New Media Eats Old Media
For a long time, in Hollywood, anyway, we've watched the growth of online video with nervous over-confidence. It's just cats playing piano, we've told ourselves. It's just kids doing skits. It's just silly, el cheapo entertainment.
Nothing to worry about.
Now, though, it's time to worry. From GigaOm.com:
Thought online video would never match the audience numbers of traditional TV? Think again: The top five channels onYouTube get the same number of average daily viewers as the top five U.S. cable channels, I was told by a YouTube spokesperson this week.
That revelation comes at the same time as a whole bunch of new data from traffic management company Sandvine that shows how YouTube is continuing to be a major contributor to bandwidth usage in North America. Sandvine’s Global Internet Phenomena report shows that YouTube is especially making a big dent in mobile, where it is now responsible for 20 percent of all downstream traffic during peak times.
The free-market conservative in me loves this. Disruptive innovation fuels growth, economic expansion, and busts up complacent oligopolies, like television networks and studios.
On the other hand, I'm paid by those oligopolies, so this news has a bittersweet taste to it.
There's nothing I can do, of course, except watch the new media hordes storm the gates. And there's nothing you can do, either, except this: take pity on me and
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Comments:
Aug '10
Re: New Media Eats Old Media
Sounds like cume, I'd bet for AQH it's a lot lower.
Jan '11
Re: New Media Eats Old Media
Rob Long: [T]ake pity on me and…
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Rob, I'd really hate to see you reduced to distilling your own vodka for your martinis in your bathtub or something, but I purchased a one-year membership and it doesn't expire until the end of January.
You might want to stock up on some potatoes.
Edited on November 3, 2011 at 8:13amJul '10
Re: New Media Eats Old Media
Buck up, Rob. They'll still need someone to write content, even if it's produced for a handheld device.
May '11
Re: New Media Eats Old Media
Rob,
Leaving aside his political and/or religious assertions, what do you think of Glenn Beck's move to an Internet only format for his TV show? It seems like a gutsy move. Do you think it is still too soon to eschew conventional broadcast media? Will it work?
I know that the message/entertainment value of a presentation has everything to do with its success. What king of message or program (other than cats playing a piano) will do well on the Internet?
May '10
Re: New Media Eats Old Media
Except that the "New" media is just a delivery platform for the old. Of the top 15 YouTube "channels," six are controlled by VEVO, a joint operation between Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group, and Abu Dhabi Media with EMI. Another of the Top Five is Universal Music Group, 100% owned by French media conglomerate Vivendi SA. Two others are CBS and Atlantic Records.
The rabble are not exactly storming the media gates here.
And with the preponderance of music videos in the top sites, I doubt many of the numbers are unique hits. Music videos can be watched dozens of times by individuals before they get tired of them.
Dec '10
Re: New Media Eats Old Media
Things will swing back once cable companies go a la carte instead of this ridiculous package nonsense we have now. I love "old media's" content, I just think its dumb that its only available to me at certain times and that I have to pay for all this extra drivel I don't want to get access to it.
May '10
Re: New Media Eats Old Media
This will never, ever, ever happen. Why? Because that means the market would destroy minority directed channels. The gay channel, Logo, would disappear in an instant. BET and OWN would totter within a year. They have to be propped up by the ESPNs and the FNCs of the world.
Edited on November 3, 2011 at 4:21pmDec '10
Re: New Media Eats Old Media
But they won't have any way to pay the person who writes the content.
At the start of the 20th century, two new technologies transformed entertainment: movies and radio. Because movies were an extension of theater, the public was willing to go to the movie theater and pay admission. Because radio was commercialized by cigar stand owners who viewed it as an advertising medium, they created the model by which radio entertainment was funded by advertisers and delivered "free" to the audience.
The public now believes that only certain forms of entertainment should be offered on a pay-per-view basis: first-run movies and live events. Everything else, they believe, should come "free" - ideally, paid for by advertisers, and suboptimally via subscription (like Netflix or premium cable channels).
Radio and television used to be able to charge large sums for gross impressions. New media has the benefit/detriment of being measurable to the individual viewer and even trackable by results. Fewer wasted ad dollars means less money for content creation.
Dec '10
Re: New Media Eats Old Media
I find Glenn Beck's idea attractive, for it's on-demand nature. Pick something that interests you and watch it whenever you wish to. However, there are real problems in the implementation. They utilize two, different, video playback formats. Most of the content utilizes a horrible, balky, buffery format. A small amount is accessible through a player that, like YouTube, allows slower connections to "preload" a program, then play it back smoothly once it gets a head start.
Powerline also uses the better playback format, which is why I use them to watch episodes of Uncommon Knowledge.