I hear what the author is trying to say, and I might be missing the point, but it seems counter to what I've seen. In agreement that it's important though. Blockbuster movies by definition aren't the long tail.
There are tons of examples of it:
- music, as the author points out. Kpop popularity in the west is probably a big example, but also artists getting famous on SoundCloud.
- video games are another place where there are a ton of indie studios doing their thing. The other day there was a post about Zachtronics.
- Books, we've seen several self publishing success stories on Kindle and others. Amazon claims more and more people are making over $50K on KDP.
- products, we see tons of success on Kickstarter and similar places. Pebble or Remarkable are two examples that come to mind.
My take, maybe counter to the author, is that the long tail is there but it's huge, but any individual thing - product, game, etc - seems small, unless it's a hit in which case it's not the tail anymore.
The last one or two decades really solved a lot of distribution problems of the long tail. You can not make a decent living playing live medieval tavern music on Twitch (and supplement with income from Spotify). Or make a living drawing fanart with DeviantArt and Patreon, publish your indie game on Steam and consoles with relative ease, get books printed in runs of 100 copies, instead of tens of thousands.
The thing the author misses is that they are looking at what big companies are doing. But big companies aren't well suited for serving the long tail, because there are fewer economies of scale in doing that. The vast majority of supply in the long tail comes from individuals or small companies, often people who start it as a hobby and notice there's enough money to do it full time.
And the economics work out, because the more underserved a niche the higher the prices that are acceptable. A teddy bear at the corner shop is $10, but plushies in fandoms where little official merchandise exists go for ten to fifty times that.
I agree and see the long tail primarily as a "phase shift" from firms back to individuals.
Niche works used to be indulged by media corporations as gambles. They would let the whole thing be fully produced right from the beginning, though often compromising authorial vision in the process or pulling the plug early. Then audiences would gamble with cash to view the work. Occasionally one broke through and you had a surprise blockbuster.
Now much more is in the hands of the actual creator, and more stuff is "view for free" and payment is more often driven by secondary merchandising, creating community space or other elements that are ancillary to the work. The average production quality is lower and the medium is often platform defined(social media engagement is now a major component of audience building), but as a creator you have a gamut of choices to stitch together into some business - often one that bypasses gatekeepers. While blockbusters still exist, they're "hollowed out" because most of their good ideas have to be borrowed now.
The actual market for the content only became bigger to the extent that we can saturate our eyeballs.
> music, as the author points out. Kpop popularity in the west is probably a big example, but also artists getting famous on SoundCloud.
Kpop is manufactured to formula by record labels and is being aggressively marketed worldwide. It is very big business and increasingly mainstream. It is analogous to 'blockbuster movies', demonstrating the consolidation of content providers and world interests. Soundcloud artists on the other hand are very long tail.
This is a good example of the dichotomy I see going on. The long tail is still alive and well, but there's a bit of consolidation in the traditional media industries, Hollywood, the big music labels, AAA games, etc. While, self publishing platforms like YouTube, SoundCloud, Patreon, Steam, etc. are where the long tail thrives.
I feel the same: the long tail is there but it's too long, so it becomes very thin. There are A LOT more content creatores today than 10 or 20 years ago.
This is the reality. The tail is much longer and thinner.
I get the feeling that the author is mourning the great late 20th century counterculture movements. They are worth missing as they did produce a ton of creativity, but the thing is that there were never many of them.
There were maybe a dozen tops: hippies, hip hop, goth, rave, punk, a few smaller or shorter lived ones.
Today there are thousands. There is no identifiable counterculture because there are too many to count and they are always popping up and dying off. I guess you could say there is one counterculture and it’s the long tail itself.
As usual William Gibson, the single most prophetic sci-fi writer, got the feel of it (but not the specifics):
“Summer in the Sprawl, the mall crowds swaying like wind blown grass, a field of flesh shot through with sudden eddies of need and gratification.” - William Gibson, Neuromancer
There’s a dozen more quotes like that. That’s the first one that came to mind.
There are tons of examples of it:
- music, as the author points out. Kpop popularity in the west is probably a big example, but also artists getting famous on SoundCloud.
- video games are another place where there are a ton of indie studios doing their thing. The other day there was a post about Zachtronics.
- Books, we've seen several self publishing success stories on Kindle and others. Amazon claims more and more people are making over $50K on KDP.
- products, we see tons of success on Kickstarter and similar places. Pebble or Remarkable are two examples that come to mind.
My take, maybe counter to the author, is that the long tail is there but it's huge, but any individual thing - product, game, etc - seems small, unless it's a hit in which case it's not the tail anymore.