“The demise of traditional television is a folklore.”
Monday, October 31st, 2005So says Jason Hirschhorn, senior vice president of digital media for MTV in a News.com article on the internet and the future of television. He added, “Viewers want more interactive TV, but traditional TV won’t die. Still the best way to reach an audience is through the TV.”
While I certainly agree that TV is still the best way to reach a mass audience (for how long?), I don’t share Hirschhorn’s confidence that traditional TV isn’t on its eventual way out. Perhaps it’s a matter of degrees, but — and this article does a fine job of pointing it out — the public’s appetite for a la carte viewing is best not underestimated. The truth is we just don’t know, because the industry has steadfastly refused to let it happen. They’ve got too much to lose, but some content creators are positioning themselves. Marguarite Reardon, who wrote the c/net article seems to agree:
But it’s clear that content providers like Comedy Central are starting to position themselves for a transition in the market. Comedy Central knows that nearly 85 percent of its viewers have broadband access and tend to be early adopters of technology, so it’s not far-fetched to assume that some of these viewers could also experiment with Internet-based television.We will go where ever the viewers are,” Hirschhorn added. “Right now they are in both places—on the Net and on cable and satellite networks. We don’t believe in shutting people off. We aren’t going to react like the music industry, who has been trying to put the genie back in the bottle.”
More people watching video clips online
Monday, October 31st, 2005According to new research from comScore Media Metrix, traffic to television related Websites has jumped now that the new season is underway. Visits to TV-related sites grew by 8 percent to 69.3 million unique visitors–from August’s 64.4 million visitors, according to a report in Media Daily News:
As broadband has become more popular, Web sites have recently started offering more TV-related fare. For instance, Yahoo! this year streamed the debut of the WB series “Supernatural,” while Google offered the first episode of UPN’s “Everybody Hates Chris.” At CBS, the Web site features blogs from shows like “CSI: Miami,” “Survivor: Guatemala,” “How I Met Your Mother,” and “Ghost Whisperer.”
Mainstream versus the bloggers, us versus them
Sunday, October 30th, 2005Bloggers and mainstream journalists need to come to agreement that they are not each other’s enemies and that the gap between them is more related to economics and the insistence of legacy media companies to milk the status quo than it is to whether one is after the other’s job or calling. It’s certainly not personal
This theme — that the bickering and sniping is misdirected and destructive — is being presented in the wake of the Online News Association (ONA) annual conference. Susan Mernit (brilliant light that she is) surveyed the blogosphere at the end of the conference and found little that was helpful:
Susan sez: Maybe it’s because I work with people in the industry, but I think most of the smarter people in online news grasp the sea changes going on–my sense is that the problems are not (just) about the people, but about the profitable, hard to refocus legacy businesses called print media that publishers are loathe to abandon till the money goes straight down the drain.Also, it’s ironic to see some of the condescension now flowing the other way.
This theme was echoed in comments to Rafat Ali’s piece yesterday (referenced below) by John Granatino, Vice President / News and Operation at the Providence Journal:
Tried-and-true methods of publishing are still making excellent money and profits, but audience interest in declining. Thankfully, some entrepreneurially minded individuals are trying new ideas and building new products. Over time, many of their best ideas will prove out in the marketplace and traditional publications will adopt those products and methods. Many of the worst ideas will die, but at least they were tried. The ideas that thrive will bring huge rewards to their creators, as we’ve already seen in the latest round of M&A activity. This is a story as old as business itself.
The constant anthem expressed in this blog is that collapse will come upon the mainstream like a thief in the night and that one day soon, these same high placed executives will wake up and everything will be gone. You may think I’m overstating that (because, after all, they’re still making a lot of money), and that’s fine. I think what’s happening in our culture is far bigger than most people realize and that our economy is a lot weaker than most suspect. I would love to be proven wrong.
I have been guilty of flaming the fires that separate, and I accept any criticism that comes along about that. In real life, I’m much more into bringing people together than in dividing people. The anger and passion expressed here isn’t intended to be personal. But mass media is dying, and I have a lot of friends embedded in the bowels of the ship who deserve a seat on the lifeboats. Every day that goes by in which legacy media companies refuse to invest time, energy and resources into new business models is another day with the lifeboats firmly attached.
So while some mainstream writers take potshots at bloggers (e.g. Forbes), and bloggers bite back with their own brand of condescension, the collision course with the iceberg remains locked into the ship’s steering mechanism.
Perhaps the real enmity is between those with eyes to see this and those without, regardless of their position in the media world. This, I think, is what’s being expressed by Rafat, Jarvis and others when they lament the lack of passion for change in the agendas of conferences such as the ONA.
Where’s the passion?
Saturday, October 29th, 2005Rafat Ali surveys the landscape at the Online News Association’s (ONA) annual conference and finds a few things missing.
Above all, where’s the entrepreneurship? The Web 2.0 thing, while may have been over hyped, at least has something at the core of it: innovation, on the cheap, and available to all. These are people who believe, and believe me, that’s half the battle won. Why is that mentality not coming to journalism, and specifically online journalism? Why isn’t more startup culture being encouraged at media companies? Yes, they’ll start blogs on their site, but beyond that, what? Why aren’t journalists being encouraged to be entrepreneurs, and the other way around? When will we have our version of the young-out-of-school-entrepreneurs amongst us?
Isn’t the passion of creation the most basic of drivers? Where is that?
Unlike you, Rafat, I don’t think they view this as “the most exciting time to be an online journalist, at the most exciting time in the media sphere.” I think they’re scared shitless of anything they can’t command and control and profoundly confused by what they view as chaos.
Forbes and the bloggers
Friday, October 28th, 2005Once again, Florida airports continue to impress me with free WiFi. I’m in Tampa on business (now homebound), and it’s nice to drop an entry in the bucket. Every airport should have free wireless connectivity.
I wanted to make a quick reference to the Forbes’ article that’s getting a lot of attention in the blogosphere today. The thing basically trashes blogs, to which I ask, “What do you expect?” The democratization of media isn’t considered a good thing amongst the business status quo, so these kinds of broadsides shouldn’t surprise anybody.
Meanwhile, Mark Glaser writes a fascinating story about bloggers in India taking on a business school’s ad claims. The school was a huge advertiser in mainstream media, but the bloggers weren’t bound by the potential diversion of ad revenues. The school tried to muscle the bloggers, and eventually wound up with egg on its face.
This is why the story in Forbes shouldn’t surprise anybody.
Changes at CBS News mean more of the same
Thursday, October 27th, 2005I don’t know Sean McManus, but I suspect he’ll do well at the helm of CBS News. The problem is that his pedigree in sports suggests there’s no way he’ll step outside the box of sameness. Consider what I wrote in an April 2004 essay called News as a Sporting Event. In this essay, I made the argument that during my lifetime, news leads had become obsessed with blame, much in the way color commentators quickly find blame during live sporting events. This, I wrote, was a part of perpetrating the Modernist dream that everything in life is cause and effect and to position ourselves as knowledgeable and important. What’s the difference, I asked, between “The Lakers lost, because Kobe didn’t perform up to par” or “Howard Dean lost, because the Internet didn’t perform the way he hoped it would?”
Nowhere is this type of news more prevalent than in the coverage of our political world. An election is a natural sporting event, albeit one that lasts for months or even years. A Presidential election is like the NCAA basketball tournament on steroids. We have an elimination tournament in the form of primaries that culminates in the championship game in November. The sidebar political stories contribute to the overall story. For example, a New York Times piece on the recent 9/11 hearings carried this headline, “Evaluating the 9/11 Hearings’ Winners and Losers.”Most that we classify as news begins with an event. I was taught long ago that the event was the first day lead and that reaction was the second. Attempts at understanding were reserved for later, but today, the “perspective” stories often shove aside the others as news organizations compete for “king of the know-it-all-mountain” status and the coveted marketing niche of “they help me make sense of the news.” Who, what, why, where and when have become the servants of how and how come. Blame is now the first day lead. Technology and speed have enabled this occurrence, but it is our marketing that has provided the mandate to turn curiosity into conclusion in the name of cause and effect.
Andrew Heyward may have totally screwed up the Rathergate business, but he appears to be the only one who actually learned from the event. Rather is busy trying to rescue his mountaintop reputation, while Mary Mapes is about to come out with a book that trashes Heyward in the name of making herself look the victim. Heyward, meanwhile, has used what he must have known were his last days at the helm of CBS News to talk about the inherent problems of traditional, mainstream news. It was remarkable to hear him talk of objectivity and multiple truths a few weeks ago in New York. Frankly, if Les Moonves had any balls, he’d let Heyward explore the new world he envisions instead of bringing in a sports-bred gunslinger to further the misdirection of Modernist news.
Heyward says he’s going to stay involved in the business of media. I think he’ll find more people interested in following him than he might expect.
Pay attention to the motherload
Wednesday, October 26th, 2005The smart folks at Comedy Central are launching a new web destination/broadband video “channel” called the “Comedy Central MotherLoad.” This is big, imo, because it’s an unbundled media project from the get-go. The offerings will be two to eight minute clips, each supported by a 15-30 second commercial up front. Users will be able to bundle their own clips and send them to friends via email.
This is so very, very smart.
Lifestyles of the super rich
Tuesday, October 25th, 2005The people at Trendwatching.com have wonderfully identified the most absurd aspects of avarice assigned to what they call UBER PREMIUM, “status-craving consumers hunting down the next wave in uber-exclusive goods, services and experiences that are truly out of reach for 99.9% of the MASS CLASS.” The statistical trip alone is worth the visit to their newsletter (e.g. “The combined net worth of the absurdly rich rose 16 percent to USD 2.2 trillion in 2004.”).
But the trend watchers also point to something that gives me hope:
Oh, and for those of you who are freaked out (or outraged!) by this display of excessive consumption, find consolation in the following: parallel to UBER PREMIUM, GENERATION C continues to grow. And for members of GENERATION C, status not only comes from what they consume or experience, but also from what they create. So will creativity become an alternative source of status? That could actually make UBER PREMIUM one of the last gasps of the consumer society as we know it in industrialized nations.Or how about the notion of luxury shifting towards something less influenced by the aspiration to consume like those richer than you; and instead find value and satisfaction (hell, even status!) in having more time to oneself, or spending more time with one’s family and friends, or in new forms of spirituality?
Go forth and make media
Tuesday, October 25th, 2005Before the lecture room began to fill up at MTSU yesterday, I talked with a gal in the front row named Danielle. She’s seeking a communications degree and supports herself by working at a local supermarket. I guess this is a fairly typical situation in the halls of higher education.
“What’s your gift,” I asked, “and what do you want to do with this degree?” She told me she wanted to write music reviews for a magazine some day. “What are you waiting for?” I probed. She told me that, well, she had just begun writing for a site called Popularity.com but that she wasn’t getting paid (yet). Good for her. She’s already doing what she’s going to school to learn to do. Think about that for a moment. No, think about it for several moments.
I encouraged her to create a music review blog and begin publishing her work immediately. I told her how to find other music review bloggers and gave her some thoughts on finding her “tribe.” Danielle will do fine, I predict.
This was a precursor to my entire message to those 300 students, and many came up afterwards to thank me. In a world where the playing field is level and anybody can “publish,” why are we waiting for some existing publisher to come along and validate what we know intuitively we can do? “Go forth and make media,” was my closing statement. “Blossom where you’re planted. DO, don’t wait.”
One student said his interests were cars and music. We walked through possibilities of creating “cars and music” media.
What are your interests?
Two different people asked me if they could start their own record label. Hell, yes. Go find a geek in the computer classes to help you with the technology and go make records, er, mp3s. Downloading is the new distribution method.
One young man has become THE go-to guy for a high school sports team. He runs a website and is seeking advertisers. He’s doing the hyperlocal thing. Good for him. He’ll do well.
The institution of higher learning needs to take a step back and reflect on what’s going on around them. The “one potato, two potato, three potato, four” formula of go to school, get a job, work hard, climb the ladder and be happy is coming apart at the seams, and nowhere is it truer than in the schools of “mass communications” (what mass?). I’m fully aware that this is not a popular message, but if education wants a seat at the future table, it had better be prepared to rise above defending the status quo or it’ll never see what’s coming.
Blog-bashing reaches a new level of absurdity
Monday, October 24th, 2005Ad Age has done some extraordinary twisting and turning to come to the conclusion that blogs are bad for American business. If this weren’t so sad, I’d be amused. The article, What blogs cost American business, is so slanted that it’s vertical.
About 35 million workers — one in four people in the labor force — visit blogs and on average spend 3.5 hours, or 9%, of the work week engaged with them, according to Advertising Age’s analysis. Time spent in the office on non-work blogs this year will take up the equivalent of 2.3 million jobs.…While blogs are becoming an accepted part of the media sphere…they are proving to be competition for traditional media messages and are sapping employees’ time.
We’ve known for years that seven of every ten people who visit news websites do so at work. The 8am-5pm spike has nothing to do with blogs, so the pointing of a crooked finger here is, at best, misleading. To grab statistics from various databases and extrapolate those to actually — and one presumes with a straight face — suggest blogging is somehow negatively impacting the labor force is an insult to even novice statistical analysts.
Look, folks, the extent to which people are seeking out information to help their lives and the ease with which technology is making that happen is the only story here. That people are using the Internet at work is nothing new. Maybe workers are doing it more than they used to, but that’s not the point of this report. RSS is likely a factor in online news reading, but bloggers’ use of RSS is coincidental, not a sign of some effort to undermine the office.
But let’s give Ad Age the benefit of the doubt and agree with their conclusion that people are reading blogs at work at the expense of doing their jobs. Why is that the fault of the blogs and blogging? Is it the blog that’s “sapping employee’s time” or is that the responsibility of the employee?
Absurd.
The challenge for students
Sunday, October 23rd, 2005I’m speaking to 300+ students at Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU) tomorrow morning, so I’ve been thinking about advice. I’m going to talk about unbundled media, but the last slide is titled, “What does all this mean to me?” After all, these are students who are in the catch-all “Communications” school. They deserve to know the truth.
When all is said and done, I believe the most important quote of the 21st century (so far) is from Michael Powell, former FCC Chairman. “Application separation,” he said, “is the most important paradigm shift in the history of communications, and it will change things forever.” Bigger than the invention of the printing press. Bigger than radio or television or the internet itself. This is an enormous challenge for all of us, but especially for those in school.
Think about it. We no longer need the infrastructure of any communications form to BE that communications form. We can ride existing infrastructure. Terry’s Daily News has the same rights, privileges, opportunities and responsibilities as the New York Daily News, because we both ride the same infrastructure. This is the fuel of the unbundled, personal media revolution.
People go to college to get a job these days, whereas they used to go to get a degree. That’s especially problematic for those in a communications program, because this is a time of incredible volatility in the media, public relations and marketing worlds. A career path that made sense five years ago may not make sense today. Everything is changing, thanks to Powell’s “application separation,” and I think it is both good news and bad news for students.
The downside is obvious. You can’t count on anything anymore. You may be the best looking, smartest, most articulate potential news anchor in your class, but there’s no assurance whatsoever that we’ll need anchors down-the-road. The mass market is dying and along with it, all those “how-to” rules that we used to take for granted. What we used to think were immutable core values of journalism are even under attack.
But the upside is that we’ve entered a new age of creativity and opportunity, one that has never before existed. How often does a generation get to invent its own communications paradigms? How can you not be excited by that?
So the challenge to communications students everywhere is how far are you willing to go to get involved in this reinvention? Will you participate or sit back and wait for others to write the book?
Benign!
Friday, October 21st, 2005
Well, the doctor finally called and everything — as suspected — is fine. Just a big, old fibroid tumor. Since my nipple has been (thankfully) in the prayers of many people, I thought a photo of the smiling fellow was in order. Very sore and bruised, but he’s a smiling little guy, eh?
I don’t have all the bills yet, but it looks like we’ll make it, thanks to the kindness of everybody who’s dropped cash into the tip jar. Your generosity — and your thoughtful comments — have helped me and my family more than you’ll ever know, and I thank God for each and every one of you.
Back to taking it easy.
My left nipple is smiling
Thursday, October 20th, 2005I’m still pretty doped and sore, but everything went well. I’ll get the biopsy results tomorrow and pass that along as well. They used a bonding that works like superglue. No bandage. Hence, I have a new “smile.” 
I continue to be humbled and overwhelmed by the love expressed through the tip jar. Thank you so much.
Back to bed.
How I know God loves me
Wednesday, October 19th, 2005I wrote this many years ago and have tweaked it a couple of times. I’ve always had misgivings about publishing it, because it contains some of my personal secrets. But somehow it seems appropriate today. This is my gift to you.
Facing surgery with friends
Wednesday, October 19th, 2005This is another deeply personal post, and I don’t really know where to begin. I have experienced an outpouring of love so profound that it cannot be fairly articulated. When I posted on Sunday that I was facing surgery to remove a tumor, and that I didn’t have health insurance, I did so because I thought my knowledge of health care in such a predicament might benefit others.
Jeff Jarvis urged me to put a tip jar on my site, and what followed was truly astonishing to me. Like the closing scenes of It’s a Wonderful Life, friends I both knew and didn’t know came to my rescue, and my understanding of love reached a new level. While I don’t have all the money yet, I’m we’re close. Four days ago, I was in an untenable situation; today, I’m free. This is the miracle of love.
I’ve always found it easier to give than receive, so this is quite overwhelming to me. How does one repay such a gift? I think the reality is that you don’t; you just repeat the kindness when you can.
One of the commenters to that original post, Britt Blaser, wrote:
How do all of us use this spontaneous outpouring of love and support to create an overwhelming mesh of interlocking pledges to reinforce each other in trials like these?Our health care system has been hijacked by lawyers and accountants while the Doctors were overwhelmed with their urge to be helpful (I’m married to an M.D.).Please, Terry, get well quick. Then lead us out of this wilderness. No pressure though…..
One thing I’ve learned about the concept of tribes since I began studying a postmodern culture is that we all have our own tribes, consisting of those we choose to invite in. I know my own tribes, but one never really knows the tribes to which one belongs, because they are choices of others, not our own. The experience this week leads me to believe that I’m a part of many more tribes than I’ve ever expected, and that is a very humbling proposition.
I’ve learned that facing surgery without insurance is nothing compared to facing surgery with friends.
Exploring the end of an era
Wednesday, October 19th, 2005Many of us were pleasantly stunned last month in New York when CBS News president Andrew Heyward told a group of observers and mainstream media execs that network television news needed to be reinvented. He spoke of tired formulas, getting off the pedestal of omniscience and rejecting the notion of objectivity.
Heyward continued the discussion with Jay Rosen, which has led to a must-read PressThink column wherein Heyward himself expands upon the ideas. I think this is a watershed moment in the evolution of professional journalism, and I encourage you to take the time to read it (and not just because I’m in it). Here’s Heyward:
We have to abandon any claim to omniscience. Walter Cronkite used to end his broadcast with “That’s the way it is.” Dan Rather pulled that back, appropriately, to “That’s part of our world tonight.” The digital journalist, if he or she were being honest, would say something like “That’s some of what we did our best to find out today.”…We have to figure out a way to incorporate point of view, even while protecting the notion of fair-minded journalism dedicated to accurate reporting without fear or favor.
…We have to break down the tired formulas of television news and find a more authentic way of writing, speaking, and interacting with the people and subjects we report on.
It’s almost here
Tuesday, October 18th, 2005Anybody know what it is?
Killing the goose, chapter 3,672
Tuesday, October 18th, 2005In an excellent MediaDailyNews commentary, In Pod We Trust, John O’Connor wonders if there’s “an advertising threshold at which people will just stop watching television.” He says no, but…
…technology is providing consumers the simple methodology to stop watching advertising. As marketers move their dollars to other, more effective alternatives, their TV budgets will decay, demand will fall, and fewer commercials will air. At that point the networks’ golden goose will become just another animal in the barnyard.
I’ve written in the past that convenience or dislike of commercials aren’t the major reasons people skip the ads with their TiVos. It’s all about time. We’re working longer hours and spending less time for ourselves these days. Who has time for commercials?
Outing Wie is a bigger deal than you think
Tuesday, October 18th, 2005I was pretty pissed when Michelle Wie was disqualified during her professional golfing debut Sunday, but I was infuriated that it was the result of a tattletale reporter for Sports Illustrated. Like most golf fans, I think she brings something new to the game, and I want her to succeed. But my anger over the disqualification has nothing to do with that.
In a nutshell, SI reporter (and former pro caddie) Michael Bamberger watched as Ms. Wie took a penalty drop on the 7th hole Saturday. He thought she’d accidentally taken an improper drop, which placed her ball inches ahead of where it should have been dropped. Golf has sacrosanct rules, and Bamberger (and in truth, a lot of fans) views himself as a keeper of the rules. So he went to an LPGA official Sunday afternoon and snitched. The LPGA had no choice but to question Ms. Wie and her caddie, and absent proof of innocence, pronounce her guilty.
Yesterday, thegolfchannel.com carried a puff piece about Bamberger written by a friend of his (Brian Hewitt) that offered the opportunity for interaction. Here’s what I wrote:
To everything’s a season, and the season to out Michelle Wie was Saturday, not Sunday. His waiting raises far too many unsettling questions that cannot be satisfactorily answered by a bothered conscience or a sense of propriety. Sports Illustrated is a business with fundamental motives beyond those of helping golfers see the error of their ways, and I don’t, I can’t trust their justification for this. Michelle made news on Sunday, but so did Sports Illustrated.
“If lives are at risk, and the journalist is the only one who can intervene, that’s different from citing a rules violation by an athlete,” Steele said. “We should report that as part of our journalism. We should not be the whistle-blower who is going to the authorities.”
Want to know why the press has lost the trust of the people? Add this sad event to the list.
Fighting “The Tower”
Monday, October 17th, 2005The Consumer’s Union has released a downloadable music video as part of a petition drive to stop big corporations from gobbling up media properties and producing “The Tower.” I like the third verse:
I dreamed that I was surfing from one website to another
Following my bliss with all my sisters and my brothers
There were gardens full of flowers and the grass was warm and green
‘Til a monolithic shadow cast a chill across the scene
“We must restrict your access in the name of liberty,”
But then a billion bloggers made it crash into the sea
Keeping the Web free is our major challenge, and we must be ever diligent in that task.