Recently I learned something that should be an eye opener for every ad agency creative, executive, planner, and owner. The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences created an Emmy category for “outstanding original programming for computers, cellphones, and other handheld devices.” We’ve known for awhile now that programming is moving from on-the-clock to on-demand viewing, and that the computer is becoming the new TV, but now it appears that video is about to jump right into our pockets. And the move is being fueled by the fat cats in the mainline media industry who hope to get fatter.
You can read all about it in USA TODAY in Kevin Maney’s column from April 12. In it Maney says, “this might be the most experimental time in media history,” and I have to say I agree with him. It’s as if the industry were crawling out of the primordial media mud, growing legs, and running like crazy in every direction imaginable.
Technology is attacking old institutions like an out-of-control virus. Television is poised to deliver Web content. And the Web is now streaming programming once only possible on radio and TV. The two will be one before we know it. Our phones now have channels dedicated to advertisers. Everything’s becoming mobile and wireless. Information, entertainment, games, movies, news, work, play, advertising—it’s all with us wherever we go.
No one wants to fall behind the curve, so everyone is rushing to try almost anything. As Maney says, “The more aggressive media execs are ready to fling anything and everything at the wall to see what sticks. Since nobody knows what's going to work or how it will all turn out, the executives, artists, entrepreneurs, and everybody else in the media business might as well give anything a shot.” He goes on to point out that shifting content to the Web and cellphones is relatively inexpensive and creates a whole secondary market or distribution system, if you will, for television programming.
The number of people who want their phones to deliver TV programs and video may be small now, but if awards are being given for original content, more and better content will come—and the attraction will grow. The future is rushing at us and demanding we answer the call.
That’s it, from the edge of the world.
Bob
It's my opinion that as soon as most of the baby-boomers die off or become irrelevant as far as marketing dollars are concerned (10-12 years or so), TV will cease to be a viable medium to reach consumers. For a long time markerters have quit seeing television as an entertainment medium and instead only seen it as an income generator. This is evident in the quality of programming now available. In fact, I think 10-15 years from now, only poor people will even have to be subjected to television spots at all, especially as the on-demand subscribers increase in record numbers, PVR sales continue to climb, and bandwidth continues to grow. Funny thing is, I don't think it'll be long before ad agencies are writing and producing sit-com like shows for television broadcast in a desperate attempt to make their traditional agency jobs relevant. Hell, with all the product placement that goes on today, they might as well be...What's funny is, it still won't matter. Their audience (18-34) will still be online and still be ignoring them. User-generated content is king. Wikiality (thanks Steven Colbert) is reality. Too bad advertising still doesn't get it. Oh, and don't be too impressed with someone creating an award for original content being delivered to cell-phones, nobody's watching there either. Today, users pick and choose at will as to what content they'll accept and where. Trying to force someone to watch an ad, just opens up the market for someone else to invent a way(s) that they don't have to. Honestly, it's like most traditional markerters refuse to understand that producing (3) 30second television spots and running the crap out of them (even if is on a cell phone) is entirely outdated. Another funny line I often hear from others in the ad industry is that print will never die. Well, outdoor may never die (here’s a medium that will actually evolve to become interactive even if no one gets that yet). Posters may never die. But the magazine and especially the newspaper industry will go the way of the dinosaur. Just ask the latest teen pubs that have either folded completely or moved entirely online. Or check out the financial statements for the NY Times. Honestly, why would I buy news that’s already a day old…
Posted by: Marc | August 15, 2006 at 04:51 PM