Nobody Has the Answers

12.02.12 | mmommorpgpiracyIPfingerprintingfanbasecooptitionHBSharvard business schoolFrederick HuntsberryMark GillGoogle Youtube

This is what I learned at the Entertainment and Media Conference of 2012, put on by the Harvard Business School Entertainment and Media Club. Nobody has the answers. Everything costs a ton of money and while we may have data that clues us into consumer interests, most companies don’t yet know how to quickly analyze that data. But, even if they do, they then have to figure out how to harness the data to market well to either the masses or various focused demographics.

So here are some observations from a series of talks and panels on new media as it impacts the following markets: TV, Internet, Games, Movies, Music and Publishing.

1) The YouTube (Google) folks might call it experimenting. In my opinion, that means they are using the millions at their avail to test new models and ideas because they don’t really know what the industry will look like and what the model should be. Better yet, they and their competitors alike, probably don’t yet know how to market to consumers so they have to experiment- ie guestimate.

2) Everything is headed the way of the Hourglass theory. People kept talking about small and/or startup companies and huge companies making up most of the marketplace, at least in the near future. Meaning that in addition to the TV and film industries contracting as they navigate the new technology-fueled zeitgeist, the market may only allow huge survivers and bootstrappers.

Part of the struggle comes from industries trying to operate while morphing. For example, for some in film, it’s a case of transitioning to a new distribution medium so companies don’t ride the wave past obsolescence. Or as Millennium Films President Mark Gill said: “We are the new radio.” He did add, though, that there is a bright side — video on demand.

Paramount Pictures COO Frederick Huntsberry devoted his talk to the struggle studios face with online piracy, which could be costing studios about 20% of their annual revenue. The problem with rogue websites such as movieberry.com and cyberlockers like those at the center of a major legal case, is that most, according to Huntsberry, are located outside the U.S. (Russia), so the U.S. government can’t touch them.

3) What’s sexy at 25 is no longer sexy at 33. None of these sectors seem sexy to me. Not film, not publishing, not TV. Sure, I miss the swag, the fashionistas, the parties, but it’s probably OK I don’t get comped drinks three nights a week and being in science by day and immersed in technology at school makes me realize there’s more potential in those areas than the “sexy” ones. Content creation is hard, but what’s even harder is to monetize it. If there were any industry highlighted at the conference I’d choose to get into, it’d be online games. But, it doesn’t seem like there’s room for anyone beside money guys and developers.

I’ll leave the media management jobs for the young, hopeful, linear HBS ladies and gentlemen. For me, I’d rather take all the technology, science, and IP and business law classes I can and do something that will create jobs and products in healthcare and technology. But, my biggest goal will be to create a startup that will appeal to moms working outside the home. My ultimate goal or challenge will be: can we have a positive triple bottom line while creating opportunities that will help our employees achieve balanced lives?

I’ll close with the buzz words and phrases of the day.

Fear * Cooptition * critical * piracy * social media * fingerprinting * fanbase * *Earned Media Value * MMO (massively multiplayer online game) vs. MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role playing game) * 

Babson: Semester Two

25.01.12 | dataapplegoogleAmazoncloudcloud computingAlaska airlinesebscohbshbrharvard business schoolbabsonmba

I just started my second semester of graduate school at Babson. I waited until I was really ready to apply to an MBA program, until I wanted it only for me and not for my parents, for my employer, or for society. And now I have to say I love it. It feels like hope and education and fuel to me.

My econ professor apparently jokes that people go to HBS for the name and they come to Babson to learn. Still I derive joy from trolling the EBSCO database for pearls from HBR and I have to toot my own horn because HBR included a company I’d been thinking about while on holiday — Alaska Airlines (AA). I was fascinated by the fact that AA offers healthy food onboard and has its flight attendants collect all recyclables, which is more than I can say for Sir Richard Branson’s airline Virgin, despite the billionaire’s talk about fostering the search for renewable energy sources.

Alaska Airlines, though was mentioned in a different light in the Jan/Feb 2012 HBR piece entitled Creating Sustainable Performance, which notes that around 2000 AA was lagging so they decided to do something about. To oversimplify, they made the shocking decision to launch a plan that partially involved- wait for it - seeking input and suggestions from their employees and actually letting them act on those suggestions.

Today in class, though, one main message was that marketing is all about pleasing the customer and that marketing  = company strategy, apart from its various other definitions. But one point that came up that echoed one of last semester’s main messages was that one of the driving forces in big technology business these days is data. Amazon, Apple, and Google are all after consumer interests and we give up our consumer interests when we give them our virginity data.