Times they are a changing - part II
A recent issue of Britain's Financial Times (19 Jan 2007) carried more doom and gloom stories for the print media, citing in particular Time Inc's hefty staff cuts in editorial departments, affecting both Time and People magazine, in an effort to cut costs. Several other of the group's magazines have been put up for sale while there are new plans to move its better known brands to the internet.
A more convoluted story emerges for the Tribune Company, which owns amongst others, the Los Angeles Times and the illustrious Chicago Tribune newspapers. The company has been up for grabs for several months, but so far no one has come forward with an offer large enough to excite investors. Various proposals are on the discussion table from major stockholders and other interested parties but analysts do not appear enthusiastic; the whole can of worms seems to be yet another uncomfortable indicator for the future of newsprint.
A lot of print media industry captains are sure they are losing business to the internet hand over fist. The people who run Google are also sure of it, which is perhaps one of the reasons that company is planning to expand its highly successful search based advertising operation into display and t.v. advertising. There are doubters of course; many so called experts and analysts say Google will find it difficult to break into traditional mainstream business. But as today's 'weaned on the internet' younger customer generations get older and global accessibility expands, the larger percentage will stay with the technology. Give it another ten years and experts will be painting a different picture. For some, a decade is too far to think ahead, but if you are old enough to think back a similar period.... you can see where this is going; ten years isn't that long.
Where does this leave the 'different' picture, particularly for photographers, or, as they will no doubt be dubbed in the future along with all other cyberspace workers, 'content providers'. Older ones will be looking back to the 'good old days', when a by-line meant, if only momentarily, a fillip for the day ahead. Already we can see how that protocol was binned long ago by many stock houses and agencies. Those who are playing the game today at any level accept they will probably never be individually acknowledged and when you look at the kind of dross that is being peddled by royalty-free archives, I wonder who would want to be associated with it.
Aesthetic and emotional issues aside, the mathematical facts are clear for all who want to see. Royalty-free business models provide a way to drive down end user costs while ensuring the supplier maintains a virtually unassailable position on content licencing; small changes and end-user tweaks across the product board, just like a supermarket. And this is without mentioning the next episode, which will centre on the current hotly debated issue of orphan rights.
I wrote an article some years back supporting the notion that concerned photographers would never let the picture business ever get to the position it is now in; in effect a massive global industry of stock agency branded products. How wrong I was. How right Mr. Getty was in his estimate for the demand for images being analagous to a new 21st century oil business. How short sighted of me not to recognise the massive user potential of a world outside the traditional media boundaries. It's been a humbling experience watching and often nursing the after effects of fall-out from a war of attrition in which the major protagonists go around eating up the small guy.
One could shrug and say, 'it was ever thus.', but the circumstances of today are vastly different to the way they were in an easily memorable distant past. Today, a handful of super stock agencies make massive returns on vast volumes of image assets; individual content providers to those businesses however, make rather less. Overall, with the crushing of end user prices, there is a colossal revenue loss to the industry as whole in comparison to its historical earnings percentages, and a lot less loot available for those who want to remain independent. Today, it is all too depressingly easy to make an analogy here between the modern image business model and 19th century coal mining. The pit bosses then seemed hell bent on increasing production at the expense of its labour force, about whom it cared little and paid less.
Visitors, users and viewers of the foregoing content may copy and re-use it in other internet content sites on condition the source of all material so used is acknowledged with the attachment of the following.
Copyright; Jonathan Eastland
www.ajaxnetphoto.blogspot.com 2007.
www.ajaxnetphoto.com 2007.
This original content may be used in any print media made available for commercial resale.
The products and companies named in this website content are trademarks , registered trademarks or servicemarks of their respective owners or licensed users.
A more convoluted story emerges for the Tribune Company, which owns amongst others, the Los Angeles Times and the illustrious Chicago Tribune newspapers. The company has been up for grabs for several months, but so far no one has come forward with an offer large enough to excite investors. Various proposals are on the discussion table from major stockholders and other interested parties but analysts do not appear enthusiastic; the whole can of worms seems to be yet another uncomfortable indicator for the future of newsprint.
A lot of print media industry captains are sure they are losing business to the internet hand over fist. The people who run Google are also sure of it, which is perhaps one of the reasons that company is planning to expand its highly successful search based advertising operation into display and t.v. advertising. There are doubters of course; many so called experts and analysts say Google will find it difficult to break into traditional mainstream business. But as today's 'weaned on the internet' younger customer generations get older and global accessibility expands, the larger percentage will stay with the technology. Give it another ten years and experts will be painting a different picture. For some, a decade is too far to think ahead, but if you are old enough to think back a similar period.... you can see where this is going; ten years isn't that long.
Where does this leave the 'different' picture, particularly for photographers, or, as they will no doubt be dubbed in the future along with all other cyberspace workers, 'content providers'. Older ones will be looking back to the 'good old days', when a by-line meant, if only momentarily, a fillip for the day ahead. Already we can see how that protocol was binned long ago by many stock houses and agencies. Those who are playing the game today at any level accept they will probably never be individually acknowledged and when you look at the kind of dross that is being peddled by royalty-free archives, I wonder who would want to be associated with it.
Aesthetic and emotional issues aside, the mathematical facts are clear for all who want to see. Royalty-free business models provide a way to drive down end user costs while ensuring the supplier maintains a virtually unassailable position on content licencing; small changes and end-user tweaks across the product board, just like a supermarket. And this is without mentioning the next episode, which will centre on the current hotly debated issue of orphan rights.
I wrote an article some years back supporting the notion that concerned photographers would never let the picture business ever get to the position it is now in; in effect a massive global industry of stock agency branded products. How wrong I was. How right Mr. Getty was in his estimate for the demand for images being analagous to a new 21st century oil business. How short sighted of me not to recognise the massive user potential of a world outside the traditional media boundaries. It's been a humbling experience watching and often nursing the after effects of fall-out from a war of attrition in which the major protagonists go around eating up the small guy.
One could shrug and say, 'it was ever thus.', but the circumstances of today are vastly different to the way they were in an easily memorable distant past. Today, a handful of super stock agencies make massive returns on vast volumes of image assets; individual content providers to those businesses however, make rather less. Overall, with the crushing of end user prices, there is a colossal revenue loss to the industry as whole in comparison to its historical earnings percentages, and a lot less loot available for those who want to remain independent. Today, it is all too depressingly easy to make an analogy here between the modern image business model and 19th century coal mining. The pit bosses then seemed hell bent on increasing production at the expense of its labour force, about whom it cared little and paid less.
Visitors, users and viewers of the foregoing content may copy and re-use it in other internet content sites on condition the source of all material so used is acknowledged with the attachment of the following.
Copyright; Jonathan Eastland
www.ajaxnetphoto.blogspot.com 2007.
www.ajaxnetphoto.com 2007.
This original content may be used in any print media made available for commercial resale.
The products and companies named in this website content are trademarks , registered trademarks or servicemarks of their respective owners or licensed users.
Labels: Photography, Print media
posted by Ajax at 21.1.07
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