10 Steps Towards the New Network TV

"These days, TV viewers have plenty of ways to watch the programs they want — when they want to watch them. And the changes have sent the TV networks into a tailspin. Profits are down. Programming is wildly uneven. Grappling with change, the TV industry is rewriting the rules it has played by for half a century, and viewers are already seeing the fruits of those changes.

They are making moves, big moves. And here are the 10 that will redefine network TV, this season and into the future:

1. Embracing the Internet, really: Soon, CBS research guru David Poltrack says, we can expect TVs with built-in Internet access, so streaming will be easy on our beautiful flat screens. That will lead to less DVR viewing. And that will make the networks happy because viewers won't be able to easily skip commercials.
2. Meeting the DVR on its own turf: The networks are making decisions in response to what works on DVR playback. (They get credit in the ratings for shows watched that way.) Turns out, science fiction and action are the most played-back genres. The demographics, who watches on DVR, who watches on the Internet, it's all in flux and may affect what entertainment is made.
3. Moving beyond the box: TV: It's not just for television anymore. CW Entertainment president Dawn Ostroff stressed her network's multiplatform push. CW is billing itself as "TV to tweet/IM/blog about." The 18- to 35-year-old females CW targets live on various platforms at once. CW wants to be more than a network, more than a website; it wants to be an enveloping experience.
4. Going global: Cross-border co-productions and replays of shows that have already aired abroad are inexpensive solutions to the programming problem. They're not necessarily hits, but they're cheaper in failure. Expect to see more of them.
5. When in doubt, imitate cable: This strategy is seen in some quarters as a response to cable's successful "brand filtering." In the same way Bravo seems to run "Top Chef" or "Project Runway" every time you turn around, the Leno brand will be available five hours a week on NBC.
6. Owning it: Ownership counts in tough economic times. "Medium," the show about a telepathic crime fighter, starring Patricia Arquette, is jumping to CBS after five years on NBC. Why? Because CBS Studios makes the show. The producer is about to become the broadcaster in a money-saving "vertical integration.
7. Converging, with profits in mind: Ashton Kutcher leads the way. The actor-producer now has 3 million followers on Twitter (a bigger audience than some prime-time TV shows) and has produced a Web show, "Katalyst HQ," that reached 9 million. He fully expects convergence to happen soon. "I think that the two mediums (TV and the Internet) will eventually merge into one, and I think our goal is to be there when they merge and already have an established understanding of that space," Kutcher said.
8. Cutting costs, cutting salaries:
CBS's Tellem said: "We're scrutinizing every aspect of the business. Whether network, studio or distribution side, we're all being challenged and, I think, actually in a very healthy way. That bubble burst in September, and just as everyone's reassessing how they're living their lives, we're reassessing how we're doing our work."
9. Staying patient, sticking with programming: The economic crunch sometimes results in a network having unaccustomed patience with what's on: Fox renewed the low-rated "Dollhouse," surprising even creator Joss Whedon, who assumed his show was dead. (Though it didn't save NBC's Kings, which hemorrhaged money from the network.)
10. In the meantime, medical shows: "Nurse Jackie," "Mercy," "Trauma" and "Three Rivers" this fall join existing medical shows "Grey's Anatomy," "Private Practice," "HawthoRNe" and "House" to make a ward full of TV doctors and nurses, saving, comforting and transplanting on several broadcast and cable networks.

Like cops and hospitals on TV, some things never change."