For some of the last 2 days I was at the Financial Times'
Future of Digital Media conference - it was very interesting, coming as it does approximately six months after "The Crunch" was officially acknowledged in WebWorld. The FT clearly were running with this too, as the conference's overview was:
The early period of experimentation is over.
We can see some of the things that have worked and some that have failed. Digital revenues are becoming a more material revenue line for many media companies - it is the new reality people are dealing with, though a harsh reality for some.
Where does the digital frontier lie in 2009?
What are the threats and opportunities facing the media industry in 2009 and beyond?
What lessons can be learned from the pioneers working at the digital frontier?
Six months is always an interesting timespan, as in the early days the funders of the failures and zombies attempt to keep schtum in the hope that someone else falls off the liferaft first, and purveyors of last years' snake oil hope that they can carry on flogging the last batch to some of teh suckers for all time.
In other words, this was a time to learn not just from what people were saying, but what they were omitting.
In this light, the most informative/revelatory sessions were those below:
Investors: Making Money at the Digital Frontier - This had Lex Fenwick, Chief Executive Officer, Bloomberg Ventures, Doug Richard, Founder, School for Startups and former "Dragon" at BBC's Dragons' Den, and Danny Rimer, Partner, Index Ventures.
This one was chiefly fascinating in that, for nearly every question, there were widely different views from these worthies. Part of this was different experiences - Bloomberg makes money from small, rich, niche audiences whereas most of Rimer's comments were from mass consumer companies' experiences. My conclusion, which was roughly that of the digital media analyst from a private equity company sitting next to me, is that those saddled with zombies and snake-oil bottles were still trying to put their best feet forward. Your takeaway, dear reader - look very carefully at the motives/history of whoever is dispensing advice on business models right now.
The Race To Build The Web's Next Dominant Platforms - this had Blake Chandlee, European Commercial Director, Facebook; Kristof Fahy, Vice President, Strategic Marketing, Yahoo! Europe; Paul Gahir, Partner, Analysys Mason and John Mangerlaars, Vice President, EMEA, Consumer & Online, Microsoft.
This was essentially about Facebook and similar systems. What was not mentioned, and downplayed when eventually questioned, was Twitter and the whole realtime platform emergence. A comment that eally interested me was Paul Mangelaar's note that Microsoft lost out for quite a while because they assumed people would value privacy far more.
Andy Duncan, Chief Executive Officer, Channel 4 had a keynote spot, and basically argued for a bailout of Channel 4 so they could use public money for risky Web TV stuff without ceding control of company or venture fund. I was most impressed when the conference chairman, Richard Waters, (West Coast Managing Editor, Financial Times) called Duncan on this:
- Waters: If one were seeking a public money bailout, one would surely look to reduce ones salary?
- Duncan: I have reduced my salary!
Wry smile.....
What was interesting is that the plea was so blatant, there is a clear whiff of panic in TV media now.
There was a session on Web TV which I covered earlier, and one on eReaders and eBooks which I want to cover in more depth. The other session that I found most illuminating was:
The Bottom Line: The Future of Advertising - Ed Bartlett, Co-Founder, IGA Worldwide;
Chris Cunningham, Founder and CEO, Appssavvy; Adam Jones, Senior Vice President, Network Development, NBC News and Mike Parsons, Managing Director, UK, Tribal DBB talked about wwhere this was all going.
Quick summary - the market wants ROI, click ads give it better today so that is where the value is captured, but everyone now knows that you need "upstream of purchase" Ads like Display to create "big picture" awareness, so lots of work is going on in making it more visible. And, of course, better and better behavioural targeting.
As to Mobile Ads coming alive in 2009 - yes, if its on an iPhone or dealing with ways of funding Mobile Apps, not content. 2009 is still not going to be The Year of Mobile Advertising.
There was a chap from Google up, but he kept schtum on both their
spat with the PRS and today's announcement of Google's approach to
"User Interest Generated" behavioural targeting. I've seen these emerge on Twitter too - say "I like X" and up pops an @you twt saying "if you like X, look at Y". Pop-up being the relevant word.
There was a twitterstream going on #ftmedia,
over here
I will add more later, but tempus fugit. The conference was also covered by
Patrick Smith.
