Anderson’s “Free” starts out by giving us a quick economics briefing, using that as backdrop to defend the notion of ‘free’.  He explains that, for instance, traditional, or old media has used a third-party advertising model to earn revenue while still providing a “free” product.  I may not pay for 30 Rock, but when I buy products advertised during commercial breaks on TV or in interstitials on Hulu, I am still giving my money to NBC.  It’s pretty basic and has worked for Google, a benevolent empire that has largely amassed their wealth through selling advertising and diversifying revenue streams.  Of course, the model isn’t absolutely identical – the web magnifies things by presenting opportunities to apply wisdom gleaned from specific metrics and target users with relevant advertising, as well as ways of satisfying niches with long tail services – but the principle is the same: subsidize one product (free content) with money made from another (paid ad space).  Multiply and diversify.

With the notion of one product funding the other in mind, I further illustrate the point by explaining how I helped inadvertently save ABC, Monday Night Football, and the Disney company in 2004.  Maybe.  Or not.  But keep reading!  I think you’ll enjoy the reasoning anyways!

The popularity of Monday Night Football, or MNF, a free over-the-air product until 2006, has apparently soured since moving from ABC to cable’s ESPN in 2006.  In fact, this year MNF has seen a decline in viewers week over week.  Meanwhile, competitor NBC’s Sunday Night Football, or SNF, has quickly become the NFL’s showcase; during that same transition period in ’06 SNF bested the last year of ABC’s MNF by comparison.  In general, it would appear that on average more fans are watching SNF than MNF (and SNF is on the rise – although, it should be noted that MNF has set cable viewing records, though still not as high as when it was over-the-air).  MNF just isn’t the same juggernaut it used to be, and that’s also in part because, for the viewer, cable TV generally comes at some price as compared to free over-the-air broadcasting).  Truthfully, ESPN doesn’t reach as many households as ABC did or NBC currently does, but, in using a cross-subsidies model – some Andersonian and basic economic thinking – I have found an interesting way of explaining how Disney, who owns ABC and ESPN, is going to come out winner.  In this situation, ABC will be our free product and the eventual beneficiary of the move.

In 2006, when MNF jumped from ABC to ESPN, NBC saw an opportunity to shift NFL eyeballs from Monday to Sunday.  On the other hand, Disney was looking at the move as an opportunity to bolster its ESPN brand as well as develop their free product – ABC’s Monday night – with other shows targeting other demographics.  However, this internal counter-programming was still probably not going to make up for all the prestige Disney would be losing in bumping MNF to a cable network.  Nevertheless, as their plans to switch MNF’s channel were taking shape, Disney still had Al Michaels in it’s deck, the lead play-by-play announcer and respected voice of MNF telecasts up to that point.  Certainly ESPN’s iteration of MNF would benefit from having Michaels, but Michaels would wind up with NBC’s SNF during the transition instead.  But this was no accident or failure on Disney’s part, for, ever the synergists, they must have spotted a different way to cross-subsidize and recoup expected losses with Michaels not around for ESPN MNF.  Michaels became expendable.  Let’s quickly investigate why.

First, back up to fall 2004, when ABC saw MNF get its lowest rating for a game ever.  Yes, their free ad-supported product was losing money.  Big deal?  Well, back up a few more months.  During the summer of 2004, Disney’s video game unit, Buena Vista Games, started a Think Tank of college interns to devise concepts for new video games.  I was one of those interns, a senior at USC.  One of the concepts we pitched, Epic Mickey, a recently announced game by Warren Spector and Junction Point that’s expected to reinvigorate the character Mickey Mouse and hopefully make him relevant to a whole new generation, was just coming together under the direction of game developer Chris Takami and others.  During our think-tanking we came across the character of Oswald, the Lucky Rabbit as we were looking for potential supporting characters to fit the story we concocted for the game. When we brought our ideas for Oswald to Chris Takami, he had some folks do some research and discover that Disney no longer held the rights to the character.  Oswald was Walt Disney’s first cartoon creation, but due to a financial dispute he wound up out of Disney’s hands and  in to the hands of Universal Pictures.  Of course, eventually Walt would craft Mickey Mouse and the rest is history, but this story doesn’t stop there.

Snap back to 2006, and The Walt Disney Company wants Oswald back from Universal in order to make Epic Mickey.  Why?  Disney CEO Bob Iger, perhaps betting that Epic Mickey will reap bounteous profits and reinvigorate a media franchise, subsequently subsidizing any long-term losses ABC and Disney might experience from MNF’s switch to ESPN, decides to trade Al Michaels to NBC Universal for Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.  Oswald was back home, and with the trade Disney has kickstarted a potentially lucrative video game venture, a mega franchise in the making (could there eventually be movies, books, and more based on Epic Mickey and Oswald? – as a progeny of George Lucas I sugggested as much for Epic Mickey when we pitched it, and Warren Spector has the same vision).  So, Disney cross-subsidizes ABC and synergistically creates new revenue with this trade, and in so doing they establish three revenue streams (new and free ABC Monday night primetime offerings, the Epic Mickey franchise, and the new ESPN MNF) where there was once only one, (free ABC MNF).  And it all starts with a bunch of interns, of which I was one.

If you think about it, as Anderson points out in ‘Free’, this is what Google does so well – they give away one free product (search) and sell another product (AdWords) to subsidize the free one while still earning a profit from other revenue streams, too (such as the freemium-based Google Apps).  ABC is free, but Disney collects revenue and then some to keep it going from other streams (selling on-air commercial time, selling games like Epic Mickey, charging cable systems to carry ESPN, and so forth).  Sure, it’s not the same as offering many high-quality free products at the same time the way Google does with free Gmail, free Google Search, and free Google Maps, all robust standalone products, but it does prove that if you diversify you can offer several very popular products for free or nearly free and still recoup and profit through other means.  Don’t believe me?  Just wait and watch how much attention they pour into promoting Epic Mickey, a game that will make oodles a pop (at whatever the typical Wii game going price will be when it’s released next year).  So, there you have it: Disney, like Google, diversifying and synergizing through new models.  You should do the same, because you must realize, as my friend Brook Elllingwood put it, that all companies are now media companies.  Step in to the 21st century and play by the same rules as the Googles, Facebooks, and Twitters of the world.

As an epilogue, I don’t actually know what went on in the room when Iger traded for Oswald (as a long-gone former intern by that point), and I’m sure there are eight gazillion other ways Disney prepared to handle the MNF move and ABC Monday losses – plus I’m not dense enough to not recognize that Disney makes plenty of money in other ways (theme parks, toys, etc).  But, they could have just bought Oswald back or found some other way of acquiring him.  Why Al Michaels?  Because Epic Mickey is going to be huge and fund rest of Disney’s free products, as well as help keep MNF on cable TV.

Here’s my white paper, in all it’s PDF glory.

What do you think?  Will watching YouTube and Hulu in the comfort of your living room be all that and a bag of chips?

Don’t worry, this will all make sense shortly.  Here are some slides to get you primed for this discussion…

Before coming to the UW MCDM, I worked in Los Angeles.  I was a another cog in the machine that we call the “entertainment industry”.  I spent the majority of my post-college years working for an interactive television company, originally known as GoldPocket Interactive (later purchased by Tandberg Television, which was subsequently acquired by Ericsson).  I was what you call an “Event Operator”, often just referred to as a “Master Control Operator“, a phrase powered from traditional TV broadcast operations.  Essentially, I ran interactive TV events.

During my free time between work-related tasks, and when systems were running smoothly, I also spent a lot of time on-line learning about the Internet’s varied cyberculture, specifically the idea of 1337.

Now, before I go more into 1337, let’s cover the issue of interactive TV.  As an MCO for GPI/TTV/Ericsson, I ran “trigger control” for executing and monitoring iTV systems.  The conceit behind iTV is simple: turn TV in to a two-way channel akin to the web.  When you interacted with your programming at home, you needed someone on the other end to talk to, basically.  No one was actually interacting with me though – it was all purely systemic.  I was just a button pusher.

iTV is a convergence technology.  It takes two previously unmarried mediums and blends them together to form a new communications method.  And, like so many new technologies, its path to widespread diffusion has been a tumultuous one.  The on-screen program guide from your cable or satellite TV provider is technically iTV, so in that light iTV has seen widespread adoption.  However, more advanced applications, at least in the US, are not yet widely deployed, with the exception perhaps of on-demand systems.

Perhaps for many users the marriage of their Internet connection and their TV is a strange concept.  Sure, the two are currently courting one another, but it seems that technologies like IPTV (TV over the Internet) are more likely to take hold once people actually even know they exist.  We’re stuck at step one of Rogers’ Innovation-Decision Process (Rogers, 1983).

Now before you say “What about Hulu or YouTube or fill-in-the-blank-site?”, let me clarify what we’re ideally aiming for here – a total blending of TV and web-browsing as a complete on-demand experience.  The set-top box (cable or satellite box, with its DVR and everything that goes with it) being wholly combined with the home PC in one solitary entertainment and computing device.  Watch any show, any time, blended with social media and a given show’s or content provider’s web presence, all seamlessly integrated.  A total experience.

Major questions abound, though.  How do businesses control their content?  How is this monetized?  How will it all work?  Like those who scratched their heads at Arizona State University in 1999 when they were trying to solve their problem of archiving digital records (Olsen, 1999), media conglomerates today need to know how everything is going to be recorded and measured and tracked, in perpetuity.  They’ve got dollars to follow.  This wouldn’t be a huge problem if digital piracy wasn’t a huge problem.

So, let’s get back to 1337 culture.  A culture exists on-line which is always one step ahead of the content providers and system manufacturers.  It’s called l33t, or 1337.  1337 is a numerological way of saying “leet”, meaning, elite.  By my estimation, 1337 is the true bedrock of future technology – nerds and gamers and programmers in their basements and in the labs of computer engineering schools hacking away at systems that will probably become everyday technologies for the rest of the world months or years down the road.  1337 has its own language, its own humor, and spawns the most fascinating movements on-line.  1337 culture is passionate about computing, games, entertainment, and the web.  1337 does everything first.  And 1337 is better than you.  Period.

Who is 1337?  Well, it’s not an organized body – it’s an incongruous culture, a way of life, it’s open source, and that so even when it’s profit-driven.  1337 finds a way to make things free.  Mark Zuckerburg was 1337 when he unveiled Facebook.  Biz Stone and Jack Dorsey were 1337 when they gave us Twitter.  Shawn Fanning was 1337 when he introduced Napster.  Pioneers are 1337.  Even memes, in their origination in the forums of sites like 4chan or FARK, are 1337.  Lolcats are basically the product of 1337 culture, because 1337 culture gets the joke before you do.

iTV, at least the way content providers would like to make it happen, is not 1337.  Christensen et al. postulate on newer communications technologies like VoIP, WiFi, and multiple-service operations (e.g. cable companies offering phone services, phone companies offering TV, etc.) in their book, Seeing What’s Next (2004).  These new technologies are disruptive technologies for big incumbent players like AT&T or TimeWarner.  iTV, on the other hand, is more of a sustaining innovation for comparably sized players in the content providing arena.  NBC, Fox, and CBS have jumped all over the likes of Hulu or TV.com.  They are becoming forced to do so because iTV is also a disruptor – it becomes 1337 when the general concept becomes recreated through piracy in the hands of the file-sharing, torrent downloading masses; 1337 can get what it wants on-demand for free.

For example, 1337 culture circumvents the advertising on Hulu (or bypasses such services when there’s a lack of desired content) when they so wish.  They pick up a show through places like the Pirate Bay.  1337 always finds a way to get what it wants, and that sets the precedent for the web.  To paraphrase John Gilmore, the net looks at any form of preventing a person from doing what they want to do and routes around it.  1337 doesn’t need the establishment.  1337 is open source.  1337 is free.  For every Vonage there’s a Skype.  For every Netflix there’s a torrent.

Perhaps Ben Bagdikian would be upset with this thievery.  Like when he decried the moral depravity of American television in Media Monopoly (1997), he might witness this underground culture of hackers and hooligans today and cry moral depravity once more.  But, he might also notice a generation of people empowering themselves and taking control of their media in a democratic way.  1337 isn’t about hurting others, though they often do things “for the lolz“; 1337 culture is about sharing the things people like with one another.

Just like this elite web culture’s ability to circumvent every blockade to accomplish this sharing, the power of the web to instantly gratify is potent.  On-demand video is quickly becoming a supervening social necessity, so much so that old-school TV carriers now offer web content on-demand (more on supervening social necessities can be found in Winston’s Media, Technology and Society, 1998).

For the dating crowd, to share just one example, Comcast in Seattle provides video personals through their on-demand services (Mapes, 2008).  Maybe this is a feeble attempt to tackle the on-line dating circuit, though.  Having one service, compared to the boundless amount of dating services and sites already on-line, is almost laughable.  Nonetheless, providers want to play the on-demand game.  They’re desperate to beat down the 1337 entrants.  But, 1337 is ahead of the curve.  They already answer pay services like eHarmony with free personals on OkCupid.

1337 may not always be moral, but 1337 happens.  Lidwien van de Wijngaert and Harry Bouwman surveyed a slew of college kids in their 2008 study of locally available wireless file-sharing and asked the question: would people share their stuff if everyone could easily connect via WiFi or similar technology in a localized area in order to do so?  The answer was generally ‘yes’, at least amidst same genders and in situations where trust has been established and all parties mutually benefit.  Of course they would.  1337 culture has been sharing with one another for mutual benefit for ages.  Torrent files are prime examples of this sharing mentality.  This sharing, again, has forced businesses to play by new rules, and is why we have sites like Hulu today.

But, what we’ve been talking about here is merely content, which is what most 1337 people really care about.  What good is the toy if you can’t play with it?  Convergence technology like IPTV needs convergence culture.  Henry Jenkins talks about convergence culture in his book, aptly titled Convergence Culture (2006).  In it, he discusses how convergence is creating new works of art through things like fan fiction and user-generated content.  But, convergence culture goes beyond just that – it incorporates the commodification of prior works of art in to new, mashed up pieces.  1337 doesn’t just share copyrighted material with one another – 1337 chops it up and creates new masterpieces sometimes.  This content not only re-popularizes people like Chuck Norris, it gives birth to the aforementioned lolcats.  (I suppose it has its pros and cons.)

In summary, if we don’t pay attention to 1337, we’ll miss the next big things.  1337 is where everything starts.  While old businesses seek to control through sustaining innovations like that found in iTV or other on-demand systems and communications technologies, the elite web culture finds ways to circumvent that control and make their own connections with others through the content that they share and love.  Some young programmer somewhere will always find a way to get through the wall.  He or she will tell the world, and then businesses will invariably have to work to catch up.

The Internet has given rise to this leet culture, and it’s never going away no matter how many barriers you stand up.  1337 yearns to be free, and that’s a desire no profit-driven corporation can overcome.

Prognosticators would be wise to watch 1337 culture, because the future is 1337.

References

Bagdikian, B. H. Afterword media monopoly bagdikian. Retrieved 2/20/2009, 2009, from http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media/Afterword_Bagdikian.html

BitTorrent (protocol) – wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BitTorrent_(protocol)

Christensen, C. M., Anthony, S. D., & Roth, E. A. (2004). Seeing what’s next : Using the theories of innovation to predict industry change. Boston: Harvard Business School Press. Retrieved from WorldCat

Chuck norris facts. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://www.chucknorrisfacts.com/

Cyberculture – wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_culture

Download music, movies, games, software! the pirate bay – the world’s largest BitTorrent tracker. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://thepiratebay.org/

Fan labor – wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fan_labor

Hulu – watch your favorites. anytime. for free. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://www.hulu.com/

IPTV – wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iptv

Jenkins, H. (2006). Convergence culture : Where old and new media collide. New York: New York University Press. Retrieved from WorldCat

John gilmore – wikiquote. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Gilmore

Leet – wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leet

Lolcat – wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lolcat

Master control – wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_control

OkCupid.com: Free online dating, online dating, dating, dating services, free dating services. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://www.okcupid.com/

Olsen, F. The chronicle: Daily news: 10/15/99 — 01. Retrieved 2/20/2009, 2009, from http://chronicle.com/free/99/10/99101501t.htm

Online personals watch: Bring your dream date home, digitally. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://www.onlinepersonalswatch.com/news/2008/01/bring-your-drea.html

Rogers, E. M. (1983). Diffusion of innovations. New York; London: Free Press ; Collier Macmillan. Retrieved from WorldCat

TANDBERG television : World leaders in video compression & digital systems – TANDBERG television. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://www.tandbergtv.com/default.ink

Urban dictionary: I did it for the lolz. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=i+did+it+for+the+lolz

van de Wijngaert, L., & Bouwman, H. (2009). Would you share? predicting the potential use of a new technology. Telematics and Informatics, 26(1), 85-102. doi:DOI: 10.1016/j.tele.2008.01.002

Winston, B. (1998). Media technology and society : A history : From the telegraph to the internet. London; New York: Routledge. Retrieved from WorldCat

YouTube – the bittorrent song. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN1D5jJAHTs

YTMND – catcher in the rye. Retrieved 2/24/2009, 2009, from http://holdencaulfield.ytmnd.com/

]]> http://nerdacumen.com/discussion-the-future-is-1337/2009/02/24/feed/ 8 http://nerdacumen.com/reading-reflections-the-ethics-of-the-future/2009/02/21/ http://nerdacumen.com/reading-reflections-the-ethics-of-the-future/2009/02/21/#comments Sun, 22 Feb 2009 01:14:04 +0000 Matthew Stringer http://nerdacumen.com/?p=272

Monty Python cartoon: Television is Bad for Your Eyes

Why is technology always viewed so negatively?  And why is the future always bleak?  Why does it feel like the future-thinking theorists and prognosticators of the late 20th century as well as the present day always seem to be pointing out how present technoproblems automatically mean future pains?

In 1997, Ben Bagdikian (and I’m sure many others like him – I’m looking at you, Tipper Gore) decried the moral depravity of mass media.  Bagdikian, in his afterword to Media Monopoly, examined the most powerful medium of the day, American television, and saw an unregulated space without a moral compass, destined to inevitably lead the nation’s unwitting people astray.

In 1999, information administrators at Arizona State University were struggling with the question: how do we archive important digital records, when deletion and turnover are so rampant?  Unlike paper records of the past, permanent storage of digital records was presenting new challenges.  How would future generations access older digital records as technology and storage media invariably advanced?  Or, in other words, how far backwards will “backward’s compatibility” reach?

Lastly, in 2003, Christensen et al.’s Seeing What’s Next looked at how new communications innovations like VoIP, multiple-service operations (MSOs), and WiFi were already beginning to present problems for standard telecoms.  Chapter 10 of the book considered how established incumbent businesses might want to embrace these new technologies and co-opt disruptive startups – a logical assumption, considering how new technologies could displace older ones, which has never happened in the whole of human history (yes, this is my added sarcasm).  Now, to be fair, they present ways in which entrants to the telecom game, with new toys like VoIP or Instant Messaging, can beat the big dogs at their own game.  Nevertheless, the problems larger providers like Verizon or AT&T face from new entrants fit into the “figure it out or its curtains” motif.

I agree that there is something to all of these clarion calls.  American TV has been a moral wasteland at least since cable’s introduction, if not earlier.  And problems with digital recordkeeping?  The Bush administration “lost” a heck of a lot of official emails through the last eight years.  And in terms of trouble in the tech world, Christensen et al. basically predicted in 2003 that MSOs like Comcast, offering phone services via coaxial cable, and Verizon, rolling out fiber-optic television, would begin spending gads of money to beat each other to death at the others’ games, all for only marginal returns.

So, here we are, in the future itself, but I’m not sure things are as bad as previously predicted.  Sure, even I am guilty of accusing Google of becoming the predecessor of SkyNet in my Neuromancer review, but then there’s merely interesting speculation and then there’s more interesting reality.

For example, Bagdikian talks about how the TV medium was out of control because of a lack of government regulation.  He also points out how calls for regulation are always met with cries of “socialism”.  NHK works in Japan, the BBC in the UK, so why can’t we have something like that here in the states?  If only Bagdikian had considered the Internet.  As far as I am concerned, the masses are responding to all that vapid and immoral televisual thought-control by turning off their TVs and logging-in to a world-wide semiotic democracy.  The true morality of free speech, stemming from the people and not the government, is now winning a fight against regulation.  How ironic!

In terms of record keeping, I am certain many of the problems presented by archiving digital records will correct themselves with the help of a few hardcore computer nerds plugging away in the basements of the very institutions faced with those problems.  As for backwards compatibility, well, the future will just need digital anthropologists.  Maybe.

And, as a former Interactive Television broadcast operator, I welcome the battles of the MSOs.  Convergence is the future.  Integrated hardware solutions will provide solutions for disintegrated software problems, and vice versa.  And entrants like Vonage have their own problems to deal with when free services like Skype rear their beautiful heads.

The future is not bleak.  It’s full of exciting problems!  And hordes of empowered “basement dwelling nerds” like me who will assuredly find solutions that businesses and governments never ever think of.  They might control the pipes, but we control the water.

Until then, here’s Coldcut’s 2006 techno track “Everthing is Under Control“.  Yes, but only for now.

References

Bagdikian, B. H. Afterword media monopoly bagdikian. Retrieved 2/20/2009, 2009, from http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media/Afterword_Bagdikian.html

Christensen, C. M., Anthony, S. D., & Roth, E. A. (2004). Seeing what’s next : Using the theories of innovation to predict industry change. Boston: Harvard Business School Press. Retrieved from WorldCat

Olsen, F. The chronicle: Daily news: 10/15/99 — 01. Retrieved 2/20/2009, 2009, from http://chronicle.com/free/99/10/99101501t.htm

YouTube – coldcut – everything is under control. Retrieved 2/21/2009, 2009, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrQcOmpbkCs

YouTube – television is bad for your eyes. Retrieved 2/21/2009, 2009, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXCpYgd338U

]]> http://nerdacumen.com/reading-reflections-the-ethics-of-the-future/2009/02/21/feed/ 0 http://nerdacumen.com/inspiration-storytelling-and-the-importance-of-old-media/2009/02/03/ http://nerdacumen.com/inspiration-storytelling-and-the-importance-of-old-media/2009/02/03/#comments Wed, 04 Feb 2009 01:27:42 +0000 Matthew Stringer http://nerdacumen.com/?p=225 Though we exist in a time of great media upheaval, where the Internet has made available so much story for so little effort, millions are still drawn to long-form traditional narratives.  We still go to the cinema, the bookstore, the concert, the play, the big game, the event.  Though so much power can be packed into a media snack – a tweet, a blog post, a text message, a sentence, a word, or even an acronym (LMAO anyone?) – we still sit down for super-sized media meals.  Something must be inspiring us to pull up that chair and sup from the old media table.  Inspiration seems to be the answer.  What is the importance of inspiration to storytelling?  In our digital world – full of bombardment from massive narrative abstraction and fragmentation, where so much story content is being communicated in so many bits and bytes and packets like bullets from a fiber-optic Gatling gun – we still find time to stick the old media morphine drip in.  This happens when we do something so archaic as watch an hour-long drama on network television, spend nine innings at the baseball stadium, or, gasp, read an entire Harry Potter book cover-to-cover.

Joseph Campbell, were he writing this, would probably say that we go to the ‘big show’ for inspiration: to experience the empowering psychological effect of transitional tales – stories about people, heroes really, who must pass from one state of being into another in order to achieve some necessary purpose and become something greater.  I believe we all want to experience this change within ourselves in one form or another.  These inspirational experiences highlight the societal and personal hunger for renewal, for a resurrection of all things truly important: progress, learning, joy, improvement, happiness.  I don’t think people are predisposed to simply decay – we always want more, better, different, and great, whether good or bad (as per the eye of the beholder).  Consider this from Joe Lambert’s Digital Storytelling Cookbook:

Why [are resurrection tales] so powerful? On one level, we all have to wake up in the morning and choose to go on — to resurrect ourselves in the face of fate and circumstance, the memory of loss and almost unbearable struggle, and our own sense of weakness and vulnerability. The  stories we are drawn to, that resonate in our direct emotional need, in general, are those that give us a reason to make that decision to go forward. They inspire us. The very word inspire, in its archaic sense, means to breath again. Stories encourage us to take one more breath, to swim up to the surface, above our despair, and live.

We dine on long-form stories despite living in a short-attention-span, digital, impersonal world. We do this, I believe, because we want to connect to characters that are becoming something greater. Why? Because we all want to be greater than we are. If it were not so, well, there wouldn’t be much point to anything. Participating in short-form media storytelling, be it tweeting or blogging or Facebook wall posting, or anything else we might do with social media, indeed generates a large, if not abstract, collective human narrative, but it also makes us subconsciously grateful for traditional narratives. How else does a film like The Dark Knight, or a media franchise like Mamma Mia!, or the sagas surrounding the winning team at the NCAA Final Four, and so on… how do they each continue to remain viable financially and culturally, despite the increasingly ubiquitous presence of the Web and it’s instant-satisfaction aesthetic? Simple: inspiration. Inspiration might come in a small dose, even in a gesture, but those stories that take work are the ones we seem to look to the most, and that is why some parts of old media will never go away. We’ll find ways, and content producers and providers MUST find ways, to keep everybody at the dinner table.