Localisation Strategies of US-owned Children's Television Networks in Five European Markets

Abstract

This study examines the children's channel output of the US transnationals in Germany, Britain, France, Italy and the Netherlands, and seeks to identify the specific factors that determine and shape their programming strategies linked to localisation. The analysis is based on a 2-week analysis of the schedules of some of the most popular transnational children's channels (Cartoon Network, Disney Channel, Playhouse Disney, Nickelodeon, Nick Junior) and key public service children's channels, as well as analysis of national TV markets and regulatory frameworks. The paper demonstrates the degree to which US transnationals are likely to adapt their offerings to meet different local circumstances, depending on a variety of connected market, regulatory and cultural factors, and points in particular to the importance of the broader institutional, policy and regulatory context in influencing the programming strategies of transnational players.

Keywords:

• broadcasting regulation
• children's television
• localisation
• media economics
• public service broadcasting
• television programming
• transnational television

Notes

^1. Measured by revenue, Walt Disney was the world's largest media corporation as of 2010, with Time Warner ranking second and Viacom fourth (after News Corporation). Viacom had joined the top tier of media conglomerates in 2000 after its merger with CBS (Gershon & Suri 2004). Even after CBS's spin off in 2005, and the creation of two legally independent entities (CBS Corporation and Viacom), Sumner Redstone's control of both the new smaller Viacom and CBS through National Amusements has, in the words of Eileen Meehan (2010, no pagination), “maintained the empire's functionality.” We thank an anonymous reviewer for pointing this out to us.

^2. As noted by Joseph Straubhaar (2007, p. 183), terms such as adaptation, customisation and domestication are sometimes used by scholars and industry practitioners, instead of localisation, to refer to essentially the same marketing strategy.

^3. The sample period encompassed the weeks commencing on 21 September 2009 and on 22 February 2010. The weeks analysed were “typical” in the sense that they were free of special events affecting the schedules of children's channels such as school breaks or national holidays.

^4. Other major US children's channels are Boomerang (Time Warner's classic cartoon network) and Jetix (formerly Fox Kids and at the time of writing in the process of being rebranded as Disney XD). They were excluded from the sample to make the schedule analysis more manageable.

^5. We classified each programme also according to its format—as either “animation” or “non-animation” (a residual category being “mixed format”).

^6. So, for instance, the pre-school animation Harry and his Bucket Full of Dinosaurs, a Canada/UK co-production between CCI Entertainment (Canada) and Collingwood O'Hare Entertainment/Silver Fox Films (UK) was classified as “national” in the UK (where it was shown on Playhouse Disney) and “European” in Germany (where it was shown on Disney Channel). Brian O'Brian, a Walt Disney series created by American Director Danny Kaplan, produced by Disney Channel Italy and shot in Italy with mostly Italian actors, was classified as “European” in the UK (where it was shown on Disney Channel). If it had been shown in Italy in our two sample weeks, it would have been classified as “national.”

^7. Tellingly, it has become industry practice to remake live-action series that have been popular in one country into animation series so that they can be sold abroad more easily. An example is Doodlebops, a popular Canadian live action show, an animated version of which was subsequently produced to enhance its exportability (“Canada: Animated,” 2009, p. 21).

^8. For a discussion of the rather limited impact of the EU quotas system for European works on the European audiovisual industry see McGonagle (2008).

^9. As pointed out in note 1 above, especially since the spin-off from CBS in 2005, Viacom's corporate structure has been remarkably different from that of Disney or Time Warner, most notably in that Viacom, unlike Disney and Time Warner, lacks ‘ultimate control over itself’ (Meehan, 2010, no pagination). Furthermore, MTV Networks International, Viacom's division in charge of the group's international television business, has often been singled out for adopting a “network-enterprise” model and pioneering localisation (e.g., Chalaby 2009, p. 166). These “internal” differences between Viacom on the one hand and Disney and Time Warner on the other, however, seem to have little bearing on the way in which their transnational children's networks are run.