Have you been to CNET TV recently?  If you have, no doubt you will have been treated to Loaded - CNET TV’s latest show hosted by 29 year old Natali Del Conte.  While billed as a ‘podcast’, Loaded is a daily video product, produced early in the morning (East Coast time), rounding up the day’s breaking technology news.
What makes Loaded so appealing is its length and pace.  At around about the five minute mark, Loaded is short and fast enough to keep the viewer interested while still being able to go a little beyond scratching the surface on the topics covered.  And with some slight changes to its current form I believe that Loaded with Natali Del Conte has the potential to take tech news mainstream.

For a long time now, tech news has not taken a major role in news programing on television.  While technology news often makes the headlines, few mainstream networks air dedicated technology news shows.  Looking at the BBC in the United Kingdom you’ll find just 30 minutes of dedicated technology output per week in the form of a single show called ‘Click’ which airs in the ‘prime-time’ scheduling slots of 00:30am, 04:30am and 11:30am over the weekend only.

For CNET to take tech to the television the format needs to be tweaked. To begin with, Loaded needs to become two three to five minute shows.  The first focused at a business audience tailing onto the end of the business section of the news.  By a business show I mean one focusing mostly on mergers and acquisitions in the technology, reports of where venture funding is going and stock movements in relation to product launches etc.  This show could be hosted by anyone really, well not Brian Cooley - I doubt I’d enjoy him on my television set.

The second show would be very much consumer focused and even then it would be aimed very specifically at the 18-35 demographic.  This show would be very similar to the current incarnation of Loaded but more focused on online service developments, online media and some consumer electronic device news.  This show would run two or three times a day on the likes of BBC 3 (in the UK) and on the MTV networks (in the US etc).

So why Natali?  Why not Molly Wood, Kara Tsuboi, Tom Merritt or Brian Tong?  Put simply, Natali is the most appealing to the largest group of people.  To the younger demographic, guys find her ‘hot’ (we are such a shallow bunch) and girls do not find her intimidating.  Moving up the age scale, she is considered by the middle aged demographic to be trustworthy.  Finally, to the older demographic, Natali makes tech accessible and and understandable.  My grandmother for example made this comment after watching Loaded with me, ‘I’m not sure who Google are, but I know I ought to think carefully about giving them my healthcare records due to the amount and type of data they are already collecting on their customers’.  (More about these perceptions in a future blog post.)

Some claim that Natali Del Conte is the next Veronica Belmont and while I wish Natali much success in her career I really do not believe she is the next Veronica Belmont.  I see her rising to become the face of CNET TV and by extensible the face of CNET.com both online and on air.

With a little luck, CBS (CNET Networks soon-to-be new owners) will try CNET on the TV or at least invest in their online video output.  That said, I am slightly worried about CBS’s acquisition of CNET Networks.  I see CBS raiding the CNET cookie jar and taking all the good stuff and leaving CNET with very little.  After all, a domain name portfolio including news.com, help.com, tv.com, search.com, kids.com and so on must look mighty attractive to CBS who want to make it big on the web quickly.  That said CNET have much to learn from CBS in particular learning the grammar of video production for television as opposed to online.

Regardless of your perspective on taking Loaded mainstream in the format I decide above, the one thing you should take away from this post is that Natali, being appealing to all demographics, is essential to breaking into everyones living room.

And on a final note, in writing and researching this post I’ve discovered why ‘Loaded’ as a name for the video is bothering me.  In the United Kingdom, loaded is the name of a ‘lads mag[azine]’ - really not compatible with the technology news show!

Currently I have a few more (better written and researched) posts about CNET Networks in the works.  Be sure to come back for those when the go live over the next few weeks.

Title photograph by Brian Solis released on a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.