Tv's Big 3 Share Centerstage

It was quite a feat, bringing together onstage the big bosses of the country’s three major broadcast networks.

That rare moment happened lst Friday at the Advertising Congress at the Camsur Watersports Complex in Pili, Camarines Sur. Sharing the stage were ABS-CBN Chairman and CEO Gabby Lopez, GMA Network Chairman and CEO Felipe Gozon and TV5 Chairman Manny V. Pangilinan.

Each presented his own vision of the future of the media and its impact on the advertising industry. Mr. Lopez believes “technology will change everything except the human nature to crave for affirmation, recognition and connection.”

Mr. Gozon said digital technology “has given consumers more opportunity to control their time, with content made for television now available in at least three screens – television, the Internet and mobile.” Mr. Pangilinan sees SMS or Short Message Service, which millions of Filipinos use every day, being “slowly overtaken by over-the-top messaging on your BBM (Blackberry Messenger, Android’s Google Char and iMessage, amongst others.”

All three see television as evolving in the digital transformation of the media.

* * *

Gabby Lopez refuses to confirm or deny that Megastar Sharon Cuneta is leaving ABS-CBN for TV5.

“I don’t know, maybe we should ask the other channel,” he half-jokingly told reporters on the sidelines of the Advertising Congress.

But my source tells me that Sharon has reviewed the contract offered by TV5 last week.

“It’s a mega deal,” my source said, one of the biggest dangled by the Kapatid network.

The buzz is that Sharon will host a talk show similar to Oprah and Ellen DeGeneres’.

A reality show is also being packaged that will be hosted by Sharon.

This could all happen before the end of the year, my source said.

Interviewed in Europe where she had a concert, Sharon denied she was leaving ABS-CBN, saying she was happy being a Kapamilya.

She said she has “no idea what’s going on back home. I just got word from boss Vic (del Rosario) that he would like to sit down with me when I get home, something important has come up.”

* * *

It’s a boy for Ai Ai delas Alas!

The Comedy Queen revealed on KrisTV that she has adopted a seven-month baby boy, who was christened Seth Andre or Sean.

It’s Ai Ai’s third time to adopt. “My first one was eventually taken from me, the second, Destiny, was a breech baby and died after only a day,” she told her friend Kris Aquino.

She adopted Sean last May. “He was given to me by Ate Fely, who does my hair.” She believes that Sean is the answer to her prayers. “I prayed to the Lord for another adopted child this year because I would be too old to take care of a baby next year.

Ai Ai said her three biological children Sancho, Sean Nicolo and Sofia welcome the arrival of Sean.