No excuse for Dan Gilbert to join Cubs at White House
June 29, 2017To bunt or not to bunt, it doesn’t matter much: Between Innings
June 29, 2017Although the Indians had an interesting few days, no new championships for the City of Cleveland. But, while we’re waiting…
It was another depressing week in the world of the media of the futureeeeeee. (You have to say “futureeeeeee” as if it’s being shouted from the bottom of a cave in outer space to properly connote the fear, uncertainty, and sense of doom felt by all reckoning with “new” media.) After ESPN’s recent expulsion of talent not long ago, FOX followed it up by scuttling its writing staff in favor of pointless videos packaged around its brand of bad opinions, and MTV axed a collection of superb writers including Brian Phillips, one of my favorite writers on the interweb.1 Awful Announcing had a depressing but thorough look at the grand vision at Fox.
I had an impassioned diatribe prepared, but it’s hard to go on a rant about the illiteration2 of America without sounding like tool. So here are some thoughts in no particular order.
- Videos are fine. Despite my parents best and admirable efforts, I was practically raised by television. I would bad-mouth the Red Cross before I spoke ill of TV. But when I’m digesting information, including anything analytical, argumentative, or opinionated, I prefer reading. I love reading. A sports website that’s all videos sounds like a kinky brand of torture to me. I’m not the only one who thinks this.
- In many ways, aren’t we dogs chasing after an invisible tennis ball? If this is all about generating advertising revenue, how has advertising not become sophisticated enough to value different consumers differently? Not all eyeballs are equal. If my $100 in advertising is going to get my product in front of 10 14-year-olds willing to read a 4000-word exposé on the Flint water crisis or 100 14-year-olds who give a shit what Chris Broussard thinks about LaVar Ball’s WWE appearance, I want the 10 14-year-olds reading the exposé. This myopic view seems to go beyond advertising and media, and indicative of a broader societal failure. But advertisers pump fake, and media outlets go chasing a ball that isn’t there.
- Isn’t the eventual destination a dynamic pricing model based around micro-transactions? I might pay five cents to find out from Buzzfeed which Hogwarts house from Harry Potter I’d be sorted into (Hufflepuff, obviously), but I’d happily pay $2 to read an investigative report from the Washington Post on my lunch break. For the outlets I visit semi-daily and read regularly, I’d pay $20-$100 a year, depending on what it is. How can Clash of Clans figure this out, but the collective genius of the media cannot? Who’s going to solve this revenue model, and when is Jeff Bezos going to do it?
- Jamie Horowitz’s strategy at Fox (detailed in the Awful Announcing link above) seems to be packaging a bunch of content around the Fox “branded” personalities, whose opinions are generally bad and generate interest by virtue of being ill-informed. The plan is taking the already bad reaction to something (anything really), and then making a video or article reacting to that reaction, like pyramid scheme of crap. It reminds me of the thinking behind collateralized debt obligations, where a bank takes a bunch of shitty mortgages, and packages them together in the hope that a certain percentage of the shitty mortgages pay off (in Fox’s case, go viral), turning a mountain of shitty assets into one worthwhile investment. Which is a nice strategy and all, except when it bankrupts the world economy like it did in 2008 when all those mortgages turned out to be even shittier than initially thought.3
- I know we live in a shareholder’s world, but doesn’t anyone do anything anymore just because they think it’s better, not because it’ll make Q3 profits .15 percent higher?
- I saw a lot of noise yesterday about how the maximum number of words readers are willing to read is 1000 or maybe even six. As I’ve probably written about 15 posts that are less than 1000 words, I just wanted to share that this is terrible news for me personally.
- There is an FS2?!? I’ve never watched Fox’s FS1 network in my entire life except to watch a college football game (more often than not some C+ Pac-12 game that’s the only one left on TV). On Tuesday night on FS1, Gus Johnson was calling a televised basketball game between two teams called the Ghost Ballers and the 3 Headed Monsters. Kwame Brown was involved. And there is another Fox Sports channel that’s of lower prestige than that channel. Where is FS2 in my DirecTV package? Between ESPN: The Ocho and C-SPAN 11? Why on earth would I emulate any of the business tactics of a company that thought FS2 was a thing that needed to exist?
Your Calvin and Hobbes strip of the day. Me, every single day of the summer. Except replace “water” with “Scotch and soda.”
And now for the random 90s song of the day. TR90sSotD is Pink Floyd’s “Marooned,” as the Cavaliers are figuratively marooned without a general manager. The best song on 1994’s The Division Bell, “Marooned” is one of the few enduring songs from post-Roger Waters Floyd. I was fortunate enough to see Roger Waters live a few weeks ago, and to experience live many of the Floyd classics that I never thought I would have the opportunity to see irl.
Few stretches of albums compare to Floyd’s 70s run of Dark Side of the Moon-Wish You Were Here-Animals-The Wall, but there are a few worthwhile tunes in Floyd’s 90s catalogue, and the instrumental “Marooned” — with some incredible guitar work from David Gilmour — is one of them. The video4 has some cool space footage and a weird old guy running around an abandoned Cold War Era building in Eastern Europe? It’s about … humanity’s promise of traveling to space yet failure to prevent decay in our own neighborhoods? Or something like that.
- If you’re interested in sampling some of his work: Phillips on sumo wrestling for Grantland, Phillips on Roger Federer for the New York Times, Phillips on Area 51 for MTV, Phillips on a strange and beloved Russian animator. [↩]
- Not a word. [↩]
- And, as it turned out with the banks, by design. Which, also kind of seems to be the case with Fox. [↩]
- Which might be from 2014, when they reissued The Division Bell. [↩]
76 Comments
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Sorry in advance WFNY, but I literally never watch video on the sports sites I visit. In fact, here or anywhere (like SI), I hit the pause button on videos before I read.
Unless it’s a GoT trailer, I’m a reader.
I don’t bother pausing on here because I have already scrolled down and it is auto-mute. It is as if it never played.
I’m a reader as well. Unless it is a good GIF…
http://media0.giphy.com/media/H4jHcQwgP2A1i/giphy.gif
Reading a newspaper, magazine, or book is infinitely more pleasurable than reading a screen. The latter is too much like work, and I just don’t have the patience to scroll through more than a few paragraphs. Gimme that old-time readin’!
As for videos, I’ll watch a few, but too often I sit there waiting for the little circle to stop going around.
The Marooned vid is pretty good.
🙂
Bezos is probably not the guy you want to figure this out.
https://www.washingtonian.com/2017/06/27/the-washington-post-social-media-policy/
I really hate when they have the delayed auto play vids. The type that don’t start until you’re about halfway down the page.
Or the hidden vids. Tiny and mixed in with ads, so you have to look for them to shut them off.
Those ones that pop out from the side! Kill them with fire!
No need to apologize. I don’t watch videos either. Our videos are there solely because we need to be able to pay to keep this site on a server.
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Yes to all of this. Nothing worse than being halfway through an article when all of the sudden something comes flying out of your speakers at MAX VOLUME. Sometimes it seems like when I click a link to read an article, I spend my first three minutes there muting things, closing popups, getting rid of slide-in videos, etc. By the time I’m ready to finally read, I forgot why I wanted to read the article in the first place.
Apparently, you have been to Vox.
http://www.nasljerseys.com/images/2013Images/2013WFL/NFL/Browns%2076%20Road%20Paul%20Warfield.jpg
I went with the 60’s version.
So . . . are we all in agreement that everyone should have the right to commit suicide by strapping themselves onto missiles filled with depleted uranium (from widely proliferated nuclear power plants) headed directly toward Mars, Venus, the Sun, Syria, North Korea, Russia, or Israel, as the individual prefers? Because, I think that’s where we landed on yesterday’s WWW.
As long as we all have universal health care, what could possibly go wrong?
Good read (IMO) about the Division Bell including how Wright was not contractually part of Floyd at the time and Gilmore’s wife wrote some songs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Division_Bell
I’ve always liked “Coming back to life”. I’m seeing Roger Waters at the Verizon Center in DC this August! Cannot wait.
I thought he deserved two, for each era.
So unrelated, but LeBron is headed to Houston now next year, right? With Wade and Melo close behind? Is that how this works?
Well, the president would still be golfing.
I totally understand that. At first, it irritated me that WFNY was yoking itself to nobodies and giving these videos prime real estate while letting your outstanding content fall underneath quite subpar stuff, but as we’ve all become adept at scrolling and ignoring, it no longer bothers me. It’s like it’s not even there.
Might be my favorite photo of them all (except #86).
I liked #61.
And I used a version of #55 just for you.
Well, shoot. I was on vacation and missed both of them.
Rumor is, if Melo gets his buyout, he’s heading to the Cavs.
But yep, season after next is going to be the season of Team Banana Boat. Wherever that may be.
You have some work to do, then.
I’ll wait.
And #64 is an all-time classic.
Okay. Very nice. #61 was perfect, and anything with that particular #55 would have been great, but appreciate the nod to the Army. Almost makes me want to play THE gif, but it’s 13 days late. #64 and #69 were terrific.
https://uproxx.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/post-25893-ralph-wiggum-go-banana-gif-jynv.gif?w=650
Interesting thought about journalism/media adopting a microtransactions model. While I don’t know if we’re there yet, the younger generation seems much more willing to that kind of system. You mention gaming, a market driven by young males (aka as a prime demographic). Microtransactions dominate that economy, ridiculously so. Rockstar supposedly has made over $500M from them with GTA V (with profit margins that I have to imagine are absurd). In ten years, those kids are going to be in there 20’s and 30’s with decent incomes and extra money to spend. They’re also going to be conditioned to accept, perhaps expect, microtransactions in markets other than gaming.
(As an aside, the revolution that has gone on in the gaming industry is astounding. As someone who was part of that world then stepped away for a decade, I don’t think people truly grasp how greatly the landscape has changed – I’d argue mostly for the better. If I were a young entrepreneur, I would try to dissect the what, why, and how of that economy and try to duplicate it somewhere else.)
I saw the Division Bell show at Ohio Stadium in 1994.
Underrated album.
Lebron should go from franchise to franchise, winning every city a championship.
Am I the only one who doesn’t really see how the whole CP and Harden is going to work?
No, because it’s that the state doesn’t have the right to prevent people from committing suicide by strapping themselves onto missiles filled with
depleted uranium (from widely proliferated nuclear power plants) headed
directly toward Mars, Venus, the Sun, Syria, North Korea, Russia, or
Israel, as the individual prefers.
http://pbfcomics.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/PBF020-Skub.gif
Good point! Wait. I think. Maybe? We should probably just reset and do yesterday all over again.
Sometimes I type out a comment here, look at it, and think – what the hell did I just write? What does that mean? What’s my point? Then I post it anyway. That happened a lot yesterday.
Totally. Me, too. At some point in my life, I will take the best advice ever given to me: Think before you talk; talk less.
One day.
blonde, redhead, brunette
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Who told you about my writing process? I HAVE A PATENT!
Whenever I read how much some games earn, I’m floored. The ROI for the blockbuster games borders on the unimaginable – in the billions, if I’m not mistaken – which is why so much Hollywood production goes into some of them now, as many games are much safer bets for producers than blockbuster movies.
Every franchise except Golden State, Washington, Detroit, and the Knicks (just because)
I am notoriously a “one draft” writer. It has won me some accolades, and has gotten me into some trouble. I’m not proud of it, and yet I am.
My best writing comes about from me having an article floating through my head all day or for days (sometimes like the LeBron one even weeks) before I finally just let it all out in one big shot. When that happens, I usually don’t need too much editorial review going back on it.
If it is w/o that thought, I rarely get things correct the first time.
Well we gave WFNY some valuable clicks? We weren’t on the streets at the time committing crimes? And if it’s any consolidation, I tried to un Pavlov you at times! https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b10eef729a02ec86cb1df821054f3a529ea1fdf1cef65112bd3bd5408c17a2cd.gif
It’s all gold. Super important stuff we’re doing. Someday, say three hundred years from now, future people are going to be looking through these comments (really just ours specifically on WFNY) and finding valuable answers. I prefer to think we’re dropping valuable wisdom into a time capsule.
“at the time”
Critical caveat.
Also, I ask you, which dog is happier? The one that gets all of the treats, or the one that doesn’t even get the treat that his stupid master keeps waving over his head?
Here’s the thing there…
I love engagement articles like yesterday’s WWW and will continue to do them. But, our comment:page view ratio sucks. It is terrible. People backdoor through disqus or leave the page open. I do it too, so I’m not calling you out for it. Just noting that they are fun and needed to build community here, but they actually aren’t the big revenue click driver articles you might think they would be.
You guys are old. Young kids would have been mobile.
That’s just proletariat newspeak for “have personal incomes.” They may be mobile, but our cars are nicer. Too bad we never get to be in them.
Glad I left the page open so I could read this.
Guess you better start charging by the comment. [Looks at his 11914 comment total; re-thinks his life.]
Dude, it’s worse. Not only am I desktop, but I have only one monitor. The staff all has dual (and some 3 w laptops) and they laugh at me bc I don’t even know how to use theirs and navigate between screens. Just imagine how much more time I could waste on WFNY!