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TV broadcaster going nova on the Web

Nova launches news site, clothing optional

By Victor Velek
Staff Writer, The Prague Post
May 14th, 2008 issue

After conquering the Czech Republic’s television screens, TV Nova is now determined to take on cyberspace.
Lured by the booming new media industry, the country’s leading commercial broadcaster has launched a video-heavy news portal set to compete with online bigwigs run by Internet portals and newspapers. The site, tn.cz, went live May 5.
“We’ll be among the top three players on the online market within a year’s time,” predicted Nova spokeswoman Veronika Šmítková.
To carve out a slice of the country’s Internet audience, Nova is banking on frequently updated video newscasts. And, taking a hint from its tabloid competition, tn.cz features a section with newscasts hosted by stripping female anchors.
Since its launch, this feature, know as “RedNews,” has drawn by far the most notice, serving as an online incarnation of Nova’s nude weather forecasts and other shows that use sex appeal to increase publicity, said Jitka Kolářová of Gender Studies, a nonprofit focusing on gender issues.
“It uses the proven fact that sex and a naked woman’s body help sell things,” Kolářová said. “Czech society is still relatively tolerant to the gender-insensitive media presentation of women and the woman’s body,” she added.
Nova makes clear the division between tn.cz’s constituent parts, dividing the portal into a blue-colored news section and a tabloid section, dressed in red (hence “RedNews”). The news section features 90-second newscasts updated three times a day.
“Our great advantage, compared with others doing business on the Internet, is our television background,” Šmítková said, emphasizing that the biggest boom in cyberspace has been seen in video content.
Nova.cz, the broadcaster’s original site with a television archive, will continue to exist independently of the new portal. However, it will be revamped and converted into a site dedicated to entertainment, Nova said.
Some media experts say that Nova’s idea of becoming a dominant online portal is far-fetched. It’s unrealistic, said Lukáš Polák, a media commentator for DigiZone.cz. “In my opinion, what’s achievable [for Nova] is getting in the top 10.”
While popular news servers like Novinky.cz and Super.cz are affiliated with the country’s dominant Internet server, Seznam.cz, Nova has no such support, Polák said. The idea that the popularity of Nova’s television newscasts is enough to make it a destination on people’s browsers is naive, he added.
While Nova’s loyal viewers are, to a great extent, older people, tn.cz aims at attracting the young. “The main target group is young and active people keen on trying new things,” Šmítková said.
According to Polák, however, Nova’s nude news and regular news can hardly be seen as innovative. The Internet is full of both infotainment videos and erotic and pornographic material, he said.
Nova’s online rivals aren’t fretting over its Internet expansion either.
“There are a lot of news portals of this kind on the market,” said Petr Kapalín of NetCentrum, the company operating the country’s second-largest site, Centrum.cz, and the online daily Aktuálně.cz.  
“We have been webcasting news on Aktuálně.cz for two years already,” he said, rejecting the claim that Nova has an advantage thanks to its long experience with audiovisual content.
The public broadcaster Czech Television (ČT) said Nova’s portal would not endanger CT24.cz, its online news platform, which is based on the news channel ČT24.
“CT24.cz is designed as a classic hard-news portal … while Nova is openly focusing on infotainment,” said spokesman Ladislav Šticha.
While Nova beat some of the country’s long-established portals on the day it launched its new portal, the very next day the surge of visits to tn.cz subsided.
After people’s curiosity is quenched, tn.cz’s real performance remains to be seen, Polák said, adding “I don’t believe [the site] will significantly boost Nova’s advertising revenues.”

Victor Velek can be reached at vvelek@praguepost.com


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