Commentary

Dietary Guidelines And The Butterfly Effect

I'm always on the lookout for a great headline. Yesterday I ran into one describing, succinctly, the conclusion from the latest work of the US Department of Agriculture. It read, "Dietary Guidelines Call For Eating Less."

I'm glad they got to the bottom of that.

On a more media-relevant note, last week I had lunch with a colleague, George Shababb of Kantar Media, for whom I have the highest level of professional respect. Before the iced teas were even delivered, he mentioned that we were going to have a bit of a debate over something I wrote, right here on the TV Board.

He didn't want to defend "Skins" or minimize the importance of business models. It was worse. He questioned what I thought was an unquestionable premise -- that content was, is, and will remain The King.

And, to make matters worse, he referenced the Butterfly Effect. This metaphor, which is based on chaos theory, says that a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil (for example) might cause a tornado in Texas (for example). Or that a small change at one place in a complex system can have a large affect somewhere else.

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We both agreed that media qualifies as a complex system, and further agreed that today it ought to be characterized as MediaTech, so then does the effect of the "tech," the platforms and the devices alter the pre-eminence of the content itself to viewers? Does the device -- the best, or sometimes the most available, screen -- significantly influence what I want to see? Has content slipped from king to senior partner? Or equal partner?

We had a pleasant discussion and I remained steadfast that I will watch the Super Bowl on anything, vs. a Polar Bear documentary in 3D, but the point was well made. The impact of the technology, he pointed out, is beyond wider distribution of the content ("TV Everywhere"). In some cases it will cause you to alter your viewing habits.

What do you think?

As a final point this week, as Tunisia begets Egypt which begets Jordan... consider the role of all media in these events. The power of the visual image, the speed of social networks. The impact of a butterfly's tweet?

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