NO SPEAKA DA ENGLISH ON NOVELAS

From the WSJ TELENOVELA PROBLEMA: As Univision gears up to go public, tension is brewing with Mexican TV company Grupo Televisa, which has supplied the Spanish-language U.S. broadcaster with the “telenovelas” that have driven its viewership for more than two decades. As The Wall Street Journal reports, Univision has pushed Televisa to give its programming a more American feel in order to lure younger and U.S.-born Hispanic viewers. Randy Falco, Univision’s chief executive, has suggested fresher story lines and scenes shot in Miami or Los Angeles. That proposal has fallen flat with Televisa, which gets paid more than $300 million a year by Univision through 2030. Things are getting pretty heated, with Univision Executive Chairman Haim Saban even proposing to cancel the deal or cut the payments in half. Univision’s average prime-time audience has dropped to 2 million this season from 3.7 million viewers five years ago. The company has made courting younger viewers a major focus, a strategy on display most recently with its $135 million acquisition of Gawker Media. This loss of revenue issue is not a problem with Spanish market share alone. All things that can be watched on rabbit ears for free on 100+ stations will be An alternative would be to look at the Novelas as a means to learn Spanish for ALL of AMERICA. They can be subtitled. It can be sponsored by radio stations. If you use this idea I am expecting a 30% royalty check per month. You do not need to go to Miami to film. If you do use the profits for independent production on the major channels *