Is Content King Again?
Which is a better business to be in right now: content creation or distribution? The New York Times alluded to this question in a piece about Warner Bros. this weekend. From the article:
For Mr. Bewkes and his team, the core of the strategy is a wager that the media pendulum will swing away from distribution and back toward content. “The last number of years, all you have heard about is new and better ways to distribute content,” says Mr. Meyer, sitting in his office on Warner’s lot in Burbank, Calif. “At some point, I think distribution gets commoditized,” leaving, he says, content as the more valuable component.
The Times is quick to point out that Apple has benefited more from the digital music revolution than the record labels. But is that an exact parallel? Music settled (for now) on a paid model and Apple quickly set the benchmark price. Even though iTunes and Amazon charge for video content, when it comes to short-form vids and TV shows, there is no price differentiator in the market because everything is free.
Plus, super-distribution is already ingrained into web video. Putting a video up on many outlets (YouTube, Veoh, MySpace, etc.) is part and parcel for any distribution strategy — even NBC, Fox and CBS put their content up elsewhere. And for the most part, all of the experiences for the viewer are the same: a small video player, decent playback quality (that’s getting better), the ability to comment and share.
How we watch is all the same. What we choose to watch, however, is a different story.
While there is a flood of video, and new series pop up online all the time, they are not all created equally. Dr. Horrible is much more enjoyable than Carpet Bros. whether I watch them on Hulu or on iTunes.
As we move towards an all-HD-all-the-time world, the picture will always be pretty, so there won’t be a visual difference between distributors, and assuming the ad model holds, price won’t be a factor. As a result, we’ll just go with whomever can get us the content when we want it. However, with so many shows to choose from, we won’t watch something just because it’s on, we’ll want to watch something because it’s good.
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[...] quite a bit is the balancing act between content and distribution. I came across the following via NewTeeVee, from NYTimes: For Mr. Bewkes and his team, the core of the strategy is a wager that the media [...]
HipMojo.com » Content vs. Distribution: Have the Balances Tipped Again? on August 11th, 2008 at 9:50 am - Permalink
[...] Is Content King Again? The pendulum swings quickly when disruptive distribution schemes (RSS, Blogging, etc) get normalized. [...]
080811 Daily Links For Recruiters (August 11, 2008) | johnsumser.com: Recruiting News and Views on August 11th, 2008 at 11:18 am - Permalink
I think content was always king, some people just forgot about the king and focused on distribution.
Content has and will always matter. It can make a platform (VHS and the porn industry) and it establishes leaders (I can find so much stuff on YouTube). Content is exactly what Hulu went after and has made it a success in the eyes of so many.
HBO has always known this and it is no different in the online world. People want great content and you should focus on being the exclusive place to see it.
So to answer your question: Content was always king, people just took their eyes off the king.
David Mullings on August 11th, 2008 at 12:44 pm - Permalink
Content was always King. He just went on a road show. Now we are just seeing a slew of hyper distributors commoditized the distribution, and are creating increasingly smaller slices of the pie for themselves. The content owners/creators of quality content aren’t suffering.
The question still remains, though, does the content even matter for advertisers? Or will targeting technologies ensure that advertisers are reaching the right audiences whether they watch “Cat Pees in Toilet” or the “Lost” season finale. As long as you don’t reach someone on a porn site, why should it matter what you are watching? As long as the length of the content supports the volume of advertising, there shouldn’t be any problems.
Thedigi Talhobo on August 11th, 2008 at 1:00 pm - Permalink
[...] And, I believe the Internet has laid the groundwork for making this theory a practical reality. In NewTeeVee’s analysis of this same NY Times article, they said “How we watch is all the same. What we choose to [...]
If you love something (and/or want to make money from it), set it free. | StraussBlog on August 12th, 2008 at 12:29 pm - Permalink