Chris Anderson's "The Long Tail"

Chris Anderson, editor of Wired Magazine, has a new book, "The Long Tail," in which he discusses, you guessed it, the long tail.  He masterfully describes in great detail the mechanisms at work, changing our consumption habits, and further segmenting us, not by geography, age or skin color, but by our common interests.  Chris says:

"Instead of the office watercooler, which crosses cultural boundaries as only the random assortment of personalities found in the workplace can, we're increasingly forming our own tribes, groups bound together more by affinity and shared interests than by default broadcast schedules.  These days our watercoolers are increasingly virtual-there are many different ones, and the people who gather around them are self-selected.  We are turning from a mass market back into a niche nation, defined now not by our geography but by our interest."

The long tail is essentially the relationship between the hits, and everything else.  Hits have the biggest sales, and everything else, much smaller.  The top 100 hits individually might far outsell the rest, but the increasingly abundant tail provides a huge profit center when sales are combined.

This is shown in the graph below

But now, we're seeing a shift from the top 100 (the head) and more power and profits to the tail (everything else).  Although, Chris shows off some technical chops in the book, I'll leave it to you to read the book for further explanation.

The real power in this book is more from a cultural standpoint, rather than a purely economic one.  As we see companies like Netflix, Amazon, Itunes, etc. extend the tail further and further, the hits get less impactful.  As the tail gets longer, the tools of production get less expensive, and the filters that help us search the tail get better, we can see this shift happening.

It's happening on our television sets, our computers, our supermarkets, and our theaters.  As the Internet grows, it allows us to have, as Chris says "the Paradise of Choice" and the means by which to find the things that interest us most, no matter the producer.  It's an increasingly decentralized version of the media power structure that's falling apart today.  As Chris puts it:

"Every time a new technology enables more choice, whether it's the VCR or the Internet, consumers clamor for it.  Choice is simply what we want and, apparently, what we've always wanted."

This is a must read for anyone proclaiming the successes of new media, and both technically and rhetorically brings to light how we have been and will be affected by our new digital landscape, and the explosion of the niche,

Now, if you have an interest in the book, I will very web2.0ishly be offering to pass it right along down the line.   The first one to post a comment or send me an email gets the book, and I'll have it shipped out to you on Wednesday.

Any takers?

Buy the Book.

Comments

[peterpappas]

As an educational consultant I see the impact of the Long Tail in our schools. Teachers who used to dominate the information flow are fighting for a declining “market share” of their students’ brains.

Students are used to controlling the flow of information in their lives. They can get what they want, when they want to - store it, catalogue it, alter it, and share it. What “market share” of student attention do our schools still retain? When students walked in the door this fall, did they feel more like they’re going back in time or into their futures?

We need to bring this movement into our schools rather than compete with it for the attention of our students. After all, I’ll bet our students are more concerned about their MySpace rankings than their school’s “adequate yearly progress” on state tests.

A recent report by the Center on Education Policy entitled “Is NCLB Narrowing the Curriculum?” notes that since the passage of the NCLB, 71 percent of the nation's 15,000 school districts have reduced the hours of instructional time spent on history, music and other subjects to make more time for reading/language arts and/or math. Twenty-seven percent of the districts reported reduced instructional time in social studies. Twenty-two reported cuts in science and twenty percent reported similar cuts in art /music. I guess the thinking is - if a subject is not tested, why teach it? Or perhaps they think that reading, writing and 'rithmetic can only happen in English or math class.

Of course these shifts in instruction fall most heavily on low performing students. As if being a struggling learner is not punishment enough, increasing numbers are pulled out of classes that offer hands-on learning and outlets for their creativity. What awaits them is likely “drill and kill’ that doesn’t sound like much fun for students or their teachers. Daily reading, writing and application of math should be common to every class. Let music students explore the mathematical elements of rhythm and then journal what they had learned.

Educational decision makers haven’t got the news that new technologies have spawned an explosion in creativity that could be harnessed to engage and support learners. They could take a lesson from the folks in Hollywood who are using innovative techniques to shore up the declining youth film audience. New Line Cinema is tapping into the creativity of their audience to promote their new film “Take the Lead” starring Antonio Banderas as a professional dancer who volunteers to teach NYC school kids all the moves.

The “Take the Lead” website includes a do-it-yourself music video maker. The viewer gets to select from a variety of images and sound styles and create their own movie trailer. They can enter it to win free stuff – like iPods. More importantly to the filmmakers - viewers can email their digital “mash-up” to friends to show off their emerging skills a music video auteur. Viral marketing at work.

Smothering struggling readers with remedial classes isn’t the answer. Instead educators might want to talk with designers of the “Take the Lead” music video maker. They said, “the goal is to encourage consumers to make a proactive decision to engage with the content… You can’t force-feed younger movie goers with traditional top down advertising…it’s all about giving these kids our trailers, our songs and letting them take control… our assets become their assets and that’s how they become fans of the movie.” Going Unconventional to Market Movies, NY Times 4.6.06

Glad to see that someone knows that engagement beats drill and kill.

For more thought on the subject check my blog “Copy/ Paste - Dedicated to relinquishing responsibility for learning to the students” http://peterpappas.blogs.com/

[Paul McEnany]

Peter-

I totally agree here. There is a growing obsession with testing and only teaching that which can be tested. Balance in the arts, as well as language and math disciplines will be necessary in the future, when creativity plays a much bigger role in deciding success.

Keep fighting!