., the new television standard, will make all broadcasting stations digital (and the programs they carry) and their reception multi-screen.

OTT TV supply from traditional TV groups + YouTube Red by Google (March 2018)

Commercial TV had to change. It is losing audience and time to Netflix, not to mention programs. Furthermore, competition also comes from social networks (YouTube, Snapchat, Facebook), especially when it comes to sports programming or news (cf. TicToc News on Twitter).
Being connected, television can break free of most traditional constraints: linearity, regular periodicity, dayparts, commercial pods interrupting and cluttering the viewers' experience, simplistic targeting, prime time: all these notions are henceforth irrelevant and obsolete.

Once digital, TV will act more or less like the web: a TV world managed by data. Consequently, one can expect programmatic buying and selling, measurements with all the ensuing problems (so-called "quality" metrics: brand safety, fraud, viewability, audibility). Digital companies will be able to target according to past and recent behaviors, location, etc.. Will we thus see the end of demographics? There will be the possibility for recommendations (personalization). N.B. Netflix is using a recommender system (algorithms, machine learning techniques) not audience ratings. Connected TV is becoming addressable: one can target different ads at different TV viewers on a one-to-one basis. Therefore, TV measurement has to move from GRP metrics and panels (this is still Nielsen's business model) to data: Nielsen provides various kinds of measurement for digital TV (Social Content Rating, Total Rating Content), but mostly sticks with the GRP.
There are more than 50 million OTT TV households in the USA (out of a total of 120 million TV homes). But measurement should take into account all devices, not only TV sets, in which case the number of OTT persons is much bigger (this would be almost everyone).