New York -- The biggest challenge in the live TV production environment is the sheer amount of content producers must create and send out quickly, according to a panel here at B&C/Multichannel’s Business of Live TV Summit Tuesday.

“You’ve got to produce content for third party screens and iPads and phones and Twitter feeds and Facebook and so on,” said Jason Cohen, director of sports production, HBO, to moderator and TV Technology editor-in-chief Tom Butts.  “I think the greatest challenge is it’s no longer just a show. It’s like two or three shows at once.”

Joining Cohen on the panel were Efi Dilmoni, broadcast technology consultant, Orad; Larry Estrin, director, Clear-Com Global Rental Group; John Hamlin, senior VP of music events and talent, CMT; James Stellpflug, VP, sports products, Americas, EVS.

Hamlin added social media is key to jumpstarting live award show programming and the conversation begins much earlier than the show.

“The Twitter sphere and the conversation on Facebook is really starting about four hours before we shoot the live awards show,” said Hamlin. “When the show opens, the first ten or fifteen minutes, I spend an inordinate amount of my budget on the first segment of every awards show, and it’s the lowest rated part of the award show, but it starts the conversation.”

Stellpflug noted live television is mostly the same as it was 10 years ago “in terms of the live event. But the audiences, the people that are getting different things out of the show, the way they interact with that show, how it goes viral, effects the show.”

Estrin pointed out that the immediacy of content in live TV added to the challenges of producing it.

“If you can’t talk to one another, whether you’re sitting next to one another or across the world, you really can’t make it happen in a cohesive manner,” said Estrin. “Tools are being developed today, as we speak, that allow total portability. A producer sitting in the front row here, if they wanted to, could in fact be talking with a handheld system directly to somebody in China, calling some shots in some shows.”

Estrin also spoke on the continuing spectrum crunch he feels with wireless communication.

“I was over at NBC this morning and we were talking about the number of wireless production people on Saturday Night Live,” said Estrin. “I happened to have worked on the first year of Saturday Night Live. I think we had four people. Now we routinely have over a hundred people on a wireless communications device walking around the studio between the two floors that they utilize.”

New York -- Almost three years into a complete overhaul of CBS This Morning, the newscast's content is where it should be, says Chris Licht, CBS News VP and executive producer of the program. Now it's just a matter of getting people to watch. "The biggest challenge is getting what you do in front of people," he said.

Licht, mastermind behind MSNBC's freewheeling Morning Joe before shifting to CBS, was given a clean slate on which to build a new morning show. "We absolutely blew up the whole thing," said Licht, who acknowledged not even knowing CBS had a morning newscast while he was growing up. The guiding principles were honor the legacy of CBS News and forget morning newscasts ever existed while reimagining a show for the modern age. "What would you do? How would you build it? How would you staff it?" he said.

Amidst the program's progress, Licht admits it's not where it should be. "It kills me to be in third," he admitted.

Melissa Grego, B&C editor in chief, interviewed Licht during B&C/Multichannel’s Live TV Summit here Tuesday. He admitted he was nervous about producing election night coverage in November. CBS News is presently rehearsing the coverage. "I think it will look very different than what CBS did in the last election," said Licht. "More people, more energy, more around the studio, more live...just more."

Licht likened himself to a basketball coach, pacing the sidelines, during live coverage. Yet he stressed the importance of a showrunner remaining calm. "Then everyone around you is calm," he said, "and things get on television the right way."

Twitter and the United States Tennis Association will present a social TV case study on their US Open partnership at the Business of Live TV Summit in New York City on Sept. 30.

Mike Park, product & content partnerships for Twitter Amplify, and Nicole Jeter West, senior director, ticketing and digital strategy for the USTA, will explore how the Twitter/USTA collaboration enhanced the fan experience, drove revenue and facilitated the distribution of @USOpen videos and photos.

Park and West join previously announced keynote speakers Andy Cohen, host of Bravo’s Watch What Happens Live, and Don Roy King, director of Saturday Night Live.

The Live TV Summit, presented by Multichannel News and B&C parent company NewBay Media, is a one-day conference that will look at the business of live events, including the best practices, new business models and technology that are driving growth.

For more information, visit: http://livetelevisionsummit.com/