December
4Content Loses its Crown
The favorite slogan of the booming ‘90s, “Content is king,” has undergone a slight change. The new version: Content is crap.
For affirmation, drop by Michael’s restaurant on Manhattan’s 55th street. There, the kings of content assemble at lunchtime to munch on their Cobb salads. The room is still crowded (OK, not quite as crowded as it used to be) but no one’s talking deals for books, movies, network shows or new websites.
The talk instead is about cutbacks and layoffs. It seems the kings of content suddenly can’t figure out how to monetize their products any more.
You can feel the culture shock in the room. Every course brings word of a new round of layoffs. Viacom shed 850 people between my bloody Mary and my shrimp cocktail. I see Jeff Bewkes across the room -- will Time Warner erase another 800 by dessert?
“Why are we in this downward spiral?” I asked one content king at a nearby table.
“You won’t quote me, will you?” he replied. I assured him I wouldn’t.
“Then I’ll tell you the truth. I have no fucking idea.”
Bolstered by that wisdom, I surveyed the room again. This was not Detroit. No one in the room was manufacturing lousy automobiles. To the contrary, the chief of a specialty film company was lunching nearby and, according to the box office charts, he was having an excellent year. People were waiting in line for his movies.
Of course, he, too, was making cutbacks.
My old friend Liz Smith was seated at her usual table at Michael’s, and she always brings a perspective to these passing phenomena. “It’s a question of mass psychology,” she offered. “It turned out that the entire economy seemed to be resting on people’s mood swings.”
So the big question is, will content make a comeback? I couldn’t tell from the mood at Michael’s. At the next table, however, I noticed that the lunch check was discreetly being shoved from one party to the next. No one wanted to be stuck with the tab.
It was still sitting there by the time everyone departed. That did not speak well for the future of the content business.
For affirmation, drop by Michael’s restaurant on Manhattan’s 55th street. There, the kings of content assemble at lunchtime to munch on their Cobb salads. The room is still crowded (OK, not quite as crowded as it used to be) but no one’s talking deals for books, movies, network shows or new websites.
The talk instead is about cutbacks and layoffs. It seems the kings of content suddenly can’t figure out how to monetize their products any more.
You can feel the culture shock in the room. Every course brings word of a new round of layoffs. Viacom shed 850 people between my bloody Mary and my shrimp cocktail. I see Jeff Bewkes across the room -- will Time Warner erase another 800 by dessert?
“Why are we in this downward spiral?” I asked one content king at a nearby table.
“You won’t quote me, will you?” he replied. I assured him I wouldn’t.
“Then I’ll tell you the truth. I have no fucking idea.”
Bolstered by that wisdom, I surveyed the room again. This was not Detroit. No one in the room was manufacturing lousy automobiles. To the contrary, the chief of a specialty film company was lunching nearby and, according to the box office charts, he was having an excellent year. People were waiting in line for his movies.
Of course, he, too, was making cutbacks.
My old friend Liz Smith was seated at her usual table at Michael’s, and she always brings a perspective to these passing phenomena. “It’s a question of mass psychology,” she offered. “It turned out that the entire economy seemed to be resting on people’s mood swings.”
So the big question is, will content make a comeback? I couldn’t tell from the mood at Michael’s. At the next table, however, I noticed that the lunch check was discreetly being shoved from one party to the next. No one wanted to be stuck with the tab.
It was still sitting there by the time everyone departed. That did not speak well for the future of the content business.
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I agree with Tim.
Posted by: bob | 12/5/2008 12:16:23 PM
Talk about a warped elite viewpoint.
Leave it to moguls to blame the content for the bad decisions they have made.
To paraphrase Shakespeare, The fault lives not in our Content but in Ourselves.
We don't have to fool ourselves do we?
Posted by: ReelBusy | 12/5/2008 12:06:31 PM
It was always crap, there was no content, only hype and finally people are calling their bluff. They never had a clue to begin with, only a way to exploit the ignorance of others for profit.
Posted by: Tim | 12/5/2008 11:23:12 AM
Hollywood was doing fine in 1929,1930. By 1932 it was in trouble -- long recession will affect everybody.
Posted by: Mkaven | 12/4/2008 11:38:30 PM