“The current agency model, producing marketing programs built around 30 second television ads, is no longer relevant for today’s business environment” Tony Palmer, Chief Marketing Officer for Kimberly Clark

“Today almost every business and social activity is a form of media. An increasing proportion of our social interactions happen across media channels”
Ross Dawson, Chairman of Future Exploration Network

“We will spend our marketing funds where the consumer will be and that is changing rapidly”
Craig Herbison, General Manager, Brand and Communication for Vodafone Australia

The quote from me is taken from the introduction to our Future of Media Report 2008, which has been getting a fantastic amount of attention globally since its launch in July.

I have spoken and written before about how media is beginning to encompass almost everything in the economy (for example in my speech on Enterprise 2.0 at KMWorld in Silicon Valley last year). I think it’s worth reviewing the first paragraph of the Future of Media Report 2008 below. I believe this view is central to how media, business, and society will unfold over coming years.

We are entering the media economy. The traditional boundaries of the media and entertainment industry have become meaningless. Today almost every business and social activity is a form of media. An increasing proportion of our social interactions happen across media channels. Every organization is now a media entity, engaged in creating and disseminating messages among its staff, customers, and partners to achieve business objectives. As the physical economy becomes marginalized and economic value becomes centered on the virtual, media encompasses almost everything.

The Department of Innovation, Industry and Regional Development in the Australian state of Victoria recently commissioned an independent review of the screen industry in the state, which goes through to a proposed vision for the future of the industry in the state. Beyond this specific initiatives will be established. The review was performed by consulting firm Nous Group, and I was an ‘Expert Advisor’ on the review. The Screen Industy value chain (as below) on page 14 of the report was developed based on some of my thinking, including my Future of Media Strategic Framework.

The Victorian Screen Industry Review can be downloaded, and makes for some very interesting reading.

Below is a summary of the key trends identified in the report across sectors, followed by five key issues raised by the report.

Back in March I was interviewed by the ABC's Media Report program about Google and Microsoft's bid for Yahoo! at the time. While some of the interview topics are a bit dated now, much of it is still relevant, including my description of Google's role in the media landscape. I'll expand on this in another post soon.

You can read the transcript on the ABC site and below (note that there are some errors in the transcript).

Antony Funnell: Now let's stay with search engines for a little bit longer, and look at the business manoeuvrings of some of the big players. Google last week announced it's beefing up its presence in Australia with a new headquarters, and it's seeking to grow in a whole range of areas. It's also announced that it's successfully acquired internet advertising firm DoubleClick.

Meanwhile, in another online universe, Microsoft appears to be still actively stalking the second-tier search engine company Yahoo. What's it all about? Well let's ask Ross Dawson. Ross is a communication strategy consultant and chairman of the Future Exploration Network.

Ross Dawson: It's important to understand that Google is not just a search engine, and that it is in fact, more than anything else, an aggregator of advertising. What it does is it goes to advertisers and says, 'We can present information about you, not just on our own search engine, but also on many, many other websites'.

My interview is below. You can also read it and the other interviews by going to the magazine from the link above - my interview is on page 30.

Further context on some of my comments is available from the Seven Driving Forces of Media and Creating the Future of Advertising.

What does the ongoing consolidation In the industry mean for marketers?

The first thing to understand is that the most powerful broad trend in media is fragmentation and while mass media remains, it is becoming a smaller and smaller proportion of the overall media landscape. So within that context, what we see is that there is consolidation within particular segments and in some of the larger players. We have seen more and more cross media ownership as regulation has eased. One of the implications for marketers is that they are increasingly being offered media packages across different segments from the same owner. This is obviously not a new trend, but as we get more and more cross media ownership, more and more marketers are being presented with these offers to access an audience through a multiplicity of different channels. From a marketers or media buyer perspective , these can only be judged on their individual merits. It really needs to be driven by the media buyer as to what is the appropriate set of media channels to reach their audience with the right message, and that may or may not tally with what is being offered by some of the larger media owners.

Participants in this conversation were:

Some of the discussion around the table follows ...

Definition of Social Media

NFP and Community Social Networks

Hope that gives you some insight into some of the thoughts that were discussed by a table-full of passionate and interested observers and participants in this very interesting time we find ourselves in!

Digg, StumbleUpon, del.icio.us, and other tools allow us to recommend content to the world at large. But recommendations are far more valuable if they are specific to the person and context. The best way to disseminate these recommendations is through our social networks, if we happen to spend time there. So social networks can become a platform for the collaborative filtering of content, giving individuals the benefit of their network’s judgment and access to information.

In this context, the announcement today by New York Times and LinkedIn of a way of providing custom content and recommendations to their network is a landmark. Over the next few years this integration of social networks and content will rapidly evolve to be a very important part of the landscape.

To start off here are some of the most interesting blog posts on the Summit. There are some fantastic ideas and insights in these, so well worth a read. In no particular order :

Stephen Collins: What will the future of media look like?, including the ‘artificial split’ between journalism and new media

Chris Bishops: Monetising future content: business models as traditional content models break down.

JD Lasica: Takeaways from Future of Media Summit, including the ‘Great Decoupling’ and media as ‘Distraction Machine’

Phil Morle: A Future for TV: The Collaborative Crowd - the future is (crudely) present

Seth Yates: Comprehensive Future of Media Summary including notes on all the panels

Jay Cross: review of Future of Media Summit, including the US future of journalism panel

Stilgherrian: Note to “old media: journalists: adapt or stfu!
(Same post at Crikey with different comment stream)

Jonathan Este: Bloggers: the biggest whingers since journalists (Response to Stilgherrian, originally posted on Crikey and reposted on Stilgherrian's blog with comments)

Brad Howarth: Live from Future of Media Summit Part 1, Live from Future of Media Summit Part 2, Live from Future of Media Summit Part 3 - detailed insights and commentary

Craig Wilson: review of the Future of Media Summit, including discussion of the Twitter backchannel at the event

Gavin Heaton: review of future of Media Summit: the future of media is PARTICIPATION

Alex Gibson: compilation of ideas and annotations from the event Twitter stream

Kathy Drasky: live blogging and commentary from the Future of Media Summit in Silicon Valley

Gordon Whitehead: Future of Media: Opportunity or Train Wreck – believing in opportunities

Also be sure to see the initial review of social media commentary on the Future of Media Summit. Since then, additional posts on the Future of Media Summit blog include two additional summaries of discussions on Participant Roundtables on the Sydney side:

Media and social networks Roundtable
Shifts in the advertising industry Roundtable

Moderated by Jim McNamara.
We were asked to think about the word “social” with regards to social networks – since the networks were used for many more things than just social interaction.
What about calling them community networks for instance? A group like Advance, meant to link the Australian diaspora around the world used it as a means of business, while Financial institutions used the networks for business interaction.

Also, since there are so many uses for social networks, should they be classified under the generic term of ‘media”?

One of the key points about the networks was that they used ‘trust’ and word of mouth, based on the user being empowered. Rather like an Irish pub, said someone, an example of a social and communications network and also a place for distribution of material.

There was discussion about misterminology about the words social networks – since after all they were mediated – so were they not just another form of media?

Or have social networks morphed into another and different form of media altogether?
Depends on your point of view, said one participant: it’s a generational thing. Older people would use them to push agendas, whereas younger people used them more for communications and social purposed.

The definition is irrelevant, said another: whatever you want to call it – you are a target audience to the advertiser. Not so, was the reply, since the advantage of Web 2.0 was the ability to talk back and interact. It gives participants a voice.

There was talk about traditional media being ‘closed media’, in the sense the audience was told what to look at, whereas social networks were ‘open media’.

Should we therefore, said the moderator, be thinking about a term such as ‘emergent’ media as it was still developing.

The conversation moved on to the issue of the audience as content generators and the day of the citizen journalist .

We agreed on the core concepts of social media as being: Open/interactive/participatory

We then turned to history and reviewed the fact that there used to be the marketplace and the forum in a village society, which allowed for participatory contact and interaction. Mass media had in fact taken away from people the ability to talk to one another. “We’re back to the global town hall meeting and the world as a village”.

Final Key points to consider:

Information vs communication
Enabling
Interative
Peer to peer influences at work
Social for engagement rather than just to be cosial

And so, does this now make social media a mainstream concept?

Marketers changing focus on CPC, wanting more action.
Underlying metrics: Different publishers have different spins. Some
emphasise engagement, UB's, PI's, CPM, etc.
Yahoo! Gateway - performance display, connection between offline and
online. On back of TV commercial - "Search on Yahoo for XYZ"
Much greater fragmentation, unbundling. Takes longer to buy media.
Instead of 5 calls, now it takes dozens.
Agency commission gone in the last 10 years for most, but agencies
starting to charge "consulting fee" to claw this back.
Online consolidating to representation (e.g., "networks")
Clients saying they want to do innovation for sake of innovation ("I
want to do an online ad", vs focussing on the message and target)
Agencies often having independent "strategy units" to tie together
different media types
Media agencies currently unskilled at doing the cross-media planning.
Many set up a "new media" division. Clients don't want that, they
want a media plan.
Influx of hedge fund skills into media buying. Think of them as asset
managers vs agencies.
Demand for data and analytics increasing rapidly.
Can we design our sites for larger screen sizes? Are those people in
a more valuable demographic?
"Free will win, but it will come at a cost" - Nicholas Wong, SBS

First stopping point has to be the Future of Media Summit Blog, where participants have been busily posting all day, notably:

Participant roundtables in Sydney:
Mobile Media and Content
Future of Media and Television

Flow Economy/ Media Strategy Workshop in Silicon Valley:
Yahoo!
CBS

Reviews of panel discussions:
Global Media Strategies – 1
Global Media Strategies – 2
CEO Panel – 1
CEO Panel – 2
Future of TV and video – by Mark Pesce 1
Future of TV and video – by Mark Pesce 2
Future of Privacy and Targeted Advertising
Future of Journalism (Sydney)

Unconference sessions:
New Media – 1
New Media – 2

Twitter comments:
See the Summize search for Twitters with the #fom08 tag – literally hundreds of Twitters from attendees at the Future of Media Summit (which included a Twitter 101 session during the Unconference session in Sydney).

Live video:
The Ustream video from Phil Morle

All this will give you a good feel for the event from the perspective of participants. I'll provide some of my thoughts soon.

In previous years the Summit blog has continued to be active for quite a while after the event as discussions continue online - hopefully this will be the case this year too! Subscribe to the blog to keep up with the conversation.

- Is consumer a dead word? It implies that they are passive
- Does the same content player work for all audiences?
- Participants drive
o Content
o Format
o Delivery
- Segmentation – not age but levels of interaction / media usage
- Content
o What you want, when you want it
- Progression of people
o Media literacy/interfaces
o Demanding short attention spans of people
- As quality increases peoples standards go up
- Production quality not important on a 2x2 screen
o Versus relevance quality
- Advertising – selling a product through need or desire
-
- Content
o Interaction vs experience
o Peer recognition
o Sharing value with others
- Technology
o MID – Mobile Internet Device
- Cheaper – increases penetration
• Fundamental change in internet demographics
- Variable content by device
o Quality of the idea
o People are not necessarily looking for production quality (time, relevance immediacy)

- Funding notes
o Selling product vs trafficking
o Traditional model – aggregate – very little mass appeal content
- We can’t make all of the good stuff free – public sponsorship
- Wider distraction channels
o Audience distribution / greater reach
o What is the measure of sources and how can discussion be monetise / the value recognised

Consumer
Generational difference
"Consumer" is a dead word (implies passive) > changed to participants, but not every participant is active
Does the same content player work for all audiences?
Participants drive: content, format, delivery
- Differences for different cultures
- Participants drive the creation of niches
Segmentation: Not age but levels of interaction/media usage; how much time do they have
Progression of people - how does it change the formats people are looking for
- demanding short attention spans
- media literacy/simplification of interfaces
- unleash untapped potential in audiences
- transferred knowledge
Segment by need vs product segment

Content
what you want, when you want it, how you want it, how you will make it
- production quality vs. relevance quality
As quality goes up, peoples standards go up
Production quality not important @ 2x2 screen. Therefore, free/grass roots content acceptable
Need content - what is it people really want?
- information vs. experience
- peer recognition
Variable content by device
- Quality of the idea
- People are not necessarily looking for production quality but time, relevance, immediacy (e.g. happy to view grainy footage of the Gulf War that has basically been filmed on a mobile phone)

Funding models
Selling product vs trading traffic
Traditional model - aggregate eyeballs
- BUT very little mass appeal content (hard to create content that appeals to everybody)
How do you fund content?
Community supported content models (e.g. Wikipedia) - make value judgement about what's important then voluntarily contribute to support it
Reality is we can't make all the good stuff free (Australian film industry) > public sponsorship
- Implications for creating a "user choice" model
Wider distribution channels
- audience distribution/greater reach
- leverage this idea to divide content up and sell it in different ways
What is the measure of success and how can success be monetised/the value recognised
- Multiple forms

Technology
MID - Mobile Internet Device
Cheaper - increases penetration, fundamental in changing internet demographics (i.e. currently the most people on the internet are English-speaking Westerners, but predictions are that this will change)

Belinda Rowe (Zenith Optimedia)
- Optimist at heart
- Get tired of discussion around whether mainstream media will survive - most of the big media companies have moved into the digital space and are using this to enhance their customer relationships

Angelos Frangopoulos (Australian News Channel)
- Don't see any option other than to grow
- A case of embracing as many opportunities as you can
- Digital since 1996
- Fanastic future for mainstream media because we are all diversifying - those who don't embrace change will suffer

Wendy Hogan (CNET)
- CBS integration
- Contrary to last session, CNET employee a significant number of just for web journalists, who are allowed to blog if they like!
- Different payment models for how you recognise the contribution of people
- Inviting the audience to participate is a method people are using to bring their production costs down
- Give bloggers the opportunity to be seen by audiences

Mark Scott (ABC)
- Positive picture for ABC - recognise they are a good content creator
- Deliver content to audience at a time they want in a format they want
- Advantages for ABC: has a lot of content and don't need to execute that in a model that makes money
- Business model relies on getting a big cheque from the Commonwealth Government, by showing they deliver unique content to Australians

Australian media landscape is distinctive
- Urbanisation, distribution of population
What will make Australian media landscape distinctive in the future?
- Global boundaries that have already been strong are broken down - Aus consumer can engage with content from all around the world
- It will be harder for media companies than when there were far fewer content providers. Who will be able to financially deliver content created in local communities and delivered to local communities?
- Access to 24 hour content from countries all around the world - challenge for mainstream media is about being more and more relevant to local markets. What is unique about us compared with operator overseas?
- Australia has successfully exported content overseas (e.g Neighbours, Home & Away). Opportunity for Australia to produce more content to export, technology can pave the way - need investment in broadband for this to happen efficiently and easily
- CNET: add content with a local context to a site that already exists (e.g. Game Spot - need to tweek Grand Theft Auto for Australian players). Deliver contextually relevant ads too. It's all about putting decisions back in audience's hands regarding content and where they want to read/view it
- ABC: how to find a program that is intrinsically Australian? The real challenge for Aus program makers not that the global market is open to Aus content, but that the global market is available for audience here to see, but you still have to make your money back from the audience here as well - i.e. it's not about selling Australian content overseas.
- No doubt that online will be a big distribution mechanism - more and more people will watch traditional TV content online. How do you monetise it? No one wants to buy/watch pre-rolls? CNET says there's a big drop off from pre-roll to video content, especially for 30 sec pre-rolls

Media channels will be increasing age fragmented
- Teenage audiences using social networking to share content experiences (e.g. MySpace page for Jamie from Summer Heights High)
- Younger audiences are more personalised and selective about what content they consume, they are more content loyal rather than channel loyal (i.e. content is channel agnostic)
- Advent of data