the audience is up to something
I’ve enjoyed being on panels for the last few years throwing around words like ‘disintermediation’ trying to describe the effect that a whole generation of kids and teens are having on the music and media industries. Back in 1998 when I was running the Los Angeles office of EMusic.com I witnessed the onslaught of Napster and the free downloading of music files first hand and watched helplessly as it devalued the company literally overnight. You don’t forget that kind of stuff quickly. Yet the media and music industries didn’t seem to take note as if they were somehow above it all. They acted rather like Senator Joseph Lieberman is acting now after being challenged for his Senate seat. He was like a rabbit in the headlights and is now scrambling to win the primary which was his for the taking not too long ago. This video which has been posted on YouTube.com is presented as if it’s a trailer for a horror movie where unwitting humans have somehow been programmed to ignore ‘normal’ interaction with the media world, but nothing could be farther from the truth; they are acting under their own volition. The Audience Is Up To Something is more of a horror movie trailer than most companies would like to believe; it’s not just a movie. Another title could have been “A Hard Rain’s Gonna Fall.”