Ari Emanuel Speaking about the Future Media Landscape

This is a very interesting conversation with Ari Emanuel, Hollywood super agent at the recent Web 2.0 Summit (whatever that's supposed to mean).  Some of the things that he says about the future of media are similar to points that I have been making.  Of course, the difference is that he actually knows about what he is speaking.   The future is coming quickly and for small players, the window of opportunity is getting smaller as the big players start to actually figure out what is happening.  Agility and the ability to pull together sophisticated media production and marketing quickly by leveraging technology and the incredible wealth of knowledge available to everyone with an internet connection will be as important for indies as it is for Lady Gaga.

Hope everyone is having a great holiday.  Much exciting news coming in the next couple of months.

Think Like a Pirate

It is worth taking a look at this video if you create media.  He doesn't say anything that, if you're really paying attention, you don't know already.  But, he does say it clearly and concisely.  I like at the end how he says off-hand, "people have moved on from Blue-Ray."



The lessons:

The days of tightly controlling your product are, or are nearly, over.   The Blue-Ray "consortium" example is a great one.  High licensing fees and lots of rules have made many people just avoid it until a new means appears (online distribution).

There will always be "Hollywood."  However, it will exist only to make projects that require that type of artistic/financial complexity.  It seems doubtful that all those union jobs that have disappeared are coming back.  Just ask all those people who worked for record labels in the 90's.  Right now it feels like a lull in the storm for film and television.  Once the stranglehold is broken on bandwidth, many of the large media producers also own the cable companies, all bets are off.