Shanghai TV Summit Seeks Answers to \'90s\' Generation TV Choices and Booming License Fees
The summit tried to determine the future of the TV series industry
The Shanghai TV Series Summit focused on two big issues, the \'90s generation\'s TV choices and the booming cost of copyright fees, at the 2016 Shanghai International Film and TV Festival yesterday.
The first half of the summit, during the Magnolia TV Forum at Shanghai Exhibition Center, invited drama producers, online writers and actors to shed light on young people’s choices in TV series to try to determine the future of the industry.
Suman Wang, chief editor and general manager of Tencent Video\'s film/drama department, introduced a survey that showed 22 percent of college students in China do not watch TV series. The survey also revealed that real-time commentary subtitles were necessary when people were watching videos online.
"The ratio of paid users is high among young audiences who not only buy the content but also spend on a wide range of related products and events," Wang said.
Zhang Na, executive general manager of Huace Group\'s Beijing planning department, stressed that a good script is the foundation of content and it\'s not necessary to purposefully cater to young people.
Carly Lee, COO of Bilibili, emphasized that young audiences have higher and stricter standards when it comes to online TV series so it was crucial to let them choose high-quality works that appeal to them.
Hou Xiaoqiang, founder and CEO of China Wit Media, said data, rankings and online exposure are crucial to selecting online literature to adapt for a TV series because they reflect what young people are thinking.
"We look at the numbers, including online rankings, ratings on Douban, statistics from Baidu Tieba and Weibo, when choosing a potential IP project," Hou said."The IPs we are working with today are from more than five years ago, so we now also consider the mentioning rate on Weibo."
Celebrated online author Shu Hai Cang Sheng said that as a young writer, her readers are also young people, so she tries to figure out what they think.
With many audiences putting emphasis on how good-looking actors and actresses are, Tang Lijun, founder of New iPicture (Shanghai) Media, said the requirement for how good the stars need to look depends on the production company as well as the TV series\' positioning.
"Because our company targets young audiences, we have a requirement for actors and actresses to look nice, but acting skill is much more important. We\'ve seen many shows fail because of bad script and filming, even though they starred celebrity actors," Tang explained.
The second half of the summit shifted to a more sensitive topic in the TV industry - the dramatic change in the past five years in copyright fees.
The licensing prices for top IPs have started to skyrocket. The copyright fee for "Empress in the Palace" was 300,000 yuan. The IP cost for such a show at the same level was 10 times more last year, and the top IPs today can cost 30 times more.
The higher licensing fees are the result of market demand, said Huang Lan, vice-president of New Classics Media."The most important thing is that audiences have strong demands, they want to watch the shows, thus the higher market demand," Huang said.
Ma Zhongjun, chairman and president of Ciwen Media, explained that high prices are also the result of a lack of really valuable resources, so good products are highly sought-after.
Richard Yang, writer and president of Smart Dragon, explained the price of every key link in the production chain is also increasing. As the price for top IPs soar, he said, it is becoming more important to have an evaluation system that assesses value and price.