A few weeks ago I attended an interesting seminar hosted by MTV3, one of the leading commercial television channels in Finland. Speakers included Jorma Sairanen, Senior Vice President of Programming, and Jani Hartikainen, Head of International Program Acquisitions.

One of the things that caught my attention was the fact that, according to Sairanen, the role of American television series is declining. Previously, American comedy and drama series have been the driving force in the channels programming, but now domestic productions are taking over. This was somewhat surprising to me, although the situation is probably not as dramatic as it sounds - a big chunk of MTV3s programming is still produced in the U.S. According to Finnpanel, people love their C.S.I., Amazing Race, and House. Then again, Finnish drama series and reality shows always get the highest ratings (places 1-5 in the MTV3 top 20) in monthly surveys.

For example, MTV3s prime time hit, Salatut elämät, manages to muster up over a million viewers at its best. That's 1/5 of the whole population..! The daily half-hour soap has been running for over 10 years and it has spawned a whole merchandise industry along the way; I'm talking books, t-shirts, board games, jewelry etc. I'm not a fan myself, but apparently they know very well what they're doing.

Hartikainen made some interesting points as well. There's a lot going on in international program acquisitions:

• the television program distribution industry is consolidating - Dutch-based Endemol, for example, is acquiring a lot of smaller businesses and spreading overseas to the U.S.
• there's plenty of good basic programming out there, but hits are hard to find: hitting the jackpot requires sifting through international hit series and choosing the ones that have potential to do well in the Finnish context and are likely to have enough viewers in their main market area to ensure future production. (Prison Break, for example, was huge in Finland and Russia and according to Hartikainen, there is even a localized Russian version of the series in the making)
• there is a constant shortage of fishing and hunting shows that work in the Finnish context - deep sea fishing and safari hunts are not something that the average Joe here can really relate to
• the distribution rights are becoming more and more complex due to online markets

I wonder if Ice Fishing Today would do well on MTV3... sitting in freezing cold by a hole in the ice is, after all, one of our favorite winter passtimes.

Whole 30-minute episodes are available online. You can start with Ice Fishing School: http://icefishingtoday.com/pages/episode_ice_fishing_school.php