Opinion: Chris Anderson says the success of Pirates II doesn't contradict his Long Tail thesis, but some critics aren't so sure. 
"If you don't know Keira Knightly, she's basically a slightly more mannish version of Orlando Bloom."
-- askaninja.comPirates of the Caribbean broke the all-time opening weekend box office record this weekend, hauling in $132M and eclipsing the previous record of $114M, held by Spider-Man. That's a whole lotta greenbacks for one movie.
Also last week, John Cassidy
reviewed Chris Anderson's new book,
The Long Tail, in the New Yorker. For those of you who haven't made the pilgrimage to Wired's
pages or Anderson's
blog, a large part of the Long Tail argument focuses on the decline of movies like Pirates of the Caribbean. As niche media outlets proliferate online, consumers will be less and less willing to lay down their dollars for blockbuster movies. Or, as Anderson writes, "The primary effect of the long tail is to shift our taste towards niches."
So does Pirates' success contradict Anderson's thesis? Anderson, of course, says no. He composed a
post noting that total box office receipts are still down 4% from 2004 (only 3% when you correct for inflation and population growth). Pirates might be a big hit, but Superman hasn't done so well. Hollywood is still losing money.
But Cassidy's review urges us to take another look at Anderson's argument, especially at the idea that our demand for blockbusters will decrease over time.
Cassidy notes that unlike the music industry, where none of the top 25 albums in American history have been released since 2000, seven of the ten all-time top-grossing films worldwide have come out
since that year: three "Lord of the Rings" movies, three "Harry Potter"
movies, and "Shrek 2." Both the "Da Vinci Code" and X-Men III" did well despite bad reviews. Movie blockbusters seem to be increasing in frequency, not decreasing.
Anderson himself says that he's always said that the Long Tail trend for movies will follow the trend in music. But couldn't it also be true that movie studios will remain committed to the success of the blockbuster, and that blockbusters will continue to do well even while other types of movies fare poorly at the box office? After all, the technology that makes niche media possible could also make mass experience more desirable. For instance, I didn't read the Da Vinci Code, but I saw the movie, if only because I wanted to see what all the fuss was about.
Cassidy makes this point well when he cites a
Columbia research study that demonstrated herding in music tastes. "Far from undermining this "network effect," the Internet strengthens it by providing instant communication and feedback," he writes.
If you happen to be an avid YouTube user, you see the same phenomenon. The most popular clips of the week and month are usually silly crap involving a 16-year-old girl and a webcam. These are the relative blockbusters of the online era. The more interesting stuff -- the niches within the niche world of YouTube -- is a lot harder to find. (My friend Jason at
the Publishing Spot says one of the best ways to demonstrate YouTube to someone is to ask them what they like, and then type that word into YouTube's search. Genius.)
As a discerning media consumer, I wouldn't mourn the passing of blockbusters in the least. I want Anderson to be right. But the reality may be that blockbusters will continue to succeed even as niche media proliferates. "A long-tail world doesn't threaten the whales or the minnows," writes Cassidy. "It
threatens those who cater to the neglected middle, such as writers of
"mid-list" fiction and producers of adult dramas."
Cassidy has one more criticism of Anderson's argument, but in this one, Cassidy is off the mark.
Cassidy notes that online media distribution is basically "dominated" by a few big businesses: eBay, MySpace, iTunes, Amazon, Netflix. Those are the brands the average consumer recognizes, those are the sites they visit. They don't know about hi5 or allofmp3.com or greencine.com or easyCinema.com.
"There's an ugly name for industries that are controlled by three or
four big firms: oligopolies," Cassidy writes, and then compares big Internet firms to the major broadcast networks, who used to control content distribution on the airwaves.
The problem with that argument, though, is that the networks were working with a finite resource: There are only 24 hours in the day during which to broadcast shows. iTunes, on the other hand, doesn't have a grid schedule for broadcast. They simply sell video that consumers can play whenever they want. And, what's more, adding video to their archive doesn't much affect their overhead costs. They don't control viewing like the networks at all. They control access to downloads.
The same goes for stores like Amazon. In previous years, Barnes & Noble essentially controlled mass market taste by saying "hey, these 60,000 titles we have in our store are the ones we think are going to sell well to a large demongraphic." Amazon, as Anderson notes, doesn't have to do that. They don't have a limited amount of shelf space because they dn't have any shelf space at all.
Besides, it's a well worn saw (and truism) that the Internet also dramatically lowers the economic barriers to market entry.
Unless you're getting into the search business, those barriers are getting lower every day.
Anderson's right: There is more choice now than ever before. But Cassidy is also right: competitive economics aren't going away. As long as people herd, there will be blockbusters in one form or the other.
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