Welcome to The TV Room. Your weekly digest of television, streaming, and digital media insights that matter.

This week we're covering:

• 🏀 The NBA Does Disney

• 🎲 Google Goofs-off with Celebrity Game Show

• 🎥 Creative Spotlight: Supernatural - “Ready to Workout”

• 🎞️ MoviePass Makes Its Comeback

Mickey Dunks the Halls on Christmas

In a mashup of sports and animation, Disney is bringing Mickey Mouse to the hardwood this Christmas Day. The New York Knicks vs. San Antonio Spurs matchup will transform into "Dunk the Halls" - the NBA's first-ever real-time animated broadcast.

Sony's Beyond Sports and Disney are turning Madison Square Garden into a winter wonderland, complete with gingerbread referees and elves operating the cameras.

The technology will render players as animated characters in real-time, while Mickey, Minnie, Donald Duck, and other Disney favorites join the action through a mix of data processing and optical tracking wizardry.

The special presentation will air simultaneously on ESPN2, ESPN+, and Disney+ - marking an interesting experiment in cross-platform sports broadcasting aimed at bringing families together.

Some holiday highlights to expect:

• Disney characters delivering pre-game pep talks

• A halftime slam dunk contest featuring the animated crew

• Santa Claus himself manning ESPN's "SkyCam"

• Live Christmas tree decorating during game breaks

This is Beyond Sports' third major sports collaboration with Disney in 2024, following successful runs with NHL's "Big City Greens" and NFL's "The Simpsons" broadcast. Their previous "Toy Story Funday Football" production even nabbed three Sports Emmy Awards.

While purists might raise eyebrows, this tech-meets-tradition experiment could herald a new era in sports broadcasting - one where family entertainment and professional athletics collide in increasingly creative ways. The magic tips off at noon ET on December 25th.

Read More:

• Sony, Disney put Mickey on the court for Christmas Day NBA broadcast - Marketing Dive

[Webinar] TV Advertising, Reimagined

Welcome to the future of TV advertising! As digital transformation and streaming shift consumer behavior, traditional TV has become costly and harder to measure, leading many brands to redirect ad budgets to digital channels with clearer, outcome-based metrics.

When:
Tuesday, January 14th, 10:00 AM PST | 1:00 PM EST

Webinar:
TV 2.0–Drive Better Outcomes with the Next Evolution in TV Advertising

Why Attend?

• Leverage TV 2.0’s advanced capabilities to precisely target audiences and measure success.

• Activate campaigns with a platform that uses AI-driven optimization for improved ROI.

• Maximize both top and bottom-of-funnel results through non-skippable, in-view ads reaching 100M U.S. households.

• Prepare for the future of TV advertising and gain a competitive edge by learning from early adopters

🎙️ Jason Fairchild on Performance TV

In this episode, Jason Fairchild, CEO and co-founder of tvScientific, talks about lessons from OpenX, creating the performance TV category, and whether big players like The Trade Desk and AppLovin might enter the space.

Jason shares how CTV can shift ad dollars from search and social by focusing on transparency and measurable outcomes, while exploring the challenges of building a new adtech category and the future of CTV advertising.

What You’ll Learn:

• 📊 Shifting Ad Dollars: How tvScientific is moving budgets from search and social to CTV.

• 🖥️ Transparent Results: Why advanced attribution tools matter for advertisers.

• 📈 The Future of CTV: How brand and performance advertising are converging on CTV.

TV Industry Updates

• White Lotus luxury: HBO’s hit series The White Lotus is back and brands like American Express are running campaigns to capture the vibe.

• Nielsen's mindful metric: Nielsen is adding attention metrics to its toolkit as the industry debates what counts as “viewership”.

• Privacy concerns: New research shows smart TVs are constantly capturing snapshots of everything on screen and sending them back to manufacturers.

• AI optimization: EDO and DoubleVerify have unveiled a first-of-its-kind AI-powered system for CTV advertising that optimizes ad placements.

• Google's gifting game show: Google Shopping has turned holiday gift-giving into a game show hosted by Jimmy Kimmel.

Stay up to date on the latest in TV advertising by joining our Slack community!

Creative Spotlight: Supernatural - “Ready to Workout”

Meta's latest campaign for its VR fitness platform Supernatural reimagined Jane Fonda's iconic 1980s workout legacy for the Meta Quest generation, proving that even cardio can be fun.

The Details:

• The creative took viewers on a journey from VHS-era sweatbands and spandex to dazzling VR-fueled fitness landscapes.

• At the core was a four-part VR workout series led by Fonda herself, blending boxing, flow, and stretching experiences with Supernatural's immersive technology.

• The campaign included a limited-edition retro apparel line and an experiential '80s workout studio activation in Los Angeles.

What We Loved: By mixing '80s fitness vibes with cutting-edge VR, Meta Quest created a campaign that hooked post-holiday fitness fans while giving a fun nod to classic home workouts.

Marketing Mix

• Feeling forgotten: Nearly half of consumers feel ignored by advertisers, with suburban and higher earners feeling the most overlooked.

• MoviePass comeback: The movie ticketing service launched its first national campaign, repositioning itself as a lifestyle brand for cinephiles.

• Auto agency shuffle: Stellantis keeps Doner and GSD&M after its creative review, with Dodge, Ram, Chrysler, Alfa Romeo, and Fiat in tow.

• YouTube's TV takeover: The video platform now commands 10.8% of all TV viewing time, up from 6% in 2021.

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