BigShinyThing

Yes, slow news and the heat getting to journalists’ brains means that it’s time to put together lists of the most influential/cool/powerful people in media. Folks in advertising and TV will be frantically scanning the Mediaguardian 100 — in particular for leads, mates, or (most importantly) themselves. Meanwhile, BigShinyThing was delighted to have got a namecheck on our friend Lisa Devaney’s renegade list on BrandRepublic which was MUCH more interesting than the Mediaguardian’s (natch). Also worthy of note is The Hospital Club’s Top 100 which is sooo alternative and cool you have to be a member to read it. (Full disclosure: we write for The Hospital Club’s site.)

Now this is not just a pat piece about our mates (honest). There is — as The Hospital contends — a new world order upon us, and one in which the old heirarchies no longer apply. It’s very sweet and retro of newspapers to ply us with the Mediaguardian Power List and Observer journalists’ idea of what stands for ‘cool’ but we don’t have to listen to them any more. Besides, old media has always been obsessed with glorifying those who have already made it — those cronies who are already ‘in the club’. We’re much more interested in the renegades, the iconoclasts, the innovators… Generation Next. Some of them have been paid lip service — drag artist extraordinaire Jonny Woo gets a namecheck in the Observer cool list — but we suspect that’s just print journalists trying to look ‘with it’.

No, the new power networks are defined by all of us and not by them. And influence is no longer a numbers game dictated by salary, age, employees, readership, viewership … all of that is blown. The true influencers now exist in a long tail of cohorts: the clubkids, knitting circles, flash mobsters, gamers, bloggers, weirdos, geeks, freaks, kids … whatever. For instance, within the perfomance art cohort, Lisa Lee’s Underconstruction night has quietly helped launch the career of many a star of the current Performance Art explosion. And in street art, stencil originator Blek le Rat is finally getting his dues. And those are just in BST’s little corner of the world.

With Generation Next, their influence is obvious: it’s in the clubs, in social media, on the bus, on the street… where it matters.

Recently we were discussing Wikipedia’s anti-business bias: Wikipedians tend to find businesses ‘not notable’ and often dismiss entries about them as them as ‘advertising’. Whilst it is admirable to root out the many articles on Wikipedia which are barely-disguised pat pieces, just because Wikipedians don’t find business interesting doesn’t mean it isn’t. It’s as if the resurgence of the long tail has become its own kind of snobbery — a land where the entry for Anna Nicole Smith can stretch to several pages but where entries about famous businesses get deleted.

A similar debate has been going on on Cute Overload. Put simply: do possums make the cut? A Wiki ‘delete war’ can stretch out for weeks and hundreds of empassioned postings. Cute Overload — understanding the nature of social media, and therefore its community, opened and closed the debate within the space of two posts:

People, it’s tough at Cute O headquarters. We can never decide if possums are cute, or just horribly evil. (There is a fine line, and otters LOVE to jump back and forth across that line, taunting! always taunting!)

But I digest. Check out this dewd with this anerable paws. Don’t look at his schnozzle or ears tho. OK, you can look at his schnozzle.

Rebecca M. claims:

• They RULE in the Moist Nosicle category.
• They have a thumb without a nail on their back feet.
• They have elaborate whiskers.
• Their ears are pink when they’re babies and turn black as they grow up.
• They CARRY LEAVES CURLED UP IN THEIR TAILS — Come ON!
• And let’s not forget they carry their babies in a pouch — North America’s only marsupial.

Wikipedants, take note. There should be a joke here about possums and long tails, but frankly we’ve got better things to be getting on with.

Mr Anderson explains:

Bottom line: even in Hollywood, the home of the blockbuster, hits are losing their power. It’s not nearly as dire as in music, but it’s trending in the same direction. Does this mean the end of movies? Not at all–there have never been more films made, just as there has never been more music available than today, despite the fact that the bestsellers sell less.

It’s not that people aren’t watching films and listening to music, it’s that they’re watching different films and different music–we’re just not following the herd to the same hits the way we used to. I’d guess that most of the decline in box office is due to the rise of the DVD, not a loss of interest in movies. Likewise for music, where the ubiquitous white earbuds suggest that music has never been a bigger part of our culture, despite the fact that CD sales are back to mid-90s levels.

Guess Tom Cruise should start looking for a new job.

Via boing boing.

Obvious really. As mass media becomes increasingly segmented (see The Long Tail), niche audiences can be pinpointed and sold to. So… create a TV channel for the super rich and target them. Plum TV is born, ‘delivering America’s most affluent and inflential audience’. According to Plum’s media pack:

Plum TV is a unique media vehicle that combines innovative local television programming, a highly targeted demographic, and an inventive approach to integrated/branded content not otherwise found in this medium.

Plum’s network of cable channels is broadcast in the Hamptons, Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard, Vail, and Aspen. Over the course of the seasons, over 6 million individuals come through these markets. Our audience comprises America’s most influential and affluent — CEOs, celebrities, media moguls, political powerbrokers, and tastemakers. Plum captures the distinct ambiance and local culture and provides an outlet for residents and locals alike who are emotionally connected to these beautiful places.

The full story is in Newsweek. Via Gawker.