#timwu

In my view there are two big ways in which the rise of NBC and CBS mirrors the rise of today’s giants in Google and Facebook: the first is how the companies changed the game when it came to advertising, and the second is how they sought/seek to control the time and space of their audience.

The same way NBC and CBS were able to “thread the needle” and successfully combine entertainment and advertising together, Google combined its search engine with advertising and Facebook combined its social network with advertising. For all three cases, the thing being combined with advertising – an age old industry on its own as the book has gone over i.e. since the days of selling Snake Oil – was relatively new in society: for NBC and CBS that thing was entertainment through radio and subsequently through television broadcasts, for Google it was an effective search engine, and for Facebook it was a popular social network.

In the words of author Tim Wu, all companies involved are “clearly and irresistibly in the business of selling the attention of enormous audiences to those who could pay for and use it” (P.92). Or, as Wu puts it more shortly, the companies are in the business of “selling eyeballs.”

The second way the rise of the four companies is similar is the way they have focused on controlling the time and space of their audience. With radio and shows such as Amos ‘n’ Andy NBC and CBS were for the first time able to enter the comfort and privacy of the American household. With television and shows such as Texaco Star Theater every week at 8 p.m., the two companies were able to create entire time slots in the day – i.e. the creation of Prime Time at night, or the creation of soap operas during the day – when the majority of the American population would tune into their content.

Google and Facebook have taken this even further, to the point where essentially nowhere is off limits for them to have access to you the audience. Whether it’s checking Facebook while still lying in bed in the morning, reading your emails on Gmail on the morning commute, Googling something with your friends at lunch, checking Instagram late at night while you study (be it in the library or in your room or wherever), the two companies effectively own the entire day and the audience’s entire world when it comes to viewing their content.

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/10/tim-wu/504623/

Is advertising ruining everything, asks Columbia University Professor Tim Wu. In an edited transcript of an interview conducted by Derek Thompson of the Atlantic, Tim Wu presents his thoughts on the history of advertising.  Referring to his new book The Attention Merchants, Tim Wu compares the advertising industry to a classic industrial activity. Whereas classically the harvesting of crops was once the top economic industrial activity of the United States, Wu claims Facebook and Google are the modern day equivalent of that agricultural industry.  “In this new industry the fields are media and entertainment, the harvesters are advertisers, and the crop is attention.”

As the infographic shows, advertising has long been in existence.  Advertising has gone through many transformations and the article boils it down to a very unique comparison.  If peanut butter and jelly are two unlikely combinations, Tim Wu compares modern day advertising to religious evangelism.  What an unlikely pair, but according to Tim Wu, both advertising and religious evangelism do the same thing, they tell us what to do.  Not necessarily a revelation, but it is true. Both advertising and religious evangelism have been directly guiding or misguiding our behavior.  One tells us to buy, the other might tell us to condemn, both tell us to give money, and we come back and give praise.  

The main point that Tim Wu is trying to drive at is that at one point, advertising was not an all encompassing and intrusive aspect to our daily life.  Advertising was relegated to specific areas, like in newspaper as print ads.  However, this no longer applies.  Advertising has taken up real state everywhere, phones, television, billboards, and radio.  More importantly advertising is directed specifically to get our attention and driving us towards a thing, a product, a service, etc.  As evil as advertising is made out to be, Tim Wu also mentions that advertising was necessary to make information available to everyone.  The idea of selling ad space is what made newspapers affordable for all, meaning easy and wide access to information and establishing the public as the audience.  Wu mentions that the challenge of first, gaining an audience and secondly, keeping the audience is where advertising faces and ethical challenge.  Advertising relies on attention, where does it draw the line on sensationalism and fabrication?  We’re seeing it now. Advertising is pushing the boundaries on content, imagery, and presentation.  

-Krokodil PSA-

Content, imagery, and presentation, these elements of advertising will change and are relatively easy to deal with, but intrusion is the main problem.  Tim Wu mentions that there has been a visible revolt against advertising.  More and more viewers are turning to subscription based television like Netflix, where there’s no advertising.  He also cites the decline in the Superbowl viewership rating as a sign that many people, especially younger people are running away from advertising.  However, this same demographic are running directly towards advertising via phones and other mobile devices.  Social media platforms such as Facebook and Google are the most prevalent ad based companies, and probably the two most heavily used media platforms.  According to Tim Wu, unfortunately the aspects our daily lives that have still remained relatively untouched by advertising will be the prime real estate for advertisers.  He mentions Youtube as an example.  Youtube was popular long before it allowed advertising, but now think of  how many thirty second ads do you have to see in a span of one hour viewing content?  If advertising is going to continue to be seen as an unwanted intrusion, there’s a potential for the ad-sponsored business model to continue to decline and eventually fail.  

-Netflix Subscription Ad-

The notion that ad-sponsored businesses will fail due to the increasing trend of the audience running way from heavy advertising content can only be considered a hypothesis.  However, if this trend proves itself to be true think how many businesses that rely on advertising will disappear.  Print based media has already taken a hit, it’s only inevitable that digital media will also suffer.  Tim Wu is also quick to point out that subscription services like Netflix might provide a solution.  Since more than enough people are willing to pay a premium in order to watch ad-free television, the same concept might be applied to other forms of media.  Have people pay a premium for ad-free content, such as an ad-free digital subscription to a newspaper.  However, Tim Wu mentions that if this should happen, it should happen sooner rather than later, before Facebook does it for them.  Why Facebook?  Think of what users share on Facebook.  Facebook essentially runs on user generated content and the news that people will share will be the ones that are considered relevant to them and their social network.  Tim Wu boils it down to the notion that ad-sponsored businesses allows everyone to have access to information, media, etc.  If people are really sick and tired of advertising, clickbait, etc, then they should pay a premium.  Free and good don’t necessarily go hand in hand. So if you really think advertising is ruining everything then pay up.