Sunday Times Reading: Convergence & Millennials

David Card | January 22, 2006, 01:23 PM

Regular readers know I occasionally mock the NY Times, especially for its Internet coverage -- you only hurt the ones you love -- but today it features not one but two sensible, interesting stories on new media.

Under an execrable headline, Richard Siklos profiles with the appropriate skepticism two companies at the forefront of what defines convergence these days. Decisionmark is trying to help local stations impose themselves on Internet TV. Warning: potential DRM "lock down 20th century business models" disaster looming. Meanwhile, startup Spot Runner is offering a very low-end -- but also low-cost -- spot TV ad network. (Google, Bueller, anyone?) But how much inventory do they have?

Tom Zeller, jr., goes a bit overboard on the media habits of millennials (doesn't he know anyone who's not in media or marketing to interview?). But there are lots of good nuggets, and more proof that the 18-49 audience is a media crutch that itself can be crippling. A crisp explanation of demographic reality:

The eldest of the millennials, as those born between 1980 and 2000 are sometimes called, are now in their early to mid-20's. By 2010, they will outnumber both baby boomers and Gen-X'ers among those 18 to 49 - the crucial consumers for all kinds of businesses, from automakers and clothing companies to Hollywood, record labels and the news media.

Good sense from a market researcher:

"We think that the single largest differentiator in this generation from previous generations is the social network that is people's lives, the part of it that technology enables," said Jack McKenzie, a senior vice president at Frank N. Magid Associates, a market research and consulting firm specializing in the news media and entertainment industries.

"What's hard to measure, and what we're trying to measure," Mr. McKenzie continued, "is the impact of groupthink, of group mentality, and the tendency of what we might call the democratization of social interaction and how that changes this generation's relationship with almost everything they come in contact with."

And this should help define what modern media companies do:

"Say, if I haven't read what's going on every day, things are so interconnected, you might not know what everyone's talking about," (one millennial woman) said. "It's like, if you don't check your e-mail and you turn off your phone, it's almost like you don't exist."

Somebody has to create what everyone talks about. And facilitate the talking.