Last night, the networks found an unexpected savior in their efforts to keep Netflix at bay: Emmy voters. Despite entering this year’s race with an impressive 31 nominations, the network came up empty during the 66^th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards. As I wrote at Quartz,

Netflix seemed primed for a big night, after last week’s Creative Arts wins seemed to indicate that Orange is the New Black would be lauded. Host Seth Meyers acknowledged Netflix’s expected big night in his opening monologue when he joked, “Not very nice when someone younger comes along, is it, cable?” And Netflix was at the center of one of the evening’s early highlights: a hilarious commercial that ran during the telecast in which Gervais crossed paths with characters from House of Cards and Orange is the New Black. It was supposed to be the first of many memorable Netflix moments on Emmy night. But it turned out to be the only one.

I also touch upon a little-known fact about Emmy voters: sometimes as few as 50 of them make the decisions for each category.

Emmy voters just did something the networks couldn’t—stop Netflix 

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David Letterman officially has a successor. Stephen Colbert will be the next Late Show host, CBS announced yesterday. I reflected on the news, and what this means for late night, at The Daily Beast, where I wrote,

With yesterday’s news that Stephen Colbert will take over the Late Show next year, the long-held notion of what it means to be a late-night host, and what it means to be a late-night audience, has been forever eradicated.

In 1992, your late-night options were Letterman and Leno, period. As of next year, the lineup will consist of Colbert, Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel on the broadcast networks, along with cable hosts like Conan O’Brien (remember him?), Jon Stewart and whomever replaces The Colbert Report. Late night is no longer all-or-nothing; it’s an all-you-can eat buffet. Thanks to the Internet, you can sample as many late-night clips from as many late-night shows as you’d like.

In the piece, I trace late-night’s evolution and transformation over the past two decades, and how Letterman has changed from scrappy innovator to odd man out. As Kimmel, Fallon and Colbert have proven time and again, “Late-night” is now late-night in name only.

Stephen Colbert and the Viral Video-Fueled Generation Hijack Late Night

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