30 Rock

Art apparently does imitate life or at least comedic art.

For those who follow NBC’s award-winning program 30 Rock, the name “Kabletown” might be familiar. Kabletown behaves with about as much shameless profiteering and charm as well-known companies like Comcast, The company’s front office releases statements like "Kabletown is thrilled to announce the recent acquisition of GE Sheinhardt NBC Universal. With this partnership comes the promise of high quality entertainment for our audiences, continued superior service for our customers, and the possibility of meeting the girl from 'Chuck' for our executives."

However, real media empires are usually savvier than that. Yet the Kabletown story line on 30 Rock is not wholly inaccurate or intentionally benign. In this clip with Liz Lemon (Tina Fey) and Jack Donaghy (Alec Baldwin) the fake merger (read: takeover) between 30 Rock (read: NBC) and Kabletown (read: Comcast) is the subject of parody and patronization.

As a parody of the NBC-Comcast merger, now called NBC Universal, Lemon’s sidebar comment to Donaghy about the fictional merger is more than just situational comedy. At the time of the merger in January of this year, our friends at Free Press characterized the merger’s outcomes as fewer choices, higher prices, and less access.

Lemon’s comments referred to her brief feeling that there was something stomach-turning about 30 Rock and Kabletown becoming financial bedfellows. Donaghy’s response to Lemon’s very valid concern was advice to her to continue watching “Bridoplasty.”

In the sitcom, Kabletown would have unprecedented control over what you can watch and how you can watch it. In the real media policy world, NBC Universal would have unprecedented control over what you can stream online and watch on TV. In the show, if you don’t have Kabletown at home, you could end up paying more to get 30 Rock shows. Just this year, Comcast threatened to slow or block Netflix for their customers if they don’t pay a fee. Also, Kabletown won’t have an incentive to promote 30 Rock shows over local or independent programming which would make it even more difficult to find independent voices on cable. Similarly, the NBC-Comcast merger promised public access channels just 1000 hours a year of local programming which amounts to less than 15 minutes a day.

This conversation between Lemon and Donaghy is an example of parody, a form of humor. Humor is a technique used in media messages to persuade the audience to believe or do something. Since the object of parody is to mock or trivialize its subject, Donaghy’s dismissive tone with Lemon can be considered an imitation of how media companies view the valid concerns of their customers. The scene positions Lemon as someone who has an unsophisticated understanding of the merger and as one who is easily distracted. This brand of persuasion additionally attempts to soften or lighten the threat that such a merger poses to the public through humor. Learn more about the Language of Persuasion here.

The subtext of this conversation seems to be a comment on how most Americans, brainwashed by “the tube,” won’t fully understand or even care about the ramifications of the merger as long as their favorite TV shows go uninterrupted. It seems to be a revealing comment about how companies might think of its consumers – as passive TV watchers. An injury further insulted by former FCC Commissioner Meredith Atwell Baker’s acceptance of a vice-president position with NBC Universal months after the merger.

It is of note, however, that Kabletown (just like Comcast) truly cares about its customers.

On Kabletown’s website, it reads, "Why Kabletown with a K? Because K stands for the Kindness we show our customers, the Keen interest we take in their needs and because Cabletown with a C was already the name of a store that sold cable knit sweaters and legal said we had to spell it with a K."

Art, it seems, was at it again on January 27th of this year when the GE building on the show debuted its new Kabletown logo the same night as the announcement of the NBC Universal merger. Funny? Well, only on TV.

For more background on the NBC-Comcast Merger please see the following links:

In NBC –Comcast Merger, Concerns Linger Over Concentration of Media Power (PBS Newshour/VIDEO)

NBC-Universal-Comcast Merger: What We Do and Don’t Know (PC World)

FCC Rules Against Comcast P-to-P Throttling (Network World)