What’s next? It sounds odd – perhaps inappropriate – to start an introduction with a question, but in this case it’s fitting. It’s the fundamental question we at PILOT are wrestling with for our industry. What’s next for broadcasters?
We have unparalleled opportunities to advance how we serve our audiences. The combination of traditional and digital media offers broadcasters a unique advantage to address how we can best engage with consumers as well as distributing, measuring and monetizing content.
We’ve launched PILOT to explore the answers to these questions with the people directly and indirectly involved. This new initiative creates opportunities for people to engage and develop solutions that benefit our consumers, industry, and members. PILOT is an evolution of NAB Labs that will explore digital technologies, while continuing to build on the advances made by NAB Labs.
My name is John Clark, and I’m PILOT’s Executive Director. I’ve spent the past 18 years at the intersection of media, technology and business, and I’m excited and honored to lead this new initiative. Most recently, as Executive Director of the Reese News Lab at the University of North Carolina, I worked with students across academic disciplines and was inspired by their collaborative approach to the development of new media products and services. As a software developer and later general manager of WRAL.com, one of the most powerful local TV digital operations in the country, I’ve witnessed the ability of technology and media working together to take advantage of new opportunities.
For me, PILOT is a state of mind. Quite simply, it’s about bringing together the smartest people across industries not only to solve problems but also to create new opportunities in well-known areas and in spaces we’ve yet to explore.
Innovation exists throughout the broadcast industry. New technologies are evaluated and reported on daily, but the successes, failures and lessons of these innovations need a broader audience. PILOT is a mechanism for not only sharing these lessons, but also creating new solutions on a larger scale that meets the needs of future generations of consumers.
And we are not doing this alone.
We are bringing together leading-edge companies, educators and organizations to advance innovation in the broadcast industry. Broadcasters, analytics companies, advertising partners, platforms and technology providers are all engaging each other in the search for opportunities. We are all working together to drive the identification, development and implementation of new solutions.
PILOT’s charter members – Accenture, Akamai, Frankly, Google, Nielsen, Shareablee and Yahoo! – will work with broadcasters to define key areas for development, with a special attention to content distribution and audience engagement.
This diverse and growing brain trust will create spirited discussions, contested opinions and ultimately the best solutions for the industry. We will find new companies making their mark on media. We will drive the creation of new technologies that better serve consumers. We will discover solutions that enhance the broadcaster business.
Much like our name implies, PILOT is a group of navigators setting course in uncharted territory.