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The observation that big business will be most interested in serving big numbers of mainstream customers with cookie-cutter blockbusters sounds trivially obviou
by mcv 4y ago
The observation that big business will be most interested in serving big numbers of mainstream customers with cookie-cutter blockbusters sounds trivially obvious to me.
The issue with the Web isn't that it makes big business more interested in serving niche interests, it's that it's somewhat easier for niche publishers to compete with them. And sometimes even on big business infrastructure! Writers self-publishing their e-books on Amazon, bands and other small content-creators reaching fans on YouTube. There's lots of that, and it's great, but it's never going to sell as big as the mainstream, because if it did, it would be the mainstream. Didn't Justin Bieber start out on YouTube too?
- tgflynn 4y agoYes, there seems to be a bait and switch going on in this article. You can't conclude that the "long tail" is dying because big business isn't investing in it. The real questions we should be asking are is the content being produced and are those who produce it able to make a living. It's harder to be sure about the second question but from what I've seen the answer to the first question is definitely yes. I have yet to find an interest so obscure that you can't find multiple high quality YouTube channels covering it. Want to listen to a recitation of the Iliad in Homeric Greek ? It's there. Want to watch a 2 hour video on configuring emacs ? You're covered.