manufactured scarcity

This is my reply to an email I got this morning from my mate Randy. Just thought I'd share it with you in case any of it makes any sense...

------------------------------------------------------------

Yeah listen - I don't think anyone really knows what's going to happen and I just like to stir up debate.

BUT...

I seriously think the times they are a'changin.

I see a world coming of hundreds of thousands of freely available audio and video shows. Who says any of those shows NEED to get in front of THE MOST eyeballs? After 100 years of mainstream media we have this idea that its a game about GETTING TO THE MOST. But I feel that this is an environment of MANUFACTURED SCARCITY. Kind of like the diamond market.
Who says my podcast needs to be heard by a million people? Why can't it be heard by 50 and still be successful?

Okay so... in a world of BIG BUDGET TV SHOWS, you need to get in front of lots of people to make the economics work. But let me ask you these questions:

• in the next ten years, do you think people at home are going to have LESS technology or MORE technology?
• do you think that technology is going to make it EASIER or HARDER to produce good quality audio and video shows?
  
• do you think we're going to have LESS broadband or MORE broadband to distribute them over?
• do you think we're going to have LESS devices to play them back on or MORE devices?
  

If you answer those questions the same way I do, we're looking at a world where most people are going to have access to the technology to produce and distribute fairly good stuff - at zero cost.

And although lots of it will be so niche that it will have a naturally small audience, some of it will be quite popular. There are a LOT of frustrated creative types working in radio, tv and film at the moment, pissed off about the restrictions they are working under, looking for outside creative outlets. How many of those do you think will be producing stuff in their spare time and putting it on the web? Just for fun or to make a name for themselves? What about all of the creative people who NEVER get a geurnsey on commercial networks because their ideas are too left field for the accountants and lawyers running things? What happens when they are unleashed?

So mate... I don't know how it will all turn out, maybe you're right, maybe the guys with the money and the power will find a way to control the chaos ....

but I don't think so... I think that when the Cambrian Explosion happened, it wasn't the biggest animals that necessarily survived.. it was the most efficient and the most adaptive...

Comments

[Josh Graham]

I have an impression that the youth in Japan apply this to fashionable clothing. Rather than wearing "popular" brand labels, they intentionally go and buy labels that are obscure and with low market penetration. The more obscure and less copies out there, the better.

Of course, the corollory is manufactured density. And funny, that's also used by the same people Randy's talking about (but more for the big piles of shite they pour out when "nothing else interesting" is going on).

Still, Randy highlights points that make me think it's as much about the intention or motivation as the distribution channels. The "success" criteria are most certainly different now (or changing anyway). Broad audience is important if your motivation is something like "change the world".

Audience size could be arrived at by at least these things:
1) It doesn't matter that your topic isn't popular. Something can be wrong even if a million people believe it, and something can be right even if it's only you who believes it
2) The arrogant MSM farty pants are right and you exist in a pathetic mutual admiration society, wasting electrons and photons that could otherwise be better used before our sun burns out
3) Your subject matter is arcane, obtuse or in some otherway "niche", so the great unwashed neither know nor care about your thoughts on it, or even that it exists in the first place.

[Cameron Reilly]

Josh, for Randy's sake, I should clarify that the comments I posted were MINE and not his. This is MY REPLY to an email he sent me which I haven't included.

[tog lub]

Mate Randy & Mr. Cameron ...
whatever happening is happening N_O_W_
(& I ain’t talking new world orleans, nor feminatzees.)

I’ve got a radio station in the middle east beaming up to satTV (on an audio band) PLUS an internet stream. oh, yes! and a web site.

The powers that wanna be, er -the ones that think they are wearing clothes, the same ones that control the greenbacks’ mantra is .... Video is still THE way2go,

I see that Video, tehevision, tehellivision has become scary, very scary.
I see that TV outdated almost immediately.
I know Video is Xpen$ive
I see Video as boring + it’s just one remote control click to another one-eye brainwash.

.... give me a great audio voice (over) & music over any teleVised view anyday.

so! “let me” answer YOUr questions, and then ask YOU 3 questions
¿#1 -in 10 years after .... the same amount of technology will be around - more does not really matter, “actually”
¿#2 -PROductions will be easier to produce
¿#3 -more broadband will become available - in a Difformat, liken this ‘more’ to TeslaTech
¿#4 -cheaper (&moremor&more&more&more&more&more&more) devices (ear plugs! what! a concept!

.... and a great concept for the future look Randy .... about “Who says my podcast needs to be heard by a million people? “ ... I’ll take 500 (listeners) a day & I’m talking globally (as a start-up)

.... ok, now my 3 ?¿’s..

¿ #1 -how muchis the cost to do this? per month? times 12?
¿ #2 -would life be advantagous to give pods AWAY? .... FREE, or almost free PLD's (personal listening devices) (I’d like to give 500 away (see above as a start-up) ... perhaps with some cool laser engraving with web sites, logos, or cheap sticky back decals. HongMart & WalKong rule!! apple.com is NOW selling refurbished click wheels apple ipods for 59$US.
¿ #3 -WHERE IS THE SOURCE for the cheapest podcast receiving devices? (& I’m talkin price breaks)

(as) ya know .... podcasting is soon coming to all, via cell phone BILLING.

so! .... NOW, & I mean SOON (like mid-January2oo6, I want to merge my 2 current techs, live casting (see above) for PODCASTING ....

Help me!!! My cutting edge needs some sharpening!

think GLOBALLY & all nations in ear.

.... ok, get back with me before FutureShock happens
signed,
Tog Lub in aLouahvulle, Cantuckee
(aka: a child of this planet, here&now, world without end

p.s. I try not to use the “they” word.

[Jett Loe]

think you're right in a lot of what you say - the near-zero entry fee of podcasting allows for people to do whatever they want (during the day i'm a mainstream tv director - totally different than the kind of thing i podcast) - and the thing is with only a few hours in the day to 'digest' media the stuff i want now has to be passionate - not just the same old crap...well, passionate AND well made - i've noticed recently that some of the big podcasts like TWIT and Diggnation have had a fall off in quality...there's no SHOWMANSHIP...
p.p.s. - here's an extract from an email my server guys sent me - what do you think this means...?

"THE BIG FREEZE?
We were talking with some other podcast hosting firms recently and we
all noticed a drop in the number of hits and bandwidth used during
the month of November. We're not sure why this is happening, but some
of us are conjecturing that fewer podcasts are being produced - in
other words, once people realize how much work is involved in
publishing a weekly podcast they eventually do it less frequently.
However, we're starting to see a good number of video podcasts coming
along, so it could just be that people are ramping up video
production this month and slowing down the audio podcasts..."

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