THOUGHT (aka Centric's Blog)

A funny thing happened on the way to the Centric ad network in Second Life—we discovered how truly hideous advertising can be.

We started out like a lot of people. Buy some spaces and get ready to put up billboards. But billboards in Second Life spin, fly, and sometimes even shout at you. And they cluster in huge numbers. They’re ugly and invasive, and they ruin the SL experience.

So we decided to do something about it. We’re buying ad spaces, putting them together, and building parks for everyone to enjoy. We’ve already built three, Eson(164, 222), Ilgop (132, 16) and Eson (120, 48).

At the same time, we’ve opened our office at Maui (208, 36). Again, we’re integrating with the environment, rather than living apart on our own private island. Feel free to drop by the office, use our park finder, or learn a little more about Centric. We’re working on some very interesting things for our clients in Second Life, and we look forward to sharing them with you.

Get in a time machine and go back twenty years. Ah, the brave old world of 1986. A world where, somewhere in the future, Max Headroom and Channel 23 ruled the airwaves, subject only to the beck and call of their most important advertiser, the ZikZak Corporation.

Seems quaint, doesn’t it?

I mean, where’s the internet? Where’s the voice of the customer, loudly complaining about the lack of good content on all the forums and review sites? Where are all the people with cellphones, taking their own video? Where is their world’s equivalent to YouTube, which broke the backs of the networks in bringing video online? Where are the social networks? How about crowdsourcing?

No, the future of the world of 1986 is a simple one, where the advertisers ruled and the consumer was a passive participant in the entertainment landscape. We all know how unrealistic that is now.

So what does that mean for television, as it makes the big switch to high-definition video? Will the networks tumble, to be replaced with user-generated content on YouTube, or will everyone switch to more interactive forms of entertainment, like Worlds of Warcraft?

In a word, neither.

(Yes, this is me, Jason Stoddard, resident futurist and science fiction writer. No aliens are controlling my mind.)

So, let me repeat that. What we know as “television” isn’t going away.

Here’s why: the need for compelling stories isn’t going to go away. The need for a relaxing form of entertainment isn’t going to disappear. Some researchers argue that the need to escape into a storyline is hardwired into the human brain. No amount of 1.5 minute Mentos videos is going to change that. The future of long-form content, delivered on a large screen, is bright.
But television, as we know it, will change quite a bit.

I’ve already weighed in on how Hollywood should be worrying about building a compelling UI and pricing model for downloads, rather than stressing about pirates. That’s because the first change is obvious. Television will become part of the internet, and the internet will become part of television. Both will become part of a seamless digital entertainment environment that includes long-form video content, websites, short-form video, games, and virtualities.

Eventually, all of these forms of entertainment will be delivered over the same “pipe.” Eventually, all local forms will be stored on a single home entertainment center, which will grow out of the media centers of today.

I’m already living this, by the way. Both my projection system and my downstairs “casual” system are fed by PCs, which talk to a central media server.

Another change, and the bad news for advertisers, is that people will stop tolerating ads in their long-form video. Period. Why should they, especially if they’re on a pay-for-play model?

And still another change is that both short- and long-form video from users and microproduction houses will become part of the entertainment landscape. The barriers are down. With free distribution, Chad Vader can capture as many eyeballs as Seinfeld.

So where are the opportunities?

Well, if I was an advertiser, I’d be looking at several things:

• Break into the home by cozying close to the major studios and networks’ show feeds. Personally, I’d stay far, far away from this. But I’m sure there’ll be plenty who try. I see 10s and 5s with “Sponsored by Warner Brothers and Wal-Mart” in the future.
• Make better ads! I’d start moving those 30s to entertaining forms that can stand on their own. People willingly watch good, funny commericals. “Good enough” ain’t.
• Tag short content. I’d also start moving a lot of the investment in 30s to single-frames for tagging short content. People accept ads there. Use the channel.
• Sponsor a “bar channel.” that aggregates local content from YouTube and feeds it into local bars. Sponsor contests. People love local stuff, and this gives you a chance to bring pub patrons something more interesting than most of the national channels.
• Get out of the big networks and studios. Sponsor microproduction, and have your product included in the production. Classic product placement, except you have a much bigger share of voice. Either that, or tag the resulting shorts with your ads.

The future of television? Don’t worry about it. Just expect it’ll be . . . well, stranger than you can ever imagine.

. . . until you have a conversation like I had today. We’re working on a project with an entertainment company in Second Life, and I had to do a few things: invite some new people to a group, deed some land to a group, etc. Problem was, the world was down.

So, talking to one of our developers, I actually got to use the line, “I can’t do it right now, they’re rebooting the world.”

And their response:

“That’s cool, but since you’re running out to a meeting this morning, can I be you for a while so I can get some things done?”