(If you've already read this post, just skip to the UPDATE at the BOTTOM.)
What is the Warshaw Curve? (Or, perhaps more to the point: Why?)
Well, the modestly named Warshaw Curve is two things:
First, it's a pattern of content consumption. More specifically, it's the contrast between two different patterns of video content consumption: a contrast between how all of us used to consume video content in the fading world of scheduled "traditional media," and how more and more of us now enjoy video in the ever-growing, on-demand and interactive world.
It's a concept I started noodling around with a couple of months ago,
and recently started showing to a few friends who work in various
corners of the media industry.
(Usually I'd tentatively bring it up at the end of a conversation
about something else entirely, I would draw the curves on the back of a
piece of paper or napkin, sketchily put forth the idea and ask my
companions for their thoughts. During one particularly fruitful
conversation, Andrew Heyward dubbed it, "The Warshaw Curve." And,
honestly, who am I to argue with Mr. Heyward?)
Below is the curve for TV News and Entertainment.
(Click on the images to enlarge them.)
So, what's the significance of the Curve?
I'm still noodling with that — but almost all the folks I've showed
it to agree that, unlike Gertrude Stein's opinion of the city of
Oakland, there's at least some there, there. Or, more to the
point, in the words of Stephen Stills: "There's something happening
here. What it is ain't exactly clear."
But the pattern is real, and I do think it tells us something about
the direction in which content consumption is heading — and that has a
good deal of significance for content producers, programmers and
distributors.
(I'll posit some of the details in future posts.)
Which finally brings us to the second thing that is "The Warshaw Curve"; i.e. this blog:
More than just a place to post my musings on the curve, this blog is a place where I hope others will post their responses, thoughts and challenges. A place to think collaboratively along some of the tangents of the curve. It's also a place where I'll be posting some examples of other trends that I've been encountering, and even some interviews with folks who work and play on various slopes along the curve.
So, here goes nothing.
Or, just maybe, something……………?
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.
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UPDATE: "Disruptive Selection"
In
May of 2009, I peaked over the shoulder of my 15 year-old biology (and
"House") obsessed daughter as she was studying evolution, and I
discovered the below:
(Click on the images to enlarge them.)
The curve on the bottom-right looks pretty familiar, doesn't it?
Makes
sense that The Warshaw Curve, which is about the effect of disruptive
technologies — like video on demand, YouTube, et al — would match up
with what biologists refer to as the curve for "Disruptive Selection."
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Offhand, it looks to me like there’s a serious discrepancy between what people want to watch and what they are given to watch. Or perhaps when choices are nearly unlimited, one cannot funnel people’s interests through narrow channels of content.
interesting and provocative!
perhaps you could explain the first curve a bit more, though.
where do network news, Fox News and CNN fall — on the skinny, right end, or in the big fat middle?
what about the morning shows? are they in the skinny end or the fat middle?
I’d ask the same thing about primetime broadcast and cable shows and the second graph — are you saying that ER, CSI, the NFL, etc. are all in the skinny right end?
It will be intriguing to see how the evolving usgae of mobile devices such as cell phones and improving mobile access on those devices to video content and premium services, fits this model. Intuitively, I think it will. It will really depend on the UI. Currently, the mobile UI requires to many clcks to get to what I want. However, this will improve, and watching the curve over the next year could prove interesting
Interesting, do you have any data to support the curve? Also, does high-end constitute a specific type of content or a particular adherence to quality by its creators? I look forward to some more posts.
(Note from DW: Donna Molesworth is the better part of the Molesworth team
Just a thought, in light of both the explosion in cellular phone cameras, and the “uncensored” Saddam execution video that has subsequently hit the internet/cable stations etc.:
What springs to my mind is how rapidly the networks are now going to have to face the fact that they are no longer in the powerful position of making decisions for the world at large, on what they deem, (in their infinite wisdom,) appropriate or not appropriate information for the viewing public.
Had it not been for the concealed phone camera being smuggled in, the world may well have thought Saddam’s execution was handled in a somewhat dignified manner. Hardly. For good or bad, we now have definitive proof what exactly occurred as opposed to what the Iraqi gov’t. tried to spin. Regardless of what folks may think of Saddam’s execution, it makes a stunning statement.
So much of what we are fed by the networks is only half a story, if that. With all the new technological advances, both in the high end and low end markets, I think you are dead on with your broad perspective on content.
(Note from DW: Mark Molesworth one of the very best cameraman/DP’s that I’ve had the pleasure to work with.)
One thought that came to mind was how the recent trend in documentaries has been to give young people small video cameras and have them go out and make documentaries. This trend had its good and mostly bad points:
Now that HD is here to stay the demand for much higher production value documentaries is going to rise as the quality needed on any proper HD monitor calls for high production value and careful, professional production practices. In other words, the trend towards low end is now turning to more high end even though budgets for companies like the BBC have gone down, companies like PBS want better cameras and better photography so that films can hold up on Channel 13 HD.
The next Frontline I’m shooting is with my new Panasonic HDX900 a revolutionary camera in many ways. The BBC will have to team up with Discovery and History Channel to budget for these types of shoots.
Interesting. I’m with you on the two ends but skeptical about the middle. My gut tells me you aren’t dealing with “local news” correctly, and/or online delivery of local news is an explosion waiting to happen. Google and Yahoo are certainly gearing up for this.
I am put in mind of this by what happened here in NYC yesterday morning: the “gas smell” that was pervasive all over the city.
My attention was first drawn to this by a Reuters or AP headline I saw on my home Yahoo page. I remarked to myself how unusual it was to see a “local” story on a national/global wireservice’s top stories and stay there all day despite the fact that the smell had been determined to be nothing dangerous. I went to http://www.ny1.com and http://www.1010wins.com, and remarked to myself that it’s not as easy as it ought to be to get local news online. This is going to change. Even then, people access news (in general) very frequently online.
Here’s a little homework assignment for you: see if you can find stats on online news pageviews (let’s say Yahoo, AOL, MSN, maybe a couple of news-specific sites like CNN and MSNBC) vs. YouTube clip views per day/week/month. It is not quite an apples-to-apples comparison but it could be interesting.
I’m curious why local news is the only thing in the middle…is the purpose of the exercise to understand how local news specifically changes in a DVR world?
Daisy: in this one case, i’ve used the curve to illustrate both news content (noted in red below the graph) and entertainment (noted in blue).
In the case of news i’m saying “high-end” (right-side) content is the news magazines, with 60-Minutes being the gold standard; low-end is home videos. (Though more and more people are editing and really “producing” stuff, the far end is really low-production-value stuff.
MOST local news content sits in the middle. But the specifics of what this means for the sort of news local stations should be focusing on are something I’ll be writing about in a bit.
Looking forward to the specifics!
The proliferation of technology enabled consumer generated content tracks closely with the growth of open source collaboration and Wiki’s, so the macro trend goes beyond media. Ultimately the evaluation of media may be determined by relative social impact. Saddam’s last minutes, Allen’s macaca fumble and Michael Richard’s rant were certainly “low end’, but had extremely high social impact.
Hi Doug, thanks for circulating this. It is very interesting.
I would like a little clarification regarding the metric for grading content from “low end” to “high end”. Is it the amount of time and money spent on the production? perhaps I missed this.
this leads to some confusion I have about what belongs where on the Warshaw Curve. for example, why does “sampling” (I assume you mean some form of channel surfing) belong in the middle?
I am also not sure that this sort of viewing is in decline. With thousand-channel digital cable, I do more channel surfing than ever. You can always find something at least mildly interesting to watch, and I tend to do this for about 90 minutes when I get home at night, usually pretty late.
A lot of where I end up after this “sampling” is perhaps what you might describe as high end content — Discovery, or History Channel, or one of the Times channels, or BBC News or CCTV news, or Knicks replays. (MSG has a brilliant innovation this year, “Knicks in 60″, a Readers Digest condensation of a Knicks game.) but I usually don’t watch the whole show. I bet a lot of other people are doing the same thing.
Also, I am not entirely sure that the actual viewership for local news has gone down, if NY1 and similar all-local channels are included. Remember, they are broadcasting local news 24 hours a day, so you have to factor that it. You now have people watching local news at 1 AM.