Commentary

Media Is Dead! Content Is Dethroned! Passion Rules!

The recent "Night of the Media Heavyweights" event in New York City was notable for one dramatic shift: the "heavyweights" - supposedly representing individual media including TV, radio, newspaper, and magazines - couldn't say enough to promote their Web and interactive properties. But as they strayed from defending the "medium" they were invited to represent, it appears to me an admission that the idea of a company building a business on a single medium is dead.

So if they are not in the newspaper or magazine publishing business, or the broadcast business, what business are they in?

Well, it's been said often that "content is king." But Mike Shaw, president of ABC Networks Sales & Marketing, seemed to belie this old saw.

He waxed eloquent about the quality of talent and creativity of today's network programming creating a "Golden Age of television." But he quickly abandoned television programming to pitch the "Lost Experience," an Internet-only extension of the program "Lost," which will bridge the summer rerun season, keeping fans involved with the plot and characters until the fall season brings new primetime episodes. He seemed to admit that great content alone isn't sufficient.

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At the risk of stating the obvious - or perhaps of going "back to the future" - these companies are really in the business of building an audience.

What has changed is that technology has changed what an audience expects of its media and content. The interactivity of the Internet version 1.0 has taught viewers that content isn't limited to a page or 30 minutes, but should continue as long as they are interested. The social characteristics of Web 2.0 have taught them that they should have control to direct the experience for themselves and engage with other like-minded individuals to discuss and debate it further.

This all comes together in what was perhaps the most common word heard all night (well, second to Internet): "engagement." Cable TV engages with its audience around food, home remodeling, history and other topics. Magazines engage their readers around family issues, news, health, beauty, hobbies, etc. Newspapers engage their readers around connections to their local community. Network TV engages viewers with the cliffhanging drama or compelling characters in shows.

At the heart of engagement is passion. The passion consumers feel about a particular topic, hobby, art form, celebrity, etc. These "passion groups," as MediaVest calls them, gather around myriad topics.

So the value creation strategies for future "media" companies won't be about how to put ink more efficiently on dead trees, or "owning" a geographic market through a government license. They will be about finding and activating the passions in a group of individuals, then giving them multiple ways to indulge that passion to the hilt. In giving consumers more of what they want, the media companies get more of what they want: a share of consumers' time and attention that they can monetize with marketers.

Passion rules. Content must do its bidding. And media must bend to the will of the cruelest master of all: the consumer!

Jim Nail is chief strategy and marketing officer for Cymfony (www.cymfony.com), a company that organizes and interprets consumer-generated and mainstream media content.

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