Eisner Enjoying Post-Disney Life, Developing Veoh, Topps
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Eisner Hoping To Boost Topps' Appeal
To New Generation |
Tornante Co. Founder MICHAEL EISNER has "settled into a comfortable post-Disney existence -- deeply involved with his talk show, his investments and his experiments in new media, and quite pleased that corporate spinmeisters no longer surround him," according to Tim Arango of the N.Y. TIMES. Eisner, who served as Disney Chair & CEO until '05, said, "I'm much happier now. The only thing I'm disappointed with is I didn't leave three to four years earlier." Eisner's "hodgepodge of ventures" include online video Web site Veoh, children's entertainment company Team Baby and Topps. His companies are "already interacting in small ways," as Team Baby will be "integrated with Topps, and [video production company] Vuguru has produced the 'Back on Topps' series, a fictionalized comedy about what happens to two brothers, former heirs to the card company, when it falls under new management." Meanwhile, Eisner "predicts the demise of broadcast television," as statistics shown to him by Veoh management "say Veoh gets 44[%] of its viewers during early evening and prime-time television hours." Eisner: "If you are [CBS Corp. President & CEO] LES MOONVES, this makes you very nervous. ... Veoh or some other video aggregator is going to be more important than NBC in 10 years." Arango noted Eisner's "success on the Web is made possible, in part, because he is not running a big media company like Disney anymore." At Topps, "finding ways to make the brand valuable online -- for example, with a virtual trading card collecting game for children -- is important, but so is selling physical goodies." Yet, today's baseball cards would "hardly be recognized by previous generations." Eisner: "We've got to get the kids back" (N.Y. TIMES, 11/23).
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