NBC

Conan 2.0

February 10, 2011: 5:00 AM ET

How a late-night Luddite accidentally fought his way back into bedrooms (and computers, smartphones, and tablets) across America.

By Douglas Alden Warshaw, contributor

Conan O'Brien is in his bedroom. It's a little bit past 11 p.m., and he's shyly, hesitantly, nervously attempting to do his first webcast. But he keeps getting interrupted. And it's driving him crazy. "Get out of my room! Get out of my room! This is private!" O'Brien's embarrassed, and he's yelling at the top of his lungs. "Everybody get out!!!"

Okay, that's part of a skit from O'Brien's new late-night show, Conan, on TBS. But, almost exactly a year ago, more than a few people in the media business thought that O'Brien, freshly tossed off The Tonight Show by NBC after only seven months on the job, just might have to sit in his bedroom for a long time, and that performing a show on the web might actually be his only option. That was until more than a million people, most of them ages 18 to 49, started shouting, "We want Coco!" and the reinvention of Conan O'Brien from traditional television performer to multimedia brand began.

O'Brien's audience came to his rescue in a way that was inconceivable until it happened. In fact, it was inconceivable even while it was happening. More

Featured Newsletters

Every morning, discover the companies, deals and trends in tech that are moving markets and making headlines.

Receive Fortune's newsletter on all the deals that matter, from Wall Street to Sand Hill Road. SUBSCRIBE

Covering the digital giants of Silicon Valley and beyond, an in-depth look at enterprise companies, and the startups disrupting them. Written by Michal Lev-Ram and emailed twice weekly.

Anne Fisher answers career-related questions and offers helpful advice for business professionals.

Company Price Change % Change
Bank of America Corp... 7.95 -0.16 -1.97%
Microsoft Corp 31.27 -0.17 -0.54%
Ford Motor Co 12.28 -0.25 -2.00%
General Electric Co 19.39 0.17 0.88%
Citigroup Inc 32.36 -1.00 -3.00%
Data as of Feb 22
Index Last Change % Change
Dow 12,938.67 -27.02 -0.21%
Nasdaq 2,933.17 -15.40 -0.52%
S&P 500 1,357.66 -4.55 -0.33%
Treasuries 2.00 -0.04 -1.96%
Data as of 6:56am ET
Most Popular
AT&T CEO pay docked $2 million for T-Mobile debacle
 
Christie to Buffett: Shut up and pay up
 
The spectrum war's winners and losers
 
PC slump kills HP and Dell's bottom lines
 
Chris Christie to Warren Buffett: Just 'shut up'
 
Market indexes are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer LIBOR Warning: Neither BBA Enterprises Limited, nor the BBA LIBOR Contributor Banks, nor Reuters, can be held liable for any irregularity or inaccuracy of BBA LIBOR. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2012 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Disclaimer The Dow Jones IndexesSM are proprietary to and distributed by Dow Jones & Company, Inc. and have been licensed for use. All content of the Dow Jones IndexesSM © 2012 is proprietary to Dow Jones & Company, Inc. Chicago Mercantile Association. The market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2012. All rights reserved. Most stock quote data provided by BATS.
Powered by WordPress.com VIP.