According to Matthew Garrahan of Financial Times, the number of people subscribing to US cable television services has suffered its biggest decline in 30 years as younger, tech-savvy viewers lead an exodus to web-based operations, such as Hulu and Netflix.
I’m not sure the implications of this are staggering, because (a) we saw it coming, and (b) the diversification of advertising to different mediums is already underway. Let’s start with the first point – the music industry was the guinea pig that suffered the digital experiment first. When online music hit, it fundamentally changed the music industry. Gone were albums – gone were mega labels that could do no wrong – and gone was the power of Billboard charts to drive ancillary parts of the industry (like radio). My personal opinion is that it was the mp3 player – not online music – that changed everything. When the player itself became small and cool looking (and easy to operate), then people really embraced online music. Sure, the tech savvy people had already made the switch – but not my Mom and Dad. Now my Mom (who has NO sense of technology) uses an iPod.
Associate Creative Director at bloomfield knoble
